Toku sat atop a tower near the center of the royal grounds, leaning back on one elbow as he stretched his legs forward.

Before traveling here to the “other side”, the bird god Tori and his colleagues had briefed the Boomtown legends, as well as he and Dario, of the relationship between the two planes of existence.

Their side, where he’d lived all his life, was the side where things came to be. This side, however, was where things ended. It was where people’s existences—who they were, who they could be—was all erased.

But as to how that happened, they hadn’t been told.

Toku had imagined some sort of continuous culling—especially when the bird gods and the Boomtown legends had described the feline deities of the other side as prison officers.

If the scarred man’s words were to be believed, the reality was far less violent, but also incredibly bleak.

Everything in this plane of existence, down to even the water they drank and the food they ate, served to slowly but effectively erode each inhabitant’s existence. To live was to die in body, mind, and spirit. The only ones unaffected by this were the warden and his officers—and those of their blood.

Toku pulled a long pipe out of his holding space and lit it. After a few puffs he leaned back, watching the smoke dissipate into the sky. The light was fading away, and from his discussion with the scarred man, nightfall would likely bring with it the second layer’s officer and its forces.

He chuckled and muttered to himself, “What am I even thinking about? Even if I somehow found her, I probably wouldn’t have recognized her anyway. It’s been so long…”

Gazing wistfully into the distance, he sighed. “I wish sh’was still alive. Wonder wha’ she’d thinka me naw.”

It was only during such private moments of contemplation that he allowed his old way of speaking to return. Despite the many, many classes he’d endured as the new Warrior King of Kaita to learn the “right” way to act, his old habits just felt more comfortable. Still, he understood the need to act the part, so he only allowed himself to relax in private.

Truthfully, he missed it. When his world had been simply himself, his mother, and whatever the world threw at them… he’d been happy.

Becoming Kaita’s Warrior King had been a wonderful surprise—he’d always known himself to be strong, but he’d always thought that the fancy warriors of the governing houses would have been stronger. It had been absolutely exhilarating to find himself superior to them.

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The first few years had been most exciting as well, filled with battles, wars… even countless assassination attempts. But over the years, all that had quieted down, and he’d been left chasing the dragon of excitement.

But maybe he’d just been searching for the same sense of adventure he’d had in his youth, hiking through the countryside with his mother, living off the land.

He shook that train of thought out of his head and sat up, shifting forward until his legs were hanging over the edge of the tower’s roof.

Despite the scarred man’s prediction that the warden’s forces would attack in the night, the land beyond the city walls was tranquil as far as Toku could see. As for inside the city, just a few hours ago, everyone had been hustling about to prepare the city’s defenses, but they’d finished and were now simply waiting.

Toku continued to indulge in the pipe as he contemplated his role in all this—the scarred man had only told him that his job was to kill the officer responsible for their continued suffering. Such had been prophesied. But as for what would happen between now and that point, and as to how that would happen…

He wasn’t sure.

After tapping away the pipe’s ashes and refilling it, Toku placed the pipe between his lips again. Just as he did so, though, a red-tailed hawk descended from the clouds and landed next to him.

“Are you the one from the mountain?” Toku absentmindedly muttered.

The red-tailed hawk tilted its head as it observed Toku, who started to feel a strange tingle on the back of his neck. With a quick wave of his hand the pipe disappeared and Toku’s sheathed sword appeared in its place.

He stared at the hawk. Something about it just didn’t seem quite right, but Toku wasn’t quite sure what.

He soon found out. The red-tailed hawk’s eyes suddenly glowed a bright red, and its beak opened wide. So wide, actually, that it continued to open until the hawk’s head had completely split in half.

In its place was a crossbow, its string already pulled back with a loaded bolt.

Toku’s eyes shot wide open as he unsheathed his sword and swung it toward the hawk. At the same time, the loaded bolt shot out towards Toku’s head.

With his senses heightened by the adrenaline coursing through his body, Toku was somehow able to adjust the trajectory of his sword just enough that the edge of his blade hit the bolt’s head.

Once he felt the contact, Toku instinctively relaxed for just a split second—but then the bolt’s head exploded.

Every head in the city whipped towards the palace’s central tower as a massive explosion demolished its highest few stories. Seconds later, shouts sounded from all around the city.

“Intruders! Attackers inside the city!”

The scarred man scowled as he looked toward the central tower from his position atop the city walls. “We were too careless.”

“What do you mean, sir?” A man near him asked. “Even if there are attackers inside the city, it can’t be more than a handful. We’ve been on guard all—”

“That’s not an excuse. Clearly they were aware of our savior’s presence and were able to single him out for an assassination attempt. Our fight for freedom could have ended before it even truly began.”

The scarred man watched as, in the distance, Toku flipped himself around midair and landed atop a building’s rooftop.

“Thankfully, it seems that our savior is as strong as we’d hoped. He seems to be alive and well.”

After another moment of observation, the scarred man chuckled. “And a bit pissed off, it seems.”