The room was tiny, just enough space for a desk and a chair.

There were no windows, just a door directly behind the office chair.

It was more of a closet than a room.

On the desk, six small screens each displayed a different image.

A man sat in front of the screens, bathed in their bluish light.

He looked at them but paid no attention to what was happening. His attention was turned inward, to the past, to his memories.

[A month ago]

His hands buried in a hole in the wall, he carefully placed a trap.

In the corridor of the bunker where he was, his attention was divided between what he was doing with his hands, and the crackling voice of the radio at his feet.

"The Deputy Consul of the Ymile Peninsula visited the capital of the Praell region today... Tzzzz..." The radio signal struggled and intermittently cut off. "...Joyously celebrating the 50th anniversary of the peninsula's unification... Tzzzz... Some observers are concerned about disturbances in the capital caused by separatists... Tzzz..." The radio then switched to a commercial.

The man withdrew his hands from the hole, stepped back a few paces, and observed his work, arms crossed.

He gave a small satisfied smile, then began to mix sand with cement to fill the hole.

"Neil," echoed a voice in the dimly lit corridor, illuminated by a few still-working lamps hanging from the ceiling.

Neil stopped mixing the cement and turned his head.

A man was approaching.

Tall and thin, his hair was very light blond, almost golden. His eyes were an equally clear blue, reminiscent of a morning sky.

He was clean-shaven but his hair was tousled, as if he had just woken up from a nap.

He wore a white button-up shirt to the neck, blue shorts, and black flip-flops.

His hands were in his pockets, and he had a small contented smile as he looked at Neil.

On seeing him, Neil jumped to his feet. "Boss, what are you doing here?" he asked, half confused, half panicked.

"I've told you to call me by my name," the man in the shirt calmly replied.

"Um... Yes, sorry... Loyre," Neil said awkwardly, his body rigid, as if paralyzed.

Loyre stopped by the hole Neil was about to close, leaning his back against the wall.

"So how's it going?" he asked.

"I... I'm sorry. I wanted to talk to you about it, but..." Neil stopped speaking, searching for his words.

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He was staring at the ground, as if he couldn't bear Loyre's gaze.

"You don't need to explain. You're one of my men, but that doesn't make you a prisoner. You have free will," Loyre said, fixing his gaze on him.

"Thank you... But you deserved to know what I'm doing here... I should have told you," Neil replied.

Neil was a rather small man, with a sculpted body.

His thick eyebrows and square jaw gave him the look of a caveman.

Despite his physical impressiveness, he seemed childlike in Loyre's presence.

He couldn't maintain eye contact, fidgeted nervously with his hands, and stammered.

His three line tattoo on his neck indicated he had successfully undergone the lab's experiments.

"I know good intentions drove you to do this," Loyre said in a reassuring tone. Neil didn't reply.

"You plan to booby-trap the entire bunker and draw the men from the North Lab here. Die while taking as many enemies with you as possible?" Loyre asked.

It took Neil a few seconds to reply.

"We have a card to play here. If they know an Eclipse member is here, they'll definitely bring a level 2 to make sure they capture me! You know after 'the incident' their forces are reduced and they can't afford to lose a single level 2," Neil explained.

He had regained his confidence.

Loyre listened attentively.

"Do you want to die?" he asked.

"I want to be useful," Neil answered.

Loyre took a deep breath and sighed. "If that's the path you've chosen, I can't stop you," he said.

He straightened up from the wall and stretched his arms above his head.

He then noticed Neil had a sad look on his face, a sadness mixed with bitterness.

"I have a question, Boss... uh... Loyre," Neil said.

"I'm listening."

Neil took a deep breath as if to gather courage. "What does it feel like to be free?" he asked simply.

Loyre seemed surprised to hear this. "In what way am I more free than you?" he asked.

"Because you're strong. You're the strongest person I know. Maybe the most powerful in the world," Neil said with admiration and envy.

"Ah... The strong are free? Is that what you believe?" Loyre asked.

He averted his gaze from Neil and looked around him, at the bunker walls, before answering.

"This strength is a prison," he simply said.

Neil looked surprised. He shook his head gently from side to side, disagreeing. "It's a prison to do what you want when you want? No one can stop you. No one can force you to do anything... I..." he hesitated. "I envy you," he finally admitted.

Loyre had a peaceful expression on his face. "I know. I also desired this power... But when you're at the top, the only thing that changes is that you see the strings dictating your movements more easily," Loyre said, letting his gaze wander over the cracks in the wall.

Neil looked at him without really understanding his words. But he didn't doubt his sincerity, and at that moment, he didn't envy the feelings of the man he admired so much.

Loyre came out of his apathy and waved goodbye to Neil. "I just came to say goodbye. Thank you for the time you've spent helping the Eclipse, and..." He took on a slightly more solemn air. "Good luck."

Neil nodded his head without saying anything.

Loyre turned around and started to walk back the way he came, but he added one last thing.

"Beware of good intentions. The serpent knows how to be convincing," he said cryptically.

Then he disappeared around the corner of the corridor. Neil was left alone, with his traps and his will to sacrifice.

The memory of that day faded when Neil saw on one of his screens that Luke was dangerously close to his position.

"Damn... How does he know where I am?" he muttered, bringing the back of his index finger to his mouth. He bit nervously into the skin of his finger, thinking about all the possibilities he had at his disposal to stop Luke.

"I don't want to activate my traps for three agents, two of whom are injured... I have to save them for the bulk of the unit, and especially for the level 2... So... I'll use... Hmm."

He took a few moments, his eyes sliding over the keys of the keyboard in front of him.

Then he pressed a series of keys, and changed the view on one of his screens.

It now showed an empty corridor. A trapdoor opened on the floor.

"Come out... You must be hungry..." Neil said, staring at the screen.

Red eyes appeared, large as tennis balls.

Then the creature let out a roar that shook the walls.

This roar sent a chill down the spines of the three agents making their way through the labyrinthine corridors of the bunker.

Something terrible had been unleashed.