System: Daily login!!, jackpot on the first day!!!

"... And you both listened"

Lembuswana let out a low rumble from his throat, somewhere between a growl and a sigh.

"We didn't have a choice. It didn't speak with words. It spoke with feeling. With instinct... With rage"

Aksara clenched his jaw.

"Are you saying… That something... Someone, manipulated both of you? Two Aboriginal beings?"

Lembuswana nodded slowly.

"And we never realized it... Not until it was too late"

Taufik stepped closer to the wall, laying his palm gently on the gold-lined mural of Mikhael. The cloaked figure felt more ominous now, like it, too, knew of that unseen whisperer.

"Mikhael chose containment… Because he must have known" Taufik said. "He knew that killing either of you might only feed the real enemy"

He turned his gaze downward, deeper into the spiraling stair that continued beyond the mural chamber. The humming was growing louder again, stronger. No longer just a pulse… But like the breathing of something ancient beginning to stir.

"…And maybe," Taufik said, voice low, "what's down there isn't just a ruin or a tomb"

Aksara's fingers tightened around the hilt of his blade.

"You think that presence is still here? After all this time?"

Lembuswana looked toward the dark passage, his glowing eyes reflecting flickers of ancient light.

"I know it is"

Taufik took a deep breath, shadows swirling around him again like armor. His voice was calm, resolute.

"Then let's end what started eons ago"

With that, he stepped past the mural and deeper into the corridor, where the markings grew denser and the air colder.

And from far below… Something responded.

A soft, guttural chuckle that echoed up from the dark, ancient and terrible.

It knew they were coming.

And it was awake.

--------

Taufik took a deep breath, then descended further into the passage. The stairs grew narrower, the air colder. The humming was no longer distant, it was close, pressing in on them, vibrating through the stone, through their bones.

And then, suddenly... It stopped.

They stepped into a vast chamber, so large it swallowed sound and light alike. The ceiling was lost in shadow, and the walls stretched far into the dark. In the center, surrounded by floating shards of crystal and fractured stone, stood a monolith. It pulsed with a slow, dull glow like a dying star.

Aksara whispered,

"What is this place?"

Lembuswana leaped onto a broken pillar for a better view.

"This… Is not just a ruin. This is a Cradle. A place where something ancient was born… Or imprisoned"

Taufik moved closer, his dark aura reacting violently to the air. The mist around him hissed and coiled like it wanted to flee.

Suddenly, one of the floating shards jerked and spun toward them. A faint voice whispered from it.

Not a voice of language, but emotion. Pain. Rage. Hunger.

Taufik raised a hand. The shard stopped mid-air. His aura reached for it, and the crystal cracked with a loud snap.

From the monolith's base, tendrils of black stone slithered outward, forming ancient glyphs that ignited in sequence.

Lembuswana's eyes widened.

"This thing is reacting... "

A burst of wind blew through the chamber as the monolith split down the middle. A deep, hollow groan echoed as two massive stone doors, sealed for untold ages, slowly began to open behind it.

Beyond was a circular room, smaller, more intimate, and at its center stood a pedestal. Upon it: a mask.

Old. Cracked. Bone-white. Etched with runes no one should remember.

Aksara stepped forward, then froze.

"That mask… Is it alive?"

The mask pulsed, not with light, but with presence. The humming returned, this time focused entirely on it.

Taufik stared at it, unmoving.

"This isn't just a relic..."

Then a voice, actual words this time, echoed in their minds. A voice older than anything.

"This is the first time anyone has come this deep"

Taufik narrowed his eyes.

"Who are you?"

The mask trembled. The air grew heavy.

"I am… What remains"

The air thickened as the voice echoed again, this time deeper, more mournful.

"I waited... For the trumpet's call. For wings in the sky. But none came"

Taufik's shadow wavered. Not from fear but recognition. The sorrow in the voice wasn't malevolent. It was a loss.

Lembuswana crouched low beside the monolith, claws tensing.

"This is no ordinary relic. I remember this soul…" His gaze sharpened. "He was an Angel, He stood alone after his Legion fell"

Aksara's eyes widened.

"The murals… That was him who made it?"

The mask pulsed again. The runes around its surface shifted, briefly revealing a weeping eye carved into the forehead.

"I failed. And in failure, I became forgotten"

The chamber trembled softly. The monolith behind them began to decay, its purpose spent.

"Now you come, not with Heaven's light… But with shadow"

Taufik stepped forward.

"We're not here to disturb your rest. But something down here has awakened, and whatever's watching us, it's not you"

The mask's presence flared, not in hostility, but in urgency.

"Then it has begun again… Demon Lord of Knowledge... The All-Seeing Deceiver… Orobas has made a move again"

Aksara drew his Ninjato, feeling the weight of the name.

"Orobas… One of the Four Demon Lords"

Lembuswana snarled, lips curling back to reveal rows of predatory teeth.

"He should not be here. Not in this place"

The mask trembled.

"He was here before the fall… Before the skies were torn… Whispering lies not with words, but with truths unfit for mortal minds"

Taufik stepped forward, his shadow flickering erratically as if even it wished to retreat.

"He was never cast down," The mask continued. "He chose to descend. And what he sought… Lies beneath this chamber"

The ground beneath them rumbled, faintly at first, like the stirring of something slumbering far below.

Taufik turned to the others.

"If Orobas is beneath us… Then this isn't just a cradle or a prison. It's a vault"

Aksara's voice was tight.

"A vault for what?"

The mask responded with three words.

"... The Forgotten Name"

Lembuswana's eyes widened in shock.

"That's not possible. That name was erased in the first cycle. No one remembers it"

"He does," The mask whispered. "Orobas remembers everything"

A thin crack split the pedestal beneath the mask, and with a flash of energy, an image burst into the chamber: a vast, twisting library of flesh and crystal, suspended in a realm of endless mirrors, each reflecting a different reality, all watched by a single, unblinking eye.

Aksara stepped back, visibly shaken.

"That place…"

"Orobas's true domain… The Atramentum"

# A/N - "Just in case someone asks, Orobas is the Demon Lord of Knowledge, and his domain, Atramentum, is not just a place; it's a memory space. It forms around any location that holds forbidden knowledge, unresolved truths, or sealed history. The more forgotten or hidden a place is, the more it overlaps with Orobas's realm"

The chamber dimmed, the illusion of the Atramentum still hovering in the air, glitching, stuttering between impossible geometries.

The presence of the Eye behind the mirrors seemed to stare directly into their thoughts.

Aksara's voice was steady, but it carried a quiet rage.

"... Then that Eye... He's watching even now?"

The mask gave no answer, but the glow from its weeping eye pulsed once more, then dimmed.

Aksara stepped forward, gripping his Ninjato tightly.

"Why the Forgotten Name is sealed below... Why? And what makes it worth Orobas breaking through the walls of reality to reach it?"

--------

With Aksara and Lembuswana in dialogue with The Mask, Taufik talks with The System in his mind.

'... System, do you know anything about The First Cycle and The Forgotten Name?'

[DING]

[The First Cycle refers to the primordial era of existence, long before the current known history of gods, demons, angels, or mortals. It is the original age of creation when the foundations of reality were first laid by The Creators]

"..."

[For The Forgotten Name is not just a being, it is a concept, a fragment of primordial truth that was removed from existence during the First Cycle. It was once a Creator's voice, a Will that refused the convergence of fate. When it opposed the merging of Knowledge and Control, it was erased, sealed beneath countless veils of memory, and declared too dangerous to be remembered]

Taufik's eyes narrowed.

'Why would Knowledge and Control merge?'

[Because control is the cage, and knowledge is the key. When joined… They become dominion. Orobas seeks this union not for power, but to become the author of all truths]

A shiver ran through Taufik's core. The Cradle, the Vault, the Mask… All of it was part of something ancient and buried, not just in time, but in thought.

'Then what is sealed here… Is an echo of what reality was before Orobas rewrote the script'

[DING]

[Correct. The Forgotten Name is not a weapon. It is the Original Script, unfiltered, uncontrollable, and uncorrupted. To remember it fully would mean unraveling the lies of every era]

Aksara, still focused on the mask, asked aloud again.

"Why would Orobas go to such lengths? Even for him… This is dangerous"

The mask pulsed in a slower rhythm.

"Because he does not fear danger. He fears the truth. The truth is that he is not the architect... only the thief"

The floor beneath them rumbled again. From somewhere below, the Eye blinked.

....

...

..

.