Chapter 156: 666 vs. 431 [1]

Cold.

Dark.

Lonely.

It didn't hurt anymore.

Azriel felt… nothing. Just a numbness, like he was drifting through a bottomless, frozen ocean.

There was a strange peace in it. A stillness. Maybe he was trapped in some old memory, or maybe he'd slipped into a different reality altogether.

Azriel didn't know. He'd stopped trying to understand long ago—stopped grasping at the remnants of a world that shattered in a single day.

'This feels... nice.'

'It's quiet, comfortable.'

'Is this what dying is really like?'

'Am I already dead?'

He'd escaped true death twice before. Maybe, this third time, he'd finally reached it—an actual ending.

He sank deeper, letting it carry him, unresisting.

'I'm tired…'

The further he sank, the more he felt something essential slipping away—something so precious he couldn't even define it. But he didn't notice. Not fully.