The fourth seal had broken—and the world would never be the same.
Grim lay still aboard the skiff drifting above Biringan's starlit lake. His skin was no longer burning, but humming—a deep, resonant vibration that echoed in his bones.
Where the seal had once flared on his arm, a new sigil pulsed softly, its light shifting between silver and black like lunar tide and void. His senses had changed—he could see things now, barely-there threads rippling in the air, like the echoes of old magic or the trembling breath of something immense.
Elyse watched him from the edge of the skiff. Her gaze held a quiet fear.
"You touched something you weren't meant to," she said, almost whispering. "When your fingers met that eye… I saw it. Not with my eyes, but somewhere deeper. It was you, Grim—but changed. Cloaked in shadow, with moons orbiting you like blades. And behind you…"
She trailed off.
Grim turned to her. "What did you see?"
She hesitated. "It wasn't a god. It wasn't a demon. It was hunger, and silence, and the cold between stars."
That night, as Grim drifted into uneasy sleep, a presence folded reality like a page. He found himself standing in a sea of black glass, stars refracting beneath his feet. Time didn't move here—it watched.
A shape emerged: cloaked in twilight, with eyes like pale galaxies. Dungawan, the Watcher of the Void.
"You have peered too far, bearer of the Veil," the lunar servant said. His voice was quiet thunder.
"That which stirs now… once devoured suns. Even the gods dared not name it. We called it only—the Maw."
Grim tried to speak, but the dream held no breath.
"The fifth seal cannot be sought. It must awaken to you. Until then… walk carefully. Even your shadows now remember what they once feared."
Dungawan vanished, and Grim awoke gasping.
The ripple was subtle—but vast.
At Philippine Hunter University, Dean Rizalde stared at a celestial map as the moon's energy spiked erratically.
He activated a rune and contacted Grim.
"Did you touch something, Arclight?"
"Yes," Grim admitted. "An eye. It opened."
"Then listen carefully—whatever saw you back… it's older than the gods we pray to."
Meanwhile, the Hunter Association reported unstable dungeon signatures. Gates flickered between ranks, and a few even changed shape. One priest claimed to see a serpent-shaped constellation blink.
And somewhere far from both, hidden beneath temples drowned in history, Thyce watched moonlight run backward for the briefest second. She clutched her staff tightly.
"It sees him," she murmured. "So soon…"
Beneath a forgotten cathedral buried in roots and dust, Xavier stood before an altar scorched black by time. The Crimson Crescent had begun their twisted ritual—the Rite of Sundering—tainting a once-sacred dungeon.
He knelt, whispering to the void. A voice answered. Apep. The enemy of Ra. The coiled hunger. The silent god of unraveling bonds.
Xavier's veins darkened as serpent markings etched themselves across his arms and chest. His teeth bled silver. Apep granted him a new gift—the Sundering Fang, a spectral blade that could sever not flesh, but soul-links. The very bond between a summoner and their divine.
"The Prime Summoner carries a light meant to blind gods," Xavier hissed. "I will tear it from him."
He smiled, and the dungeon beneath him wept.
Silagan coiled around Grim like a second skin, quieter than usual. Its voice, usually sharp and wise, now murmured odd fragments.
"It watches… not from above… but from beneath the stars…"
Grim began seeing things where none should be—shadows twitching the wrong way, reflections that blinked twice, sky-rips like paper tearing in dreams.
He stood at the highest tower in Biringan, staring at the horizon. The stars were unusually dim. And then—a feather. Silver, glowing faintly, drifting on unseen wind. It brushed his hand and dissolved.
A message.
He turned—a roar thundered in the distance. Not natural. Not bestial. Summoned.
Somewhere else, a summoning circle burned open in crimson flame, etched into stone by corrupted hands.
The Crimson Crescent had opened a minor underworld gate—without the seals.
Grim's mark flared again. His gaze rose to the stars.
And for just a moment—they blinked back.
The world trembled.
Grim stood atop the highest tower in Biringan, staring at the crack in the sky. It was a rift—a jagged line in the air, pulsing with an unnatural red light that seemed to **throb like a heartbeat**. From beneath it, a strange, sickly heat radiated, and the world below felt... too still.
There was no wind.
No breath.
Just the eerie hum of magic stirring from beyond the Veil.
A feather—silver, shimmering, almost alive—drifted past him, carried by the broken sky's winds. It was the same feather he'd seen before, the one tied to Bakunawa's ancient power, but now it felt heavier, laden with some unspeakable warning.
Grim's heart pounded as his hand moved instinctively toward the **fourth seal** on his arm. The mark was burning—like molten light, the seal was no longer just a sign of his trials but an unspoken promise, a **bond to something far beyond him**.
It was as though the world *knew*—Grim could feel its pulse against his chest. He could feel the **Maw's hunger** stretching toward him, a **thing of shadows**, of **flickering stars**, trying to find purchase in his very soul.
And then came the sound.
A low, ominous hum rising from the Crimson Gate—the source of the rift.
---
"The Rite of Sundering has begun," whispered Silagan, his voice no longer a whisper of shadows but something louder, darker. The force of it rang in Grim's ears, echoing off the walls of his mind.
Grim's thoughts froze.
Before him, the Crimson Gate shimmered—an ancient, corrupted circle of blood-red energy that twisted and cracked like the sky itself. Within it, a dark figure materialized, emerging from the abyss beyond.
At first, Grim could only see the outline—the towering silhouette of a humanoid creature, covered in seaweed and blackened scales. His figure seemed woven into the very darkness of the gate, and as he stepped forward, the ground beneath him groaned in silent protest.
The figure stepped out fully, and Grim's breath caught.
Krakus.
The Second General of the Underworld had emerged—not in his monstrous, abyssal form, but humanized, clothed in tattered robes of kelp and coral, his face lined with scars and ancient wisdom. His eyes glowed with the deep, inky void of the underworld, and his presence was so suffocating that the very air around him seemed to tremble.
---
"I felt the Maw stir…" Krakus's voice rumbled like the sound of a storm breaking on the ocean's surface. "So, I followed the scent of the stars."
His gaze locked onto Grim, and it was as if the world stood still.
Grim could feel the weight of the abyss in those eyes.
He had faced Krakus once before during the Trial of the Fourth Seal—but this time, it was different. The demon's presence was heavier, his hunger deeper, and the darkness within him more suffocating than ever.
"This world has far too much light,"Krakus continued, his voice laced with ancient malice. "Let's fix that."
Behind him, an army of demonic forces began spilling from the gate—a host of beasts, monstrous forms, their eyes gleaming with twisted hunger, waiting for his command.
Grim's shadow, Silagan, writhed at his feet, its shape more intense, more tangible than ever before.
---
In a reflexive surge, Grim summoned Silagan—the shadows igniting around him, twisting and coiling through the air, instinctively drawn to the sinister presence Krakus exuded.
But something felt different this time.
Silagan **reached out**, and instead of simply cutting the shadows, it **drained**.
Grim staggered as the magic *coiled* around him like a snake. His body felt as if it were being pulled apart, but not in the way he'd felt before. This was something *different*, something *new*. He was not just tapping into the darkness—he was *drawing in souls*.
---
"No, not now…" Grim muttered, his eyes wide. He could feel the distorted energy, the tainted essence of the creatures. He was too close to the edge now.
But Silagan continued, pulling in the flickering fragments of souls.
Elyse's voice broke through, urgent.
"Grim! Control it!"
Grim could barely hear her. His hand clenched around his arm where the fourth seal burned. The power was too much, a torrent he couldn't contain. The pull was deep, more than just hunger—it was a gravitational pull, pulling at the very fabric of his being.
---
At that moment, the Minokawa's presence stirred. The lunar guardian, bound by the celestial pact, felt the shift, the instability in Grim's power. In the corner of his mind, Grim heard the voice of the Minokawa, soft, ancient, and heavy with warning:
"You are not just a vessel of darkness, Grim Arclight." The Minokawa's words echoed through him. "You must learn to purify, to burn away the corruption, while safeguarding the essence of what remains within—be it person, beast, or creature—except for demons, who will be fully purified."
The words were a promise. A gift for the future.
But for now, it only brought more tension.
---
Grim could feel the shadow growing unstable, thrumming with power. He fought to regain control—and with a deep breath, he called on Minokawa's light.
A flash of silvery light erupted from him, a purifying pulse that radiated outward like a wave.
But it wasn't enough. Not yet.
---
Krakus only smiled, his eyes glinting with cruel amusement as he sensed the rising power.
"You think you can purify it all, Prime Summoner? No. The gate is open. There is no returning from the Void."
As the demonic army surged forward, the Crimson Gate's pull deepened, warping the sky. But in that moment, a new force entered the fray—a new threat.
Grim's vision shifted as he stood alone atop the tower, barely holding himself together. He could still feel the tainted remnants of Silagan's power swirling through him, threatening to overtake his very being.
The rift above him shimmered once more, the Crimson Gate crackling in the distance, and Grim knew, without a doubt:
This was only the beginning.
The Crimson Crescent had found a way to open a minor underworld gate—without needing all the seals.
A blinding crimson light burst from the gate, a summoning circle igniting within the heart of the underworld.
Krakus's words echoed in the air:
"The Maw stirred... So did I."