The Blue Star Floating in the Sky

Consciousness surfaced like crawling through mud, emerging from a black, viscous darkness like cracked asphalt.

The first thing felt was a foul stench filling the lungs. The smell of rust and mold, and the peculiar, choking odor emitted by oxidized, blackened blood. Next, the sense of the body was forcibly dragged back by intense pain tormenting the entire frame. The bound wrists were so cold they had lost all sensation.

Eyelids, heavy and stuck together, were somehow pushed open while twitching. In a vision that refused to focus, a rugged iron caster stand sat prominently. Upon it, scalpels, battered pliers, sharp hooks, and instruments of such gruesome shape their purpose was unimaginable were arranged in a messy row.

Windowless walls on all four sides and a bare concrete floor came into view. They were hideously stained with blood spatters likely scattered by past victims.

—Nothing has changed.

With a clouded mind, Guest understood the current situation. That they were still stitched down in the bottomless basement of that underworld organization.

And that the cursed blue star likely floated in the sky, ticking away the countdown to extinction. It was no different from the scenery before losing consciousness.

Except for one thing: The man who had been obsessively swinging those gruesome instruments, trying to wring out Barco's whereabouts and scrap away Guest's mind and body, was nowhere to be seen.