---- Dark mist surged around him, daggers and spikes materializing out of nowhere and hurling toward Sigrid.


    "Ss, its me, its Sigrid!" she kept shouting as she defended herself.


    Round shields of golden runes appeared in the air around her, absorbing the vicious magic Ss threw at her.


    He didnt seem to recognize her, but she would make him remember.


    BAM! BAM! BAM! Each time their des shed against the spear, golden and ck sparks erupted.


    Dangerous thunderbolts began striking down from the dark clouds.


    The specters shrieked in excitement.


    Their mastertheir master was fighting a creature far too powerful.


    ?Devour, devour, devour? That was the only thing on their minds, despite having spent millennia slowly corroding and absorbing the power of the Selenias ? seal, weakening it until a new sacrifice was made every hundred years.


    ?My love...


    my Ss...


    you are mine...


    Sigrid...


    m Sigrid...


    please, Ss,e back to me? Those words lodged themselves into Umbros'' mind, and he couldnt shake them off, even if he wanted to.


    ---- A dull pain raged in the deep hole within his chest, a void that was never filled.


    And yet, every time he exchanged blows with that woman, his whole being trembled.


    He never hurt herhe wanted to, but he couldn''t! ?Why was she speaking to me like a lover?!? That name haunted his nightmares, lost in the endless darkness.


    Sigrid, his light.


    ?No, no, no.


    Itsa trick, a lie!? "SHUT UP!!!" he roared, shaking the world.


    Enormous wings burst from his back like thick mist.


    Ss would end her, once and for all.


    He couldnt bear this pain in his chest.


    His mind was too clouded.


    She was confusing him.


    The clouds twisted under hismand.


    They moved at high speed, forming whirlwinds with purple and ck lightning surging inside them.


    A deadly storm was brewing.


    Sigrid looked up at the towering man.


    The mask had fallenpletely in one of her strikes, revealing his beautiful faceone eye entirely ck, the other golden like the sun.


    Nothing could do justice to the dark beauty of her mate.


    Ss watched her with that same macabre, obsessive intensity he always had.


    But Sigrid knewSs didnt fully recognize her in his heart.


    His hatred was so immense that it had drowned out his memories, ---- the ones she had built with so much pain and sacrifice.


    All at once, the sky tore open, and acidic rain threatened to fall.