Greed froze mid-step, head tilting as though a whisper carried across the battlefield. His lips curled upward.

"Lust… is gone." His chains rattled, not from movement but from the subtle tremor of excitement in his frame. "Heh. An Eclipse Vanguard must be here. Only they could erase her completely."

Shun's grip on his sword tightened. His silver eye stayed locked on Greed, but his sealed left eye pulsed beneath the mark, dark tears leaking down his cheek. He didn't need to ask, he could feel the cursed thing gnawing at his mind.

"(Damn it… the seal is slipping faster than I thought. At this rate, I'll drown in the Void. I won't be Shun anymore.)"

Greed noticed the shift. His grin widened, blood still dripping from shallow cuts across his arms and chest. Shun's last technique had drawn blood—proof enough of his skill.

"I'll admit it," Greed said, voice sharp with both respect and mockery. "You're strong. Strong enough to stand on the same ground as an Eclipse Vanguard." His chains slithered back into his hands, ready to strike again. "But what you don't know is… we've already surpassed that. We grew stronger, thanks to him."

Shun's blade raised slightly, edge gleaming with wandering arcs of Shinrei. His voice was flat. "Him?"

Greed's grin sharpened. "You don't need to know."

He lunged. Chains erupted from his arms, silver links twisting into barbed whips that lashed forward with unnatural speed.

Shun slid sideways, cloak whipping in the wind. His blade flicked upward, catching one chain and knocking it aside. Another came low, he spun, sparks flying as steel met steel. His stance was tight, refined, honed by decades.

"Echo Art: Wandering Blade!"

The world flashed. Dozens of slashes, arcs of light given shape, tore through the air like spectral swords. They spiraled around him, homing in on Greed with impossible trajectories.

Chains snapped up in defense. Sparks exploded as the spectral blades collided, each strike slicing through or rebounding off. Cuts opened across Greed's arms, his chest, his legs. Black ichor spilled like tar.

"Tch… what an annoying technique!" Greed snarled, retreating half a step as his chains recoiled. His grin never faded. "But it won't be enough."

Shun exhaled, steadying his hand on the hilt. But the cursed eye pulsed again. His breath hitched.

"Kill."

A whisper slithered in his mind, low and guttural.

"Kill, kill, kill—use me, use us, unleash everything."

Shun clenched his jaw. "Shut up."

The voice laughed. "Why resist? With me, you could tear him apart. You know you want to. All it costs… is you."

His vision flickered, the battlefield split between light and shadow. He saw Greed in front of him, chains writhing. But beneath it, his cursed eye painted another image: not Greed, but prey. Everyone. Anything. All waiting to be consumed.

His hand trembled.

"(If I let this thing take over… there won't be a difference between me and them. But if I don't… I might not survive Greed at all.)"

Greed noticed the hesitation, the tremor, the spreading darkness creeping from Shun's eye. He grinned wider, chains rattling with excitement.

"Yes… that's it. That's what I sensed in you earlier. You're not just strong—you're tainted. You're ours."

Shun's blade lowered slightly, as if the weight of the cursed whispers pressed it down. His shoulders shook.

The void's voice swelled, overlapping Greed's mocking laughter.

"Use us. End him. Kill."

And for the first time, Shun couldn't tell if the scream in his head was the cursed eye's… or his own

His vision fractured. Black veins spiderwebbed across the sclera of his left eye as the tear widened until the seal broke.

A surge of darkness erupted from him, a cyclone of black flames mixed with raw void energy that blasted outward, cracking the marble beneath his feet and shattering the chains Greed had poised to strike. The battlefield quaked as if the world itself recoiled.

Shun staggered forward, his breath ragged. His sword trembled in his grip, but now it was wreathed in writhing shadowfire, the cursed energy shaping jagged extensions along its edge.

Greed's eyes widened, and for the first time, his grin faltered.

"So… you've given in." He licked his lips. "Hah! Yes, show me! Show me the monster you're hiding!"

Shun's voice tore from his throat distorted, layered with something inhuman.

"MONSTER…?" His blackened eye locked onto Greed. "THEN I'LL BE ONE."

He vanished.

A shockwave thundered through the hall as Shun's figure blurred, moving faster than even Greed's chains could track. His blade came down, cloaked in voidfire. Greed barely twisted aside, chains crossing in a desperate guard. The impact split the air with a deafening crack, the chains snapping under the force, shards of metal scattering like broken glass.

Greed stumbled, ichor spilling from a gash across his shoulder.

"Tch—!" He recoiled, chains reforming, spiraling outward like serpents. "So this is your true strength

But Shun didn't answer. His screams were wordless now, pure rage and hunger echoing from the cursed eye. Every strike was brutal, unrestrained, like an executioner swinging at the world itself. His blade cut through walls, pillars, even the air—voidfire leaving scars that pulsed like bleeding wounds in reality.

"(Stop… STOP—this isn't me! If I keep going… I'll—!)" Shun's human thoughts flickered, faint sparks swallowed in the ocean of the cursed voice.

"More. MORE. Devour him. Devour everything."

Greed laughed through bloodied lips, chains lashing desperately, trying to keep distance.

Shun roared, no longer Shun but a storm of void and fire, chasing Greed with relentless, monstrous speed. Every strike now was not just aimed to kill—

but to consume.

The hall quaked, chains snapping, walls collapsing under the cursed energy's pressure. Shun's blade screamed with each swing, hungry for flesh, hungry for Shinrei, hungry for everything.

Then—

"Sensei!!!"

The voice tore through the storm like a bell.

Shun froze mid-swing, his jagged blade locked inches from Greed's throat. His corrupted eye flickered, black tears running freely down his cheek. His chest heaved. Slowly, shakily, his head turned.

There—standing at the broken archway—was Kaen Suro.

The boy's eyes were wide, his fists clenched, but he didn't back away from the monstrous aura suffocating the air.

To Shun… Kaen wasn't just a student. He was family. When the boy had lost everything, it was Shun who had taken him in. Guided him. Carried him. And now—Kaen was looking at him not with fear… but with something far heavier.

Recognition.

Pain.

Love.

"Sensei… you…" Kaen's voice shook, but his gaze was steady. "…you're still you."

Shun staggered back a step, his blade trembling. The cursed whispers hissed violently.

"LIES. HE SEES THE MONSTER. SLICE HIM. DEVOUR HIM."

Shun pressed a hand against his face, clutching the cursed eye, his teeth grinding as he fought not to scream.

And then Rael stepped forward beside Kaen, his sharp glare cutting across the battlefield.

"Tch. He's not your sensei anymore. Look at him—he's a voidborn!"

The word cracked through the hall like thunder.

Kaen's head snapped toward Rael, his eyes blazing.

"NO!" His voice was raw, fierce. "Sensei is not a voidborn!.... he's my family!"

Shun's breath hitched. The cursed whispers faltered for the briefest heartbeat.

Greed tilted his head, amusement curling his lips. His blood dripped onto the floor, sizzling against the cursed fire's scars, but his grin never wavered.

"Family, hm?" His chains coiled lazily around him, glinting in the void's light. "How sweet. How pitiful."

Rael's gaze narrowed, snapping toward Greed.

"…You. You're one of them, aren't you?"

Greed smirked wider, licking the blood off his knuckles.

"Hoh… yes, I am. Eclipse of Greed." He spread his long fingers, chains jingling faintly. "Why? Do I reek too much for your delicate nose?"

Rael's lip curled. "You reek of shit Shinrei."

Greed chuckled, the sound low and grating. "That's harsh."

His grin sharpened, eyes sliding back to Shun. "But delicious. Because no matter what they say, Asamaru… that cursed eye is eating you alive. And sooner or later, not even your precious student will recognize you."

Shun's hands shook violently, his blade wavering between collapse and carnage.

"(Kaen… I… if you keep looking at me like that… I can't… I can't give in…!)"

But the cursed voice screamed louder, shrieking through his mind:

"SLICE THEM. DEVOUR THEM. THERE IS NO FAMILY. ONLY HUNGER."

Greed tilted his head, eyes darting across the battlefield. His smile widened when it landed on Kaen.

"Another cursed one… hoh. But yours…" His grin split, chains clinking as he leaned forward. "…yours is far superior."

Kaen's stomach dropped, his fists tightening. "What?"

The chains rattled as Greed's eyes slid toward Rael, his expression shifting into amusement.

"And you… a blessed body. Must be nice, hm? Your Shinrei sings in harmony—while his screams."

Rael spat to the side, lightning sparking faintly across his arms. "This shit…"

Greed's gaze drifted past them and then his grin sharpened like broken glass.

"Hoh. Reinforcements."

From the shattered archway, the thrum of Shinrei rippled in. Team 1 and Team 2 stormed in, weapons drawn, eyes wide as they caught sight of Shun's monstrous aura and Greed's towering figure.

Kai cracked his knuckles with a grin. Luka's arms flared with flame tattoos. Damon flexed his stone-clad fists.

Behind them, Sora yawned even as water gathered in his palm, Anaya clutched her remedy notebook like a charm, and Riku muttered sharp strategies under his hood.

The air shifted. Numbers were on their side now.

But Greed only laughed. His chains lashed into the floor, ripping open black sigils that bled across the stone. From them, dozens of voidborns clawed their way out—twisted beasts of shadow and bone, mouths gaping too wide, Shinrei leaking like smoke.

"I can't let you all overpower me… right?" Greed's smirk gleamed under the ruin's dim light.

Kaen's teeth clenched, his fire already spiraling at his fists. "This bastard."

The voidborn screeched, flooding forward like a wave of nightmares.

Shun's cursed aura flared uncontrollably, half his blade raised to slaughter, half trembling to protect. His eye burned, a black star dripping madness into his veins.

And in that single heartbeat, the battlefield split—

Greed commanding his endless voidborns.

Kaen, Rael, and the reinforcements preparing to stand their ground.

Shun—teetering on the knife's edge between savior and monster.

To be continue