{Outside The Projection}
Someone whispered. Could've been anyone. Could've been everyone. But the moment it escaped, the entire hall went quiet.
Before them, the projection floated high, its image frozen—Malik, calmly standing tall before a crater of pure annihilation. He took no breath, showed no movement, and only stood.
Their Sultan had survived.
He hadn't won; no, he had survived.
And more than that, he guided certain death away.
"Return by Death, huh..."
"How many blinks did we see?"
"I don't think even a Mithqal could count it."
"He was torn apart every single time."
"His eyes, brother. His eyes, they... they..."
"Every time. Red, red, red… and then—BOOM!"
"Did you see how the wall went?"
"Yeah! Not exploded—imploded."
"The world gave up on holding it together."
"And, heh, the Sultan didn't even flinch."
They all looked again at the projection.
He had successfully burned through the loop.
Now, he stood up there, staring Cyrus down.
Unafraid. Seemingly unbothered.
They weren't seeing things.
A Jinn had indeed defended himself against a Mithqal—something that somehow felt even more impossible than defeating IT, a thing that they had forgotten.
It was beyond unbelievable and impossible.
Even Layla couldn't keep awe from creeping into her expression.
With her blood dripping hands clasped over her mouth, silent tears streaking down her cheeks, she looked up at the projection.
"That's my husband..."
Huda, standing not far beside her, let out a long, shaky breath.
"No one... no one can ever use the curse like he did..."
She looked down, her voice lowering.
"Most of us wouldn't have even survived the first loop."
Her anger was still burning, but for the moment, her "big brother's" accomplishment absolutely dwarfed it, making her forget about her uncle, the one responsible.
But not everyone had such incredible pride in their chest.
Roya, standing where she always was, said nothing... again.
One might expect her sadistic self to have enjoyed his torture like she had once before, but no, her eyes didn't even flicker. She only stared at the floating image like it was some sort of painting that she saw in passing. Just one more mural of impressive madness.
Whatever she felt, she buried deep, never allowing it out.
Noor, though… Noor was shaking.
Of course, it wasn't from fear.
It was from fury. Perhaps barely suppressed awe.
These emotions originated from something she never wanted to admit.
From something that now, she could not deny, at least not to herself.
It came from that tight-chested envy that made her want to slice the world in half.
Indeed, the Emperor of Light had taken the King of Dumbasses's place.
But, though they felt the same emotion, it wasn't for the same reason.
Far from it. Faqir's envy was born out of their shared starting point.
A commonality between them that made the Sultan someone to be compared to.
Noor's envy, however, was a lot more different, less personal.
A system was bestowed upon her.
She had the skills. The talent.
Her voice could barely be heard.
"Never done something like that."
Despite all that she had, she could never hope to do what he did.
Because this wasn't a man simply bending a spell, this was a man breaking the world's very system. Reforging it into something only he could navigate. This was Malik, without saying a single word, acknowledging the concept of Divine Ranks and spitting in its face.
"How... how do you even beat someone like that? How did we c-capture him?"
Someone below her said what she and the entire crowd were thinking.
And, of course, no one could answer him, not even Roya.
This naturally made them reach one conclusion and one alone.
Malik, their Sultan, the "Villain," the "Devil's Spawn," the Wielder Of Spine Breaker, the Stranger, the Flipper Of Armies, the Lifter Of The Gate, the Bane Of Corruption, the Bearer Of Ouroborus, the Weaver Of Fate, he...
He allowed them to win.
He had let himself be captured.
He had let himself be sent to the guillotine.
This break... he had taken it himself.
This revelation, or late realization, had shocked them to Hell and back.
Even Roya, the one titled THE broker, was surprised, unable to hide her shock.
Despite all that she saw and heard, the constant repetition of the word "break," how he always called himself tired, and how he grew more and more insane, she had never once considered that Malik had let them win.
Why had she overlooked something that was staring her right in the face?
Why had she, the one who had mostly kept her calm from beginning to end, miss something once more, something so important, like that time with the Aether cores?
Was it due to her pride? Her belief in herself? Her grudge?
Was she, like Noor, an arrogant woman?
She did not believe that at all.
Unlike her, she was not Blessed with a system.
Knowledge. That was all she had as a regressor.
Knowledge of the future, of the day Malik had killed her.
Still, ignoring that for a moment... Roya didn't know how to feel about it.
She didn't know how to feel about his self-claimed death or her repeated mistakes.
Was her revenge meaningless now? Wasn't it only fulfilling what her enemy wanted?
She thought herself better than this, claiming that last time was a fluke, a result of her emotions, her dying thirst to see Malik in pain, resulting in a mistake that would never, ever, be repeated.
Or perhaps it was wrong of her to think that way.
This could be something natural, something to expect when dealing with him.
After all, he was her killer, a man who stabbed her once and left her body to rot.
A man whom she despised more than anything in this world.
So, and again, all of this was so damn shocking to her that she, like most of the others in the crowd, made another 'mistake.'
They had failed to notice that someone was missing.
This 'someone' hadn't been seen throughout the unfathomable number of blinks that had unfolded before them.
Indeed... that someone was Crimson.
A momentarily cute little owl who was supposed to be on Malik's shoulder.
The bird was nowhere to be seen, and nearly everyone in the hall forgot about him, save for Huda, who worried for him, silently wondering where he had gone.
Perhaps there was a lot more to him than they suspected.
In any case, even if their grim realization and 'mistake' were to be ignored, the crowd still wouldn't erupt in cheers.
Some victories were too heavy for celebration.
Some moments were too vast for sound.
This was one of them.
Instead, they watched. Waiting. Wondering—
What was he going to say? What came next for him?
Would his tragedy ever come to a pause?
They could only wish...
They could only wish.
Soon after, the projection shimmered again. A new moment stirring.
Malik had yet to speak, but they knew, whatever came out of his mouth next…
It wasn't just for Cyrus.
It was for all of them.
And as the light shifted once more, as the pressure built, Malik opened his mouth.
The next second finally began.