The strands of energy that were moving towards his forehead stopped mid-air once more, as the force the Moon exerted over them increased. For a second, there seemed to be a deadlock between the forces, but slowly the upwards pull prevailed as the misty strands started to fly away once more.

‘Is this it?’

Red felt the pressure of the gaze diminish as it regained control, and he couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief. Even if the organ on his forehead was strong, it still wasn’t capable of taking away this energy from the Moon being.

Or so he thought.

All of a sudden, a splitting headache attacked him. Its source, however, wasn’t from the lunar gaze, but rather from the strange organ in his glabella. It started to pulse from inside his head, as if it was expanding, and for a second Red felt as if his head was about to explode. His heart started to pulse faster in rhythm with the strange organ, and the edges of his vision began to darken as blood was pumped faster and faster through his body.

As it turned out, despite having plenty of experience dealing with this sort of incapacitating pain, the youth didn’t suffer any less from it.

He gritted his teeth and reached out for his glabella. To his surprise, he didn’t feel anything there with his hands, despite the prevailing sensation in that area he felt from the inside, as if something wanted to burst from beneath his skin. Once more, Red was at a loss about what to do.

While he was dealing with this pain, the strands of energy that were floating upwards slowed down again as the absorption from the organ on his forehead strengthened. Sure enough, a few seconds later, these misty trails started to be pulled back towards him once more.

The youth was dismayed as he saw this. With no other choice, he gritted his teeth and braced himself for what was about to come.

The Lunar Gaze fell back on him with renewed anger, its crushing pressure exerting itself upon his mind as it tried to pull back the strands of energy. While that was happening, though, the pain he felt from his glabella hadn’t diminished, and suddenly Red found his head being torn apart by two opposing forces.

Even for him, this was too much.

He grunted in pain. “Ugh… I-I can’t-”

Blood started to flow down his nose from his exertion. The youth could almost feel his brain spasm and contract as it tried to resist these forces, to no avail. His senses started to weaken and his body began to give out as Red felt the darkness of unconsciousness surround him. He couldn’t even pay attention to the situation with the strands of energy any longer, focusing instead on finding a way to stay alive.

‘All this fight… for a meager amount of Moonstone energy?’

His special acupoints could barely hold a small amount of the energy. It was a small fraction of what was contained in the insectoid core, which in turn paled in comparison to the unending stream of energy moving towards the Moon up above. And yet, here he was, fighting for his life because of it.

He didn’t understand why the organ in his head behaved like so. Was it a natural reaction? A reflex, perhaps? He didn’t know, but what puzzled him even more was the attitude of the being in the Moon. It was willing to fight even for these insignificant strands, which the youth couldn’t imagine would be of much importance to it.

Yet, it wanted it. Not because it needed it, but because this energy belonged to it. No rational thinking would help Red understand it. This he understood, and yet he felt bewilderment and indignation all the same.

“What are… doing?!” Aurelia’s muffled voice reached his ears. “You need to… awake! You… die!”

Even if he barely understood her words, he could guess what she meant. The youth couldn’t fall unconscious. There was no guarantee the organ in his head would stop afflicting him even if he wasn’t there to feel it, so falling unconscious instead would be leaving his fate to things outside of his control.

Yet, that was exactly what was happening right now. Awake or not, he couldn’t do anything to resist these forces.

“I can’t…” Red said in a weak voice.

“You… focus!” Aurelia said, her voice even fainter. “… use… consciousness!”

‘Consciousness?’

Red was confused at these words, however, they gave him a sudden idea. He closed his eyes and started to chant the mudra for his meditation technique out loud while executing the hand seals. He had gotten to a point where he didn’t need to do these preparations to enter a meditative state, but that was under normal conditions where he could focus.

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Right now, the situation made that almost impossible, so Red reverted to executing the technique in the normal way. His senses were so weak that he couldn’t even tell if he was being successful, but that didn’t matter. As he found out a long time ago, intent and visualization were the most important thing to grasp when executing this technique, and this was something the youth grasped instinctually.

Sure enough, a few seconds later, he felt his expanded awareness inside of his body, and an immediate sense of clarity appeared. What concerned him immediately, though, was how disconnected he felt from his physical senses after doing this. The Radiant Current technique allowed him to enter a meditative state, expanding one’s own consciousness to regard one’s own body as if from the eyes of an outsider. It created a sense of aloofness regarding your motor skills and senses, but the connection would still be there, even if faint at best.

Right now, though, Red felt almost disconnected from his body, as if he was back in that Sea of Stars. This time, however, he could sense through his awareness that he was indeed still inside his physical form, and that’s where his concern grew.

‘Is this because I’m on the verge of unconsciousness?’

The youth couldn’t tell, but he knew this couldn’t mean anything good. What if he fell unconscious while he was in this state? What would happen?

‘No, that’s not what I should concern myself with.’

He was almost dying right now. The first thing he needed to worry about was how to stop that from happening.

His expanded awareness reached towards his head, where the main war was being fought. The situation there was drastic indeed, as Red felt his brain spasm and the blood in his head flow at an increased pressure and speed. It all was centered around this strange organ of energy, which now pulsed with renewed intensity.

‘Aurelia wanted me to use my consciousness, but how?’

Even through this state, he could feel the extreme suction force the thing in his glabella was exerting. It didn’t affect his physical body, but Red was almost certain that if he got close to that, his consciousness would be swept up and sent to who knows where, and there was no guarantee it would end as well as it did when he forced himself asleep. It was why he was so hesitant to approach it with his expanded awareness.

‘… then how?’

It was clear that this organ still interacted with his physical body, or else his head wouldn’t have been in so much pain as soon as it started to flare. Red thought that maybe there was a way to use his physical functions to contain it, but he didn’t have any idea how to do that. This meditative state was just used to control his emotional state and inspect his body, not to exert minute control over his bodily functions.

‘Wait!’

Red had a sudden idea. He might not be able to exert control over his bodily functions, but he knew something that could.

His awareness moved towards the pit of his stomach, finding his target in a hurry. A small floating sphere of crimson mist, resting unmoving in place. It had been that way since Full Moon after expending its energy to keep his body from collapsing, and the youth had left it alone to recover.

Now, however, he didn’t have any choice but to request its help.

“Please, wake up… I need your help.”

There was no response other than a small stirring in the crimson sphere.

Red was starting to feel hopeless. “If you don’t help me, I am probably going to die.”

There was finally a response, as that weak, calming voice responded. “I… can’t… I’m too weak.”

This was exactly what the youth was afraid of hearing.

“Then teach me… Help me put a stop to this.”

There was a prolonged silence as the mist continued to stir, as if in deep thought.

“There is… no time.” it said. “But for you… I give it all. You… my last and only hope.”

The mist suddenly fell still again, leaving Red confused.

A few seconds later, though, the youth felt his body undergo a change. A lot of the pressure he was in suddenly disappeared, and bit by bit, his senses recovered. The youth used his expanded awareness to inspect the area around his head, only to find out that the strange organ was still active, exerting its absorption even if its intensity had diminished.

This, in turn, only left one option as to what could have changed.

Red left his meditative state before opening his eyes again. As he came into full control of his body, he felt that the Lunar Gaze had indeed completely disappeared, and the mist trails were completely absorbed into his forehead.

“Y-You… What did you do?” Aurelia asked in confusion

Red, however, was also at a loss for words. “I don’t know. Something chang-…”

He trailed off as his vision trailed up. The night sky was still there, as well as the seven currents of energy flowing towards it. However, what stood out to Red was the Moon. Or rather, the being on it.

The youth never could quite distinguish its form, but one thing he was sure of was that it was always “squirming.” Yet now, when he looked at it again, it seemed to have fallen completely still. He was confused before something else caught his attention.

The rivers of flashing light in the sky seemed to undergo a change. Amidst the endless flashing green lights, another color suddenly appeared.

Crimson red.

At first, it was just a few lights. But then, they started to grow in number, and soon enough, all seven of these green light rivers had hundreds of crimson light in their midst, all still flowing towards the New Moon and the being on its surface.

Nothing seemed to be happening to the celestial body, but Red could feel deep in his bones that a change he couldn’t yet see was taking place. A few seconds later, the lunar being started to move again. Its movements, however, weren’t the same. Instead, it seemed to be more frenzied, as sections of its body that were wrapped around the Moon began to move all at once, in a chaotic and violent state.

And that was when it happened. The dark, once shadowed Moon started to glow - but not in its usual, mellow white light. Instead, it seemed to glow with a faint crimson-light.

“You… What have you done?” Aurelia asked, her voice tinged with genuine fear.

It was at that moment that Red realized he wasn’t the only one that could see it. Indeed, it was dawning on him now that the whole world, far and wide, could probably see what was happening.

A blood Moon, bathing the entire world in its maroon color. An omen of destruction and horror untold.