Inside the temple hall, the sound of cracking glass kept spreading.
Slow.
Sharp.
Relentless.
The soldiers froze around the pedestal.
Thin fractures crawled across the Mirror's surface like spiderwebs.
One soldier stepped back.
"…this wasn't supposed to happen."
The tall spy's face had gone pale.
"Put it down," he ordered quickly.
"Now."
The soldiers lowered the Mirror back onto the pedestal.
But the cracks didn't stop.
They spread wider.
Faster.
Inside the Mirror world, the sky above the lake was breaking apart.
Fragments of reflected stone and light split across the horizon.
Eunwoo knelt on the ground, shaking.
His hands pressed against the grass.
His breathing came out uneven.
Constance's final moment replayed in his mind again and again.
The sound of the blade leaving its sheath.
The soft thud of her body hitting the floor.
Her walking stick rolling away.
And the silence afterward.
He had watched all of it.
And he had done nothing.
Because he couldn't.
Because the power of the Mirror had rules.
Because he was useless.
The lake began to tremble violently.
Ripples turned into waves.
Cracks split across the sky of the Mirror world.
Eunwoo slowly lifted his head.
His eyes were empty now.
"…I hate this world."
The ground shattered beneath him.
Outside, the Mirror exploded.
A deafening sound tore through the temple hall.
Glass shattered in every direction.
A blinding burst of light erupted from the pedestal.
The soldiers screamed.
The blast tore through the stone walls like a storm.
Temple pillars cracked.
The roof split open.
The shockwave rushed outward across the courtyard.
Across the temple grounds.
Across the city.
Everything in its path was swallowed by the explosion of light and shattered glass.
Inside the storm of fragments—
The shards did not fall.
They floated.
Thousands of glittering pieces hung in the air.
And from the vapor rising from them—
A figure appeared.
A man.
Tall.
Beautiful.
His hair flowed like pale silver in the glowing haze.
A cloth blindfold covered his eyes.
His expression twisted in grief.
The soldiers who still lived stared in horror.
"…what is that?"
The man didn't look at them.
He only looked down.
At the floor.
At what remained of Constance.
The explosion had torn the temple apart.
Stone.
Wood.
Ash.
And fragments of the girl who had stood in the doorway.
The man collapsed to his knees beside her.
His hands trembled as he gathered what little remained.
A broken piece of cloth.
A strand of her braid.
Dust.
His voice cracked.
A sound escaped him.
Not a word.
Not a scream.
A wail.
Deep.
Raw.
The sound of someone who had lost everything.
The floating shards around him began to glow brighter.
And brighter.
Then—
They exploded outward.
The storm of glass shot across the city.
Anything the shards touched simply disappeared.
Buildings collapsed.
Soldiers vanished.
Fire spread across the capital.
Within seconds—
The entire city was gone.
Reduced to ruin and ash.
The glowing fragments dissolved into vapor one by one.
The blindfolded man still knelt in the center of the devastation.
Holding the last remains of Constance.
His shoulders shook.
"…I'm sorry."
His voice was barely a whisper.
The wind carried away the final shards.
And with them—
The man disappeared.
Leaving nothing behind but silence.
Three days later.
The ruins of the capital were quiet.
Smoke still drifted from broken stone.
Collapsed walls and shattered streets stretched endlessly in every direction.
Almost nothing remained.
A lone figure walked slowly through the destruction.
Harun.
The old shopkeeper adjusted the bag on his shoulder and sighed heavily.
"Well…"
He looked around the empty wasteland.
"That escalated."
He had heard the stories.
Everyone had.
The day the sacred Mirror exploded.
The day an entire city vanished.
Most people stayed far away from the ruins.
Harun, however, was a curious man.
And he knew something about strange artifacts.
He stepped carefully over broken stone and stopped near the remains of the temple.
Or what used to be the temple.
Only fragments of walls remained.
He scratched his beard.
"…figured it would end badly."
As he turned to leave, something glinted faintly beneath the dust.
Harun paused.
He crouched down slowly.
Brushing the ash aside with his hand.
A small piece of glass lay there.
A shard.
Smooth.
Unbroken.
Harun stared at it for a long moment.
"…so you survived."
His expression softened slightly.
Not fear.
Not excitement.
Just quiet pity.
He picked up the shard gently.
The glass felt cold in his hand.
For a second, he thought he saw something faint moving inside the reflection.
Then it vanished.
Harun sighed again.
"Alright."
He opened his worn travel bag.
Inside, among old trinkets and strange artifacts—
Sat a familiar object.
The ugly frog statue.
Harun placed the Mirror shard beside it.
The frog stared upward with its crooked stone eyes.
Harun closed the bag and slung it over his shoulder.
"Well," he muttered.
"Let's get moving."
And with that, the old shopkeeper walked away from the ruins.
Leaving the dead city behind.