Location: Deck 4 – Forbidden Archives Compartment
Time: 02:47 AM, 4 hours after the Crown was forged.
Status: REDACTED. Cloaked. Forgotten by design.
A room that doesn't exist.
That's where Professor Saravak made his nest.
Not in the physical sense—
But in the space between belief and memory.
It was hidden behind five doors, each unlocked not by keys…
…but by false memories the visitor must believe to even step through.
And tonight, the hunter was not lost—
But the one who would rewrite the maze itself.
⸻
💠 Kaen: Mind-Shaper, Crown-Bearer
Inside the Mind Palace, Kaen's steps echoed down the Hall of Mirrors—
the newest wing born from his confrontation with the illusion assassin.
"Mora," he said aloud, inside and out,
"I need a map of memories that aren't real."
She blinked, adjusting the swirling projection orb above her palm.
"You want me to make a path… of lies?"
Kaen nodded.
"To defeat a liar, I'll need to walk on their own stage.
Let's bait the librarian with the smell of burning pages."
Renzu chuckled from the background.
"That's delightfully evil, you know. I'm proud of us."
⸻
🌀 A Memory Labyrinth
In Deck 4, Kaen approached the first false door.
It looked like a janitor's closet.
Only those who remembered sweeping this hallway five times could see it open.
Kaen stared at it, eyes glowing with the Crown of Clarity.
"Let me remember what never was…"
He reached into the Mind Palace—
and conjured an artificial memory of cleaning this hallway, whistling with a mop.
Click.
The door swung open.
And behind it—
a hallway made of books, with no titles.
Each book screamed when he passed.
⸻
📚 Enter: Saravak, the Memory Librarian
Saravak stood at the center of a vast, floating library.
Hair like wet feathers, skin like aged paper, and eyes made of bookmarks.
"Child-King," Saravak murmured.
"You trespass in the sacred domain of revision."
Kaen walked toward him, aura coiling like a snake in a storm.
"You rewrote a prince.
You attacked my mind.
You tried to erase my companion."
Saravak smiled gently, tilting his head.
"Because you are not meant to exist."
Kaen's heart skipped.
"…What did you say?"
⸻
🧬 Truth Fragment: Kaen's Forbidden Birth
Saravak extended a palm, and a floating memory-thread unraveled into a vision.
It was Whale Island—years ago.
A lab. A woman sobbing. And a white-haired man with a pipe speaking into a recorder.
"The Mind Palace is stabilizing. He's absorbing theoretical Nen logic like instinct. This child will… shift the power balance. The Zodiacs will kill for it."
Kaen's mother tried to flee. They branded her as mentally ill.
She escaped. Raised him in silence.
"Your birth was not an accident, Kaen," Saravak whispered.
"You are designed."
Kaen stepped forward—eyes wide, fists clenched.
⸻
🔥 Kaen's Wrath: Palace Warcry
"Then I was born to burn down every lie you wrote."
Boom.
Kaen's Nen surged—
And the Hall of Mirrors flooded through the false library like wildfire.
Every fake book around Saravak shattered into glass and smoke.
The librarian screamed.
"NO! These were carefully arranged!!"
Kaen formed a new sigil—
⸻
👑 Crown Construct – Memory Guillotine
A blade of light that severs an opponent's ability to recall or utilize any constructed memory.
A weapon against the rewriters.
Kaen raised it.
Saravak reached for a final tome—
But the blade came down.
SLASH
His bookmarks burst into flame. His aura flickered and cracked.
"I remember… nothing…"
Kaen stared down at the trembling figure.
"Good.
Now rebuild yourself with the truth—
Or stay lost in the lie."
He walked past him, deeper into the library.
⸻
🧩 Epilogue – Fragment of a Name
Among the burning memories, Kaen saw a name etched in gold:
"XEL'RA."
It wasn't a name from the human world.
Not a Hunter. Not a prince.
It felt ancient. Alien.
The Mind Palace pulsed.
Mora: "Kaen… I think we've opened something much older than Nen."
And beneath the ship—
in the abyssal floors the princes didn't even know existed—
something stirred.
⸻
🔥 TO BE CONTINUED IN CHAPTER 41 – Xel'ra, The Name Not Spoken