A harsh wind blew.
On top of a hill was a broken castle.
Mere moments ago, this castle had been whole.
Now, the back of the castle was missing.
What had once been a room was now a ruin.
Half-broken walls were behind Shang as the bright sun shone down on him.
The bright sun didn't reflect Shang's feelings, but the weather didn't care about the feelings of living beings.
Shang's body had become a husk. Nearly all his muscles had shrunk to a sickly degree, making him look like a skeleton with merely some skin on it.
The two empty eye-sockets only strengthened this perception.
About 140 years ago, Shang sacrificed his left eye.
Today, he had sacrificed his right eye.
Shang couldn't possibly sacrifice his arms or legs since that would severely weaken his Battle-Strength.
Organs couldn't be sacrificed because that would reduce Shang's maximum life energy tremendously.
The ears or the nose weren't enough to achieve any kind of significant power with Entropy.
Shang had decided to go with the eye.
Due to his Spirit Sense, he wasn't reliant on vision anymore.
However, all of this was actually only of secondary importance.
In fact, Shang didn't even really think about what to sacrifice.
His mind had been someplace else.
Jerald.
His friend.
His only friend.
His closest companion.
Shang's life had always been surrounded by a cloud of darkness.
His Affinity made it impossible for him to have friends or companions.
His goal made it impossible for him to have friends or companions.
He was alone.
The world was dark.
His life was dark.
Yet, Shang was willing to walk through this darkness.
In fact, Shang had walked into this darkness voluntarily.
If he had just stopped searching for power, he wouldn't need to be surrounded by this darkness anymore.
But he couldn't.
He needed to achieve his goal.
This was the only purpose of his life.
Had he had more purposes back then?
Maybe, but ever since Shang had stepped onto this dark path, all the other purposes vanished.
Shang had to reach the end of the path, no matter what.
The consequences didn't matter.
The sacrifices didn't matter.
The price didn't matter.
He wanted to reach it.
He needed to reach it!
Shang had always believed that he had already made his choice.
He believed that he had already come to terms with his path.
But he realized the true weight of his path only today.
During this dark and lonely journey, Jerald had been like a visitor.
A ray of light.
Something nice in a place of nothing but apathy.
It wasn't actually that hard to walk the path.
Shang looked at the hand lying in front of his feet.
The hand had Jerald's Space Ring on it, and Shang had avoided it on purpose.
If he destroyed the Communication Crystal that Relon had given Jerald, Relon would know that Jerald had died.
For several seconds, Shang's empty eye-sockets only stared at the hand.
He didn't move.
The wind blew across the now exposed floor.
The bright sun mercilessly shone down on the scene.
The world was so bright.
But Shang only saw darkness.
Shang stood in front of the hand without moving.
Step.
A woman walked out of the still-standing part of the castle behind Shang, and her eyes widened in horror at what she was seeing.
Half of the castle was gone!
What about King Storm?!
This was one of the True Mages responsible for organizing everything in the castle, and she had heard and felt the commotion.
When she saw Shang's husk and the solitary hand on the ground, she took a horrified breath.
Then, the world around her moved.
The power of the world around her gathered beside her head.
Before she could say or do anything, her head separated from her shoulder.
Shang didn't move.
His empty eye-sockets only stared forward.
A couple more True Mages arrived shortly, but they died as soon as they arrived.
It took Shang two minutes to move, and the only reason he was moving was that he was seeing someone approach in his Spirit Sense.
Sylvia was returning.
There was a shocked and horrified expression on her face as she activated one Mana Step after the other.
Shang stepped forward and scooped up the hand.
Then, he put it into his inner world.
Shang's expressionless face stared toward the direction where Sylvia was coming from.
He didn't want to see her, but he couldn't stop himself from looking at her one last time.
She had also been a friend of Shang's.
She had been Jerald's wife of 75 years and the mother of his children.
Jerald had been a good father, and she had been a good mother.
Jerald had only wanted to continue living.
Shang had destroyed their happiness today.
Sword left Shang's back and hovered in front of him.
Shang lightly jumped on it, and Sword flew away.
In just a couple of seconds, Shang had reached a height of over eight kilometers.
No one from the ground would be able to find him that high up in the air unless they were specifically searching for him with their eyes.
Shang's Spirit Sense encompassed the ruined castle.
Sylvia had arrived, and she was searching around the ruined castle in horror.
No, this couldn't be!
He had to still be alive!
Jerald had to be somewhere!
After not finding any trace of Jerald for a while, she quickly left the castle again to search for him.
He had to still be around somewhere.
Shang's expressionless face only stared in her general direction for a while.
Then, he slowly turned around, and some distorting light gathered around him.
In an instant, Shang's body had vanished.
With Distortion hiding his body, Shang flew towards the south.
The barrier had become active again.
Shang only activated his Domain of Entropy and flew past the barrier.
The guards, including Prince George, looked upward with horror.
The barrier had been breached!
Yet, they couldn't find the culprit!
Prince George immediately took out his Communication Crystal and contacted Jerald.
And the Communication Crystal told him that no one with that aura existed.
