The VIP of nightmares
Chapter 15
Everywhere fell silent.
Not even a whisper.
Not even a single breath too loud.
The air itself felt like it froze.
Eidolon tensed even more, his muscles tightening instinctively as if preparing for something he couldn't see. The children around him stood just as still, trembling but silent-because all of them felt it.
They weren't just waiting for someone.
They were waiting for something.
He felt it before he saw it: a pressure in the air, sharp and ancient like the weight of a forgotten god pressing on his chest.
Then-
A metallic click echoed across the arena.
A door opened on the highest platform of the coliseum... a room built with polished black stone, decorated in gold, draped in symbols no child should understand. But Eidolon understood one thing:
VIP.
A room made for someone above the hooded figures. Above the demon woman. Above everything in this nightmare.
And then it stepped out.
The figure looked like an old man at first glance-wrinkled skin, bent spine, one foot already in the grave. But the moment Eidolon truly looked at him, a shiver stabbed straight into his bones.
This wasn't a human pretending to be powerful.
This was a monster pretending to be weak.
His aura was completely different from the hooded demon woman. Hers was cold, venomous, like poison sliding on his skin. But this thing-this old man-its aura was heavy, suffocating, crushing. A fog-like smog spilled from his body, drifting lazily around him like it had its own consciousness.
And in that fog...
Eidolon saw it.
A demon's face.
Twisted. Grinning.
Laughing directly at him.
It mocked him silently, its mouth stretching impossibly wide, its eyes burning with ancient hunger. Every time the fog pulsed, the demon face shifted-laughing harder, sharper, crueler.
Eidolon's stomach clenched painfully.
This aura... this presence...
It made the demon woman feel like a mere shadow.
He hated it immediately.
Every instinct in him screamed that this thing-whatever it truly was-was far, far more dangerous than anything he had ever seen.
The old man took one step forward, and the entire coliseum bowed without being told.
Thousands of hooded figures knelt.
Even the children dropped to their knees out of sheer terror.
Only Eidolon-standing frozen, trembling, staring at the fog demon laughing at him-remained upright.
Not because he was brave.
But because his body refused to obey the fear.
The old man's dead eyes slowly lifted...
And locked onto Eidolon.
The fog demon's grin widened.
And Eidolon knew-
This nightmare was only just beginning.
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