NARAK: The Blood Covenant

The Chamber of Offerings was colder now. Not physically, but spiritually—as if even the walls were holding their breath.

Raka and Nayla stood amidst crumbling incense bowls and sacred artifacts.

The Archive inside Nayla's pocket glowing with sentence : To get out is to arrange it.

Nayla take a look at the all kind of offerings there in that room and she knows it is some kind of puzzle that looks really easy.

And yes, the puzzle before them was deceptively simple: place the offerings on the central altar in the correct historical sequence.

But "deceptively simple" + Raka?

Disaster was always just one misstep away.

"Okay so—incense, rice, petals, then coin," Raka said confidently, placing each item in its slot.

"Wait," Nayla said, "that coin is Majapahit era, not Sriwijaya—"

CLICK.

Too late, with innocent smile, Raka look at Nayla's angry face.

The entire altar lurched.

The room pulsed—once. Then twice.

Then it screamed.

A seal behind the wall shattered like obsidian glass, and from the crypt behind it emerged a figure twisted in both shadow and agony.

Four arms. Masked face.

Blood-drenched batik.

Skin bloated with dark energy.

The Anak Buang of Rangda.

A child cast aside by the queen of black magic herself.

Malformed.

Unforgiven.

Hungry.

"...You just had to guess, huh?" Nayla muttered, Archive flaring.

"HOW WAS I SUPPOSED TO KNOW HISTORICAL RICE ORDERING?!"

"RAKA." Arkana's voice echoed inside his mind, calm and clear. "Stop yelling and listen. I will guide your hand."

"Finally!" Raka shouted, dodging a sweeping claw.

"Where the hell have you been?!"

"Waiting for you to stop being an idiot. Now freeze his legs before he hits you."

The Anak Buang lunged—mouth unhinged unnaturally wide, spitting corrupted incense mist.

Raka dropped, slammed his palm to the floor, and a burst of glacial spikes erupted from below—catching two of the creature's legs and pinning them.

"HOLY—did I just—?!"

"Yes. Basic Sub-Zero Anchor. Now move. If he screams, block your ears."

The creature twisted, screaming through shattered teeth. The sound wasn't just loud—it crawled inside their thoughts, gnawing at memory.

Nayla gritted her teeth, whispering a sealing mantra, her Archive forming a barrier of glowing script.

"It's trying to make us forget how to move," she warned.

"...That's terrifying," Raka said, breathing hard. "Also kinda metal."

"Focus."

Raka blinked—and the mind realm snapped open fully.

He stood in a snow-blasted field of stillness, beside Arkana Arhad: tall, pale, and cloaked in cosmic frost.

"You've used pieces of me before," Arkana said. "But never with intention. Now—we synchronize."

"Wait, this is like that anime fusion dance, right?"

"This is war, not choreography."

"Even better."

Back in the real world, Raka's aura ignited, not with fire, but with silver frost, spiraling from his arms and eyes.

He drew a sigil midair, imperfect, but burning with conviction.

"Arkana. Lend me the name of stillness."

"As you wish."

The creature charged again, limbs snapping from its frozen anchors, howling with black mist.

But Raka stepped forward, hands raised.

And the room responded.

A dome of shimmering frost formed around the altar.

The creature moved to strike.

And froze mid-lunge.

Time didn't stop.

Momentum did.

The very concept of motion was paused around the beast, caught in a fractal ice field generated by Raka's presence.

Nayla stared.

"You paused its motion... by freezing its memory of attacking us."

"I—what? That's insane."

"Yes," Arkana replied. "And temporary."

"Right! Uh—NOW!"

Raka twisted the sigil, forming a spike of condensed frost, and slammed it into the beast's core.

The Anak Buang shattered into dust made of forgotten offerings.

Silence.

Then, a soft wind.

And the doors ahead opened with a slow hiss of approval.

"Puzzle cleared," Raka panted.

"Don't ever touch rice bowls again," Nayla said.

"Well done," Arkana whispered. "You're finally listening."

"Thanks, man. I think I peed a little."

Somewhere else in the temple…another Gate stirred.

And someone—not human—began to answer The Question.

The Room of Echoes hadn't changed since Vicki and Putri entered.

Or so it seemed.

But every second they spent inside it, the shadows thickened, and the mirrors warped deeper, not showing reflections, but possibilities that never happened.

Putri stood still, eyes flicking around the cracked obsidian walls.

"This place is reacting to your soul," she said softly.

"Why not yours?" Vicki muttered.

"Oh, mine too," she added with a bitter laugh. "But I'm used to it. You're still pretending you're normal."

A sound rang out—like a flute, but twisted.

Wrong notes stretched too long.

The mirrors rippled.

And from them, one by one, they crawled out.

Not illusions.

Not tricks.

But fragments of selves—versions of Vicki with hollow eyes, broken minds, some wearing Avici's colors, some screaming in silence. All whispering one word:

"Replace."

Putri gasped. "They're echoes. And something's forcing them to anchor."

The air split open.

A new presence emerged.

Not Vicki.

Not an echo.

Not human.

From the farthest, darkest mirror slithered the form of a Leak.

Flesh burned, intestines coiled like serpents, its head floating just above its dripping neck.

Eyes locked on Vicki.

"You carry a borrowed name," it hissed.

"Let me return it… in pieces."

BATTLE BEGINS.

The Leak surged forward, crashing into Vicki with a wave of corrupted mirror shards.

He raised his arm to block, but the shadow didn't respond fast enough.

Thrown across the room, Vicki gritted his teeth.

"Avici—come on! You there?"

"Yes."

"Then help!"

"You're trying to control a tide by yelling at it. Idiot."

"Then what do I do?!"

The Leak summoned echoes of Vicki's failures—each one physically manifesting around them.

They circled, closing in.

Putri stepped beside Vicki, hands up, pendulum glowing like wildfire.

"You're panicking. Stop thinking like yourself."

"That helps nothing, Putri."

"You're trying to fight like Vicki."

She turned to him, voice sudden and sharp:

"Then stop. Fight like the one who was never meant to be seen."

Silence in the mind realm.

And then—clarity.

Avici's voice shifted—no longer biting, but composed.

"Ah… there it is. She speaks the truth."

"You were never built to win clean. You were born from conflict. From what was silenced."

"So stop fighting from the light."

"Let the mirror fight for you."

Everything changed.

Vicki closed his eyes—stepped backward—not away from the Leak…

But into his own reflection.

From the ground up, his aura inverted, like ink bleeding through paper.

His eyes glowed silver.

His shadow stretched.

And from every surface, mirror-versions of himself stepped forward.

But this time—they moved with him.

Obeyed him.

The shadow around the Leak wrapped upward, forming a mirror cage.

The echoes shattered, caught in a false memory loop Vicki created with his will.

"This is my story now," he said, stepping forward.

"And I don't need to reflect you anymore."

The cage collapsed inward, sealing the Leak in infinite mirrors that bent time and form.

Then—silence.

The creature vanished.

The echoes broke.

The Room calmed.

But before they could exhale...

Putri collapsed to her knees.

From her back—white mist burst outward, forming the shape of a roaring tiger, made of fireflies and starlight, its body ethereal but watching.

"Putri?" Vicki rushed forward.

She looked up, her eyes glowing faintly silver like the pendulum she held.

"I didn't call him," she whispered. "He came... because he felt something awaken in me."

"What is that?"

"I think..." she paused, trembling."I think I'm not the first in my family to fight this war."

The Tiger looked directly at Vicki.

Then spoke.

In flawless Balinese:

"She remembers the name."

And vanished.

The three teams converged at the heart of the temple, a sunken chamber surrounded by cracked murals and a floor inscribed with glyphs older than the Archive itself.

A moment of stillness.

Then:

"You guys survived," Nayla said, brushing dirt off her coat.

"Barely," Vicki replied, glancing at Putri beside him.

"Some of us even made new friends," Putri added with a wink.

Cue the entrance of Daramahesa, tail twitching, eyes narrowed.

He immediately locked eyes with the massive White Tiger still silently pacing near Putri, its celestial form flickering like moonlight through fog.

"Excuse me," Daramahesa said dryly, "but since when do we allow spirit zoo exhibits on field trips?"

"He's family," Putri replied smugly.

"So is rabies, but you don't see me inviting it."

Raka snorted.

Nayla rolled her eyes.

The tension cracked just long enough for a smile.

Then Daramahesa stepped forward, his voice shifting—serious now.

"Before we go deeper, you need to know what Karuna told me."

He raised his paw—glyphs etched by Karuna began to glow across his fur.

"The temple isn't guarding a gate. It is the gate."

"A question embedded in reality. And Vicki..."

He turned to the boy still clutching shadows.

"You've already started to answer it."

But before he could continue, a hush fell.

Every light died.

The glyphs dimmed.

And a soft, melodic voice echoed through the room.

"So curious… so bright. You little fires love asking questions…"

A ripple shimmered in the air.

And she stepped out of it.

A woman in a flowing black gown, her hair cascading like ink, eyes glowing violet.

Her beauty was unnerving, not because it was flawless, but because it looked incomplete as if it was still being edited by something invisible.

"Who—?" Vicki started.

"One of the Untold," Daramahesa whispered, fur spiking.

"Her name is Chaos."

She raised a finger.

The chamber responded, walls twisted, glyphs scrambled, time flickered backward.

The group suddenly found themselves trapped in a spiraling memory loop, unable to move forward or back.

"You've seen too much," Chaos cooed. "And you've remembered things that should've stayed erased."

"So now… I'll unmake your names myself."

She lifted both arms,

And the room collapsed inward.

In that moment, Vicki's body snapped still.

Raka fell to one knee, gasping.

Nayla flinched, her Archive recoiling.

Putri clutched her chest, her pendulum glowing erratically.

Then—

Two voices echoed across the collapsing space.

One made of flame. One of frozen silence.

"AVICI NARAK.""ARKANA ARHAD."

The glyphs in Vicki's and Raka's bodies ignited.

Their eyes rolled back.

Their bodies surged with energy not their own.

And for the first time since the Fall of Anata Dharma, they gave the wheel fully to their Oathbound.

Their voices changed.

Their stances sharpened.

Avici stood tall in Vicki's body, grinning like a god with a grudge.

Arkana took over Raka, calm as a glacier mid-collapse.

"Hello, Chaos," Avici purred. "Still dramatic, I see."

"Still foolish," Arkana added.

Chaos narrowed her eyes.

"I should've erased your names when I had the chance."

"And yet here we are," Avici said, snapping his fingers.

The shadows behind him twisted, mirroring Chaos' attacks, absorbing impact and redirecting space itself.

"You're not the only one who knows how to bend memory."

Chaos begins her attack.

And Arkana responded.

He raised his hand, a mirror of frost and light exploded outward, creating a battlefield of suspended time-bubbles.

Every strike she made was countered by temporal inversion or shadow mirroring.

Nayla flanked Chaos—Archive glowing violently—and cast sigils that blocked her rewriting powers.

Putri's White Tiger leapt, intercepting a memory-spear and pinning a timeline thread back into order.

"You want to erase our names?" she shouted."Then you better spell them right."

In the mind realm, Avici and Arkana stood back-to-back, pushing their powers to near collapse.

"We can't hold this forever," Arkana said.

"Then we don't have to," Avici grinned."We just hold it long enough for them to remember what they are."

As Chaos roared, Daramahesa stepped forward once more.

Glyphs fully awakened.

"Then let me answer The Question."

He placed his paw on the center seal.

And the temple began to shake.

The Gate beneath the roots… began to open.