Rael didn't like leaving his apartment.
Even now—after crushing an S-rank dungeon solo, after wielding power that once shattered realms—he felt that same, gnawing discomfort with the outside world. Too many eyes. Too much noise. Too many ghosts.
But today, he needed to breathe. After syncing with the clone, after that flood of memory and pain, he had to feel the sky again—to remind himself that the world hadn't stopped moving when he died.
It just moved on… without him.
He kept his hoodie up. Cracked headphones played soft static, not music—just something to drown out the silence. The limp in his step was gone now. Not healed. Just… overridden. The System ran silently in his mind, a cold guardian pulsing at the edge of awareness.
Sector 7 was quiet. Forgotten. A place the Hunter Guilds barely patrolled anymore. The inactive Gate nearby had long since gone cold—its mana residue still haunted the air like a fading scar.
Then it happened.
A shift.
A presence.
Like moonlight drawn across a blade.
He stopped walking.
Slowly, he turned.
She stood at the far end of the alley—where the sunlit street met the shadows.
White hair, pale as frost. Eyes like twin voids. She wore robes that shimmered faintly, too elegant for this crumbling district. Her very presence distorted the air—like the world was uncertain whether it should allow her to exist.
His System screamed.
[Warning: Dimensional Signature Detected]
[Entity Status: Tower-Linked]
[Name: Selene Vireya]
[Threat Level: Unknown]
[Affiliation: ???]
[Recognition Level: MAXIMUM – "Welcome, Master."]
His blood ran cold.
Rael Arden.
She had spoken it, softly. His true name.
Not Rael the ghost. Not the anonymous figure who'd just destroyed a Gate unseen. But him. The one who'd died. The one who'd fallen from the Tower.
No one should've known that name. Not here. Not in this life.
He didn't move. "Who are you?"
Her lips curved slightly. "You don't remember me. But I remember you. Even after death. Even after reincarnation. I felt it the moment your soul stirred again."
The System crackled with instability. Her aura wasn't just foreign—it was impossible. She wasn't supposed to be here. This world wasn't ready for her. He wasn't ready.
"I watched you climb," she said. Her voice was quiet, reverent. "I watched you defy gods, rewrite laws, break the unbreakable. I watched them betray you. I watched you fall."
Wind rustled through the alley. Her hair swayed like snow in a storm.
"And I waited."
He stepped back, instinctive. "Why?"
"Because you are mine."
The words fell like a sentence passed down from another lifetime.
Rael's face didn't move. His heartbeat stayed steady. But something deeper—something buried—shifted. An echo, a resonance. Like her voice had spoken to his soul, not his ears.
"I don't know you."
"But you will," she said, stepping forward again. "You always do. In every cycle. Every fall. Every death. You always return to me."
His hand inched toward his sleeve, where a phantom skill was primed. She saw the movement—and stopped.
"I'm not your enemy," she said gently. Then, slowly, she dropped to her knees before him. "I came to protect you. The Tower is bleeding into this world. Your enemies remember. The gods remember. And they are watching."
She looked up at him. Her voice trembled—not with fear, but with fierce certainty.
"I am your blade."
Rael stared at her.
This wasn't worship. It wasn't madness. It was conviction—pure and burning.
The world had already begun to change. Red Gates appearing where they shouldn't. S-rank threats awakening. And now… this.
He exhaled.
"Then get off the ground," he muttered. "I don't need followers."
A pause. Then—
She smiled.
"No," she whispered. "You need monsters."