Lucien stared across the battlefield, jaw slightly sck, as he turned around.

  The explosion had left a crater at least thirty meters wide. The trees surrounding the area were scorched, broken like splintered matchsticks. And in the middle of it all, standing in the wreckage like a goddamn fashion model dropped into a fantasy novel…

  Was the Protagonist.

  And he looked ridiculous.

  Jet-bck coat, long and fluttering in a wind that no one else felt. White hair—perfect, silky, and always flowing in slow motion like he lived inside a shampoo commercial. Eyes? Blood red, glowing faintly like he was trying way too hard to look cursed.

  But the worst part?

  The dude had horns made of darkened amethyst mana curling back over his head, and massive spectral wings made of purple energy unfurled behind him, pulsing with power and ego. He held dual greatswords, each nearly as tall as Lucien, and one of them was literally crackling with crimson lightning while the other dripped a bck mist like it was leaking trauma.

  Lucien blinked slowly.

  “…What the hell is that design,” he whispered to himself, voice ft with disbelief. “This isn’t an MMO, it’s a mid-2000s DeviantArt OC tier.”

  The protagonist turned toward him, eyes fring. “You.”

  Lucien raised a brow. “Me?”

  “Did you come to steal my kill?” His voice was low, gravelly, intentionally rasped like he’d gargled edge for breakfast. “Or perhaps… you were drawn here by the scent of ruin.”

  Lucien actually squinted. “What?”

  The edgelord took a step forward, boots crunching the dirt with dramatic reverb that absolutely wasn’t coming from reality.

  “You don’t have to worry,” he said, voice dripping with theatrical doom. “I’ll erase everything that stands in my way. This world is but a vessel for judgment.”

  Lucien visibly gagged. “Oh god, please stop talking like that.”

  The protagonist frowned. “What?”

  “You sound like a Twitter thread rolepyer going through his sixth personality shift,” Lucien muttered, turning around and rubbing his temples. “Christ, that hurt to listen to.”

  The Protagonist gave no indication of hearing—or caring. He turned toward the fading embers of the explosion.

  Lucien sighed, watching from a few steps back. “Well, no mistaking it. If he’s here, then the event’s officially kicked in.”

  The sky above them shimmered.

  Reality bent.

  And with a sickening tearing noise, a jagged rift opened in mid-air—like someone had sliced the world open with a rusted bde.

  From the spiraling hole came an unnatural cold, followed by a stench of rot and sulfur.

  Lucien stepped back, eyes narrowing.

  “Right on cue.”

  From the rift, something began to emerge—huge, looming, impossibly wrong.

  It stepped forward on long, skeletal legs wrapped in crimson robes that dragged along the ground like melted fabric. Its height easily towered over the trees—seven meters at least. Its upper body was gaunt, wrapped in bckened sinew under ceremonial cloth, etched in glyphs that twisted and reshaped when you looked at them too long.

  Where a face should have been, it wore the skull of a horse—bleached white, but cracked and old, with mismatched teeth and carvings burnt into the bone. Its eyes—if they could be called that—were gaping sockets from which thick, bck liquid constantly poured, dripping down its cheeks in slow, endless rivulets.

  In its cwed, elongated fingers, it held a scythe far too rge to be practical. The bde was jagged and rusted, shaped like a crescent moon drawn by a lunatic, and the handle was made of braided bones.

  Lucien felt the pressure on his chest, like gravity had doubled.

  “Damn,” he whispered. “They really went full horror with this one.”

  [Abyss-Css Entity Detected: Grimdrake of the Howling Rot]Species: Nekrathim – Inhabitants of the Abyss Layer "Oblivial Maw"Danger Level: Catastrophic

  The Nekrathim lifted its head and let out a groan—low, guttural, and wet. The trees nearby wilted from the sound alone.

  The protagonist stepped forward, swords glowing. “I’ll handle this.”

  Lucien was already turning on his heel. “You do that.”

  “Where are you going?”

  Lucien waved a hand over his shoulder. “Away from whatever scene you’re about to monologue over.”

  “You’ll regret turning your back on this battle.”

  “No,” Lucien muttered, already calling his Velkryns to regroup. “I’ll regret not getting out of here before the death camera rolls.”

  He hopped onto his makeshift air-rig—pnk, rope, and fpping nightmare chickens—and took off, rising into the trees again.

  Below, the Nekrathim raised its scythe. The protagonist crossed his swords. The sky crackled.

  Lucien smirked as he vanished over the treeline.

  “Freedom, here I come.”

  As Grimdrake lifted its rusted scythe, and the OG Protagonist began monologuing some nonsense about fate and judgment, Lucien was already halfway gone—mounted on one of his recently tamed Mindstalkers, FYDEV leading the charge. His entire flock of Velkryns followed close behind, a screeching swarm of loyal bird-lizard nightmares.

  He tore through the forest at breakneck speed, ducking under branches, dodging rocks, weaving past startled deer-Eidolons. His system map flickered with arms behind him, but he didn’t care.

  “That’s fine. That’s all fine,” he muttered, eyes locked ahead. “Let Protagonist-kun pose and sparkle all he wants. I’m out. Peace. Exit stage left. I'm not getting scythed by some demon dressed like a rejected Bloodborne boss.”

  He felt it. Freedom. He was close to the perimeter of the Rift. Another hundred meters and the magic field would destabilize just enough to stage his “death.” He already had a Velkryn corpse ready to swap with. A blood-sptter trap prepped. Everything was perfect.

  Then the world… shivered.

  A blink.

  A pulse.

  In less than a second, Lucien and every one of his tamed beasts were ripped from their positions—instantly, violently teleported—straight back to the clearing.

  To the feet of Grimdrake.

  “Wha—WHAT?!”

  Lucien smmed into the dirt, skidding several meters on his side as FYDEV nded in a tumble beside him, chirping angrily.

  All around him, Velkryns squawked and stumbled, dazed.

  And worst of all…There was a chain.

  A glowing bck chain, translucent like smoke but solid, now extended from Grimdrake’s skeletal wrist straight to Lucien’s chest—right over his heart.

  Lucien froze.

  “...Okay. That’s new.”

  The Nekrathim loomed over him, its empty eye sockets pouring endless bck liquid onto the ground, forming steaming pools. The horse skull tilted.

  Then it spoke—its voice a wet whisper that seemed to echo from inside Lucien’s skull.

  “Exiler’s… Champion.”

  Lucien’s face contorted in raw confusion.

  “What?! Who the hell is the Exiler?!”

  The chain pulsed once, sending a jolt of pressure through his chest. He wheezed and nearly vomited.

  OG MC turned his head, bdes still glowing. “What’s going on?”

  Lucien, still on the ground, raised a shaky hand and pointed at him. “I don’t know who the hell the Exiler is, but it’s probably him! He’s got the horns, the trauma swords, the tragic backstory. I’m just a guy with birds and a stick!”

  Grimdrake didn’t respond. Just stared.

  Lucien groaned, ying back in the dirt, eyes staring up at the sky.

  “Why does the world keep giving me named cutscenes I don’t want...?”