"Gotta keep my cool," Luke muttered to himself.

His breathing came out in ragged gasps, and his eyes darted around the inky darkness.

His muscles were trembling, a sign that they were at their breaking point.

The creatures, the explosion, Atlan's disappearance— they all added to his stress. But what sent him spiraling into full-blown panic was what he'd seen just before regaining consciousness.

The Black Sun.

A symbol of chaos, pain, and death.

Luke had only witnessed it once before, when his mind had been flooded with psychic energy. He had lost consciousness amidst excruciating pain, only to wake up minutes later, covered in his own blood.

In his unconscious state, he had destroyed everything around him with such force that he had broken his body.

"What did I do? Did I kill Atlan? Those creatures? What now, Hannah?" These thoughts raced through his mind, like a macabre parade.

In a desperate attempt to calm himself, Luke shut his eyes.

"Alcohol to cure the hangover," he repeated like a mantra.

He'd heard it somewhere, a distant voice. He couldn't remember who, or where, or why. Was it even a memory, or something he'd heard in a delirium?

It didn't matter. Luke wanted to stop thinking.

He bolstered his mind and forced his senses to capture every detail of his surroundings.

His senses kicked into overdrive, processing the influx of information at a lightning speed.

It was sensory overload.

Luke decided to fill his mind with the outside world to prevent himself from overthinking.

Almost immediately, his heartbeat began to steady.

He took a few deep breaths, then started thinking again.

"The last time I saw the Black Sun, I couldn't move afterwards." He moved his shoulders, then his feet, one after the other.

"Ok, it's not that bad this time. But I need to know what happened. Those creatures weren't real, but the explosion was? Or was none of it real? I don't know..." His thoughts were now controlled, but he was still confused.

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His eyes widened with realization.

"At this point... If I've been in the Black Sun territory, I've already exposed too much. I don't know if anyone saw what I did... But if I'm to take that risk, I might as well do something useful."

He focused his psychic energy on his eyes, optic nerves, and cortex. His pupils began to shine faintly, like a predator's.

Suddenly, the darkness was no longer mysterious and inhospitable.

He had been welcomed into its midst, like a creature of the night.

Luke had developed all sorts of ways to use his energy, night vision was one of his earliest discoveries. The detail he disliked, which prevented him from using it more often, was the eerie glow it gave his pupils.

Their color intensified, and they glowed faintly, giving him an animalistic, unsettling look.

He did everything to keep his powers hidden from the lab. But here he didn't have a choice; his survival was at stake.

His eyes were the only things shining in the heavy darkness that enveloped the corridor.

He scanned the surroundings carefully.

Corpses everywhere, pale bodies, severed heads, limbs scattered here and there.

"So those creatures were real..." Luke thought, disgusted by what he saw.

The further he ventured into the corridor, the more careful he had to be not to step on a body part. And his worry grew.

Fear made his steps heavy, as if he was trudging through molasses. His sharp eyes refused to scrutinize the scene too closely.

The things we run from find us.

Like in a grim prophecy, Luke stumbled upon what he'd been dreading.

There on the ground was a severed hand.

A human hand with a still-attached bracelet, a bracelet he recognized all too well.

"The metal detector," he thought.

He stared at the hand, his eyelids almost entirely obscuring his horrified gaze.

He stood still, his head slightly tilted to the side, his hand firmly gripping his sword's hilt.

A horrible sensation in his stomach, in his throat.

He hiccuped.

He felt like vomiting.

Both because of what he saw and what it implied.

He disgusted himself.

"What have I done?" He asked himself several times.

But he quickly pulled himself together, he didn't want to leave any room for doubt to creep into his mind.

"Atlan wouldn't have died so easily. He would've fought back, and I'm not even injured. It could well be one of those creatures that did this," he thought.

Looking closer, he saw that the hand had been ripped off, not cut off.

"All the other bodies have been cut with precision, the technique is clean and precise. That came from me. But this. This is crude and brutal," he thought, relieved.

Looking around, he saw that a part of the wall and ceiling had collapsed, partially blocking the corridor. Searching the vicinity, Luke found blood that was lighter than the creatures', human blood.

"He's nowhere. No way to know if he's dead or alive... Damn it."

Atlan's condition worried him, but his own condition was just as uncertain.

The Black Sun had pushed his body to use high-level enhancement and fight with all his strength; he was exhausted, and everything hurt.

The taste of blood in his mouth, his right hand clenched so tight, he was afraid he wouldn't be able to hold his sword if he let go.

He didn't have much time left to fight. He had to find the target quickly, or this bunker would be his tomb.

"All in... Sorry, Hannah, I have to take another risk," he thought.