Bia and her master were two of a kind.

  He was studious and inquisitive, while she was keen and intelligent.

  He pursued the path of a hero with temperance and dignity, and she supported him in any way she could.

  Not just because he was her master or because he was destined to walk the heroic path but just because of how well they got along.

  Knowing a person, truly understanding a person was rare, even in times of peace yet there they stood side by side, facing all the world had to throw at them with raised heads.

  They gained strength and knowledge together, ate and bathed together, and it was almost inevitable that they went on to share a bed.

  They licked each other’s wounds after each battle and complimented each other in every way when it came to how they battled.

  However…

  The day came when he met his fate.

  What was supposed to be a simple mission into Cultist territory as the vanguard of a larger force, they encountered the Red Dullahan.

  The vanguard, consisting of seven KVL that ranged from level one to fifteen, alongside their masters, were barely able to keep Elynn shredded through them one at a time, eventually managing to stall until the larger force arrived.

  But by the time they did, Bia’s master had already bled out in her arms.

  Bia blamed herself for being weak.

  For not seeking more power.

  This led to her return to the outskirts of Cu?al, where she searched for alternative sources of power, but conventional means were far too expensive.

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  Realstone Shards were exceedingly rare since one could only either get one by killing something with an Actuality Level of 5 or buying one, which would set one back by hundreds of thousands.

  Bia was a level five as well meaning that she couldn’t guarantee success if she encountered an enemy that was as strong as her.

  She also didn’t have anywhere near as much money, and so she did as she and her master always did.

  She read.

  She studied.

  And searched.

  Her quest for power eventually led her to Dollman, whom she encountered in a library.

  The two discussed many things, including the conjoined nature of creation and destruction. He was kind enough to gift her a pair of eyes that allowed her to see the weaknesses of her enemies, and all Dollman asked for in return was for her to come speak with him from time to time in his bunker.

  It was in these talks that Bia realized just how herculean a task getting stronger by natural means would be.

  Realstone Shards, crystalized fragments of reality itself, were just too hard to get.

  Malignant energy, however... seemed more readily available, and so Bia returned to the trenches.

  Her goal was the Cultist base that had been set up just across Linden Bridge. A dark factory wherein the Cultists stored the MAL energy they used for their insidious devices and explosives.

  Bia fought fiercely, purposefully absorbing MAL with each battle and every time, she lost more and more of herself since MAL energy wasn’t a different type of energy, it was the coalescence of destruction itself.

  MAL ate away at matter and turned it back into pure energy, which, granted, she used to fuel her march into oblivion.

  She eventually reached the factory alongside the Saintly Forces, and just as they cleared the base, she consumed all of the MAL energy she could find.

  This would have ordinarily given her more power, but it also ate away at so much of her being that at some point, there was not much left of her apart from a burning desire for power and a thirst for revenge.

  And so, when the Saintly soldiers finally found her in the containment bays, Bia saw them only as the one thing she wanted to kill most.

  Ellyn the Red Dullahan.

  She killed them without mercy before descending on the rest of the unit, killing them all while thinking that she was fighting the one who had taken her world away.

  She killed for so long, and it only broke her mind further.

  What hadn’t been eaten by MAL was constantly screaming with pain and grief.

  It was all so painful, so humiliating to have to relive her failure over and over again, that it was a relief when one of the phantoms she couldn’t quite see beat her face in.

  With each punch, Bia’s mind grew quieter and quieter.

  Until all was silent.