Chapter 252: Familiar

Hide lay on his side in the damp filth, his cheek pressed hard against the freezing floor.

The visitor's mocking words hung in the darkness, grating against his mind like glass shards.

"And you think you're better than me?" Hide snarled, his voice rough and wet with blood, spitting the words toward the shadowy partition. "Huh? Why don't you come around that wall, take these fucking cuffs off, and let's see what's up your ass!"

Silence settled over the room once more.

For several long seconds, the only sound was the faint ticking of the titanium device.

Then, from the hidden side of the concrete partition, a dry, dismissive snort echoed through the gloom.

"You are like a child right now," the raspy voice answered, completely devoid of anger or offense. The tone was flat, hollow, and terribly calm. "I have no interest in talking to a mindless, barking child. I will return later. You better not completely turn into one by then."

The metal legs of the chair scraped against the stone floor as the figure stood up.

"Wait! Who the hell are you?!" Hide yelled, straining his vocal cords as heavy footsteps began walking away. "Answer me!"

The footsteps halted just before the threshold of the iron door.

"Oh," the voice murmured, a strange, faint lilt coloring the rasp. "I am just someone you know."

CREEEAK... CLANG.

The heavy door groaned on its iron hinges, clicked shut, and locked with a mechanical thud.

Silence crashed down upon the room once again.

Hide's chest rose and fell in heavy, ragged wheezes. He stared unblinkingly at the empty darkness, his mind churning.

'Someone I know?'

Who? The voice was distorted—hoarse, dried-out, and unnatural—yet beneath that gravelly cadence, there had been a cadence of speech, a subtle rhythm that felt like he had heard it somewhere. Was it someone from the National Exterminator Agency? Someone from the Sihue clan? Or another ghost from the International Corporation working alongside Walter Bigiva?

He racked his exhausted brain, but the agonizing pressure in his temples made sustained thought nearly impossible.

Lying alone on the cold stone, Hide stared into the void. Time seemed to stretch into an endless crawl. Minutes turned into hours of dead silence.

His head throbbed with a blinding ache. His mouth tasted of dried blood and bile, his throat parched as if he had been swallowing sand. But worse than the physical pain was the hollow, gnawing void in his stomach. He was feeling hungry.

Then, a sudden realization struck him like a bolt of cold lightning.

'Zenith... Aegis...'

Why hadn't he called them?

When he had awakened, the crushing grief of Risa's death, the terrifying paralysis of his limbs, and the sudden silence of the system had thrown him into a blind, unthinking spiral of panic. He had assumed that because his active skills were locked and his mana channels were severed, he was entirely powerless.

'No,' Hide thought, his eyes narrowing in the dark. 'Phantoms are not skills.'

They were not active skills given by the system. They were autonomous entities forged from his Core, tethered directly to the immortal essence of his soul as the Dark Liege.

Hide closed his eyes, ignoring the pounding in his skull, and focused inward.

'Zenith. Aegis. Hear me.'

They did not appear immediately. There was no sudden eruption of dark mana beside him.

Hide didn't despair; instead, a grim, steady flame of hope ignited within his ribs. The fact that they didn't materialize instantly meant they had survived. They were out there in the physical world, separated from him by distance. But through the tether, he felt the faint, unmistakable resonance of two immense, loyal presences responding to his call.

Their Liege had spoken. They were coming.

CREEEAK.

The sound of the heavy iron door unlatching shattered the silence once more.

Hide's train of thought broke, and his body tensed as much as his paralyzed muscles would allow.

Footsteps approached from the corridor. But unlike the heavy, dragging tread of the man from before, these steps were light, delicate, and remarkably composed.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The door clicked shut. The visitor rounded the concrete partition, stepping into the open area.

Hide saw the person through the dark, thanks to his true sight.

His biological perception pierced through the gloom, outlining the figure in sharp detail. It was a young woman, slender and agile, dressed in dark. Her face concealed behind a smooth mask—devoid of painted designs, featuring only two narrow, oval slits cut out for her eyes.

She stopped three paces away, looking down at Hide's battered form lying in the pool of dried vomit.

Slowly, carefully, she knelt onto one knee. Reaching into an inner pouch of her vest, she pulled out a wrapped piece of bread and gently set it down on the clean patch of stone inches from Hide's face.

She stood back up, her hands clasping together in front of her waist.

"Just wait a little," she whispered, her voice trembling faintly with a quiet, desperate resolve. "I... I will get you out of here."

Hide blinked, his mind completely stalling.

He had expected corporate inquisitors, torturers, or Walter Bigiva coming to finish the job. He had certainly not expected an apology and a piece of bread.

And that voice...

Hide's brow furrowed tightly. Just like the raspy man earlier, her voice struck a chord deep within his memory. It was muffled slightly by the mask, but the inflection. He was certain he had heard it before. Were they corporate operatives having second thoughts? Sympathizers within Walter's inner circle?

He strained his exhausted mind, trying to attach a face to the cadence, but the memory remained just out of reach.

By the time Hide pulled his focus back, the masked girl had already turned on her heel, her boots carrying her swiftly toward the exit.

"Wait..." Hide croaked out, his dry throat scraping painfully.

The girl halted at the edge of the partition wall, half-glancing over her shoulder.

"How... how long has it been?" Hide asked, his voice a low, raspy whisper.

A brief hesitation hung in the air.

"Nine hours," she replied softly.

CLANG.

The iron door closed behind her, and the latch locked from the outside.

Hide let out a long, shuddering exhale, collapsing his forehead back against the cold floor.

Nine hours.

Not weeks. Not months. It had only been nine hours since Walter Bigiva killed Risa, and kidnapped him. The outside world hadn't moved on. The war hadn't ended without him.

Hide's gaze drifted toward the bread resting on the floor beside his chin.

His stomach rumbled violently.

Yet, Hide didn't touch it. He didn't even lean his neck forward to take a bite.

He didn't trust her. He didn't know who she was, who sent her. More than that, a cold, stubborn pride surged through his veins. He didn't want her help, and he certainly didn't need her pity.

Because he was getting out of here, and he was not going let off anyone he finds.

Soon, Zenith and Aegis found him.

No cage built by mortal hands could keep out the court of the Dark Liege. No matter where they hid him, nothing could keep his phantoms away.