Aetheric Chronicles: Reborn As An Extra

A soft creak of movement drew their attention to where Aurelius lay bound. What should have been an unconscious form stirred, his head turning with an unnatural smoothness toward them. One eye, pitch black as the void itself, stared through them with predatory intensity.

The restraints that had held him—thick, enchanted bonds meant to contain him—snapped like thread. His charred upper body seemed to gleam in the dim light as he rose, each movement precise and controlled, like a puppet on invisible strings.

"Fascinating," Aurelius's voice emerged, but the cadence was wrong—too smooth, too amused. Kalin's words flowing from Aurelius's lips. "Such power contained in this vessel. Such... potential."

"Alas..."

He began walking toward them, his movements creating an unsettling dissonance—too fluid, too perfect. Each step echoed in the chamber like a hammer strike. The air around him began to crystallize, frost patterns spreading across the floor and walls in his wake.

Yet Adrian remained unmoved, his expression calm as he watched Aurelius approach. Even as the temperature plummeted and ice began creeping up both his and Evangeline's bodies, freezing them in place until only their heads remained free, he showed no sign of concern.

Through Evangeline's lips, Kalin laughed. "Not so confident now, are we?" But there was an edge to his voice, an unease he couldn't quite hide. Something about Adrian's composure disturbed him.

So, he controlled Aurelius to quickly transfer the eye to Evangeline's masterpiece.

However, just as he was about to rip the black eye, Aurelius's other eye snapped open.

For a moment, the body seemed to war with itself—one side moving with Kalin's artificial grace, the other jerking with natural human movement. Aurelius's face contorted in confusion as awareness returned, his gaze darting between the frozen forms of Adrian and Evangeline.

Then pain exploded behind his eyes.

"AAAAAHHH!" The scream tore from his throat as he clutched his head, falling to his knees. The black eye trembled, its darkness wavering like smoke in wind. Slowly, inexorably, the obsidian color began to fade from his eye, dissolving like ink in water until nothing remained but his natural iris.

"How?" Kalin's voice shook through Evangeline's lips, genuine fear creeping into his tone. "How is he doing this? This isn't possible—"

A soft chuckle cut through the chaos. Adrian stood in his icy prison, a small smile playing at his lips as he watched Aurelius shake off Kalin's control like it was nothing more than an inconvenient dream. Well, the pain was nothing as long as you could rid of a virus, right?Nôv(el)B\\jnn

After all, Adrian knew something Kalin didn't—something fundamental about the nature of existence itself. A mere fragment of darkness, a splinter of control embedded in flesh, could never hope to contain someone like Aurelius. The very concept was laughable.

'If you were here personally, Kalin,' Adrian thought, his smile widening slightly, 'perhaps he'd stood no chance. But this pale imitation of your power? Against him? The Main Character? His ever-growing willpower? That?'

He watched as Aurelius steadied himself, the last traces of Kalin's influence evaporating like morning dew. 'You will never understand what he truly is, you manipulative creature.'

'Well, not like us the readers understood.'

'That damned author kept Aurelius's origin a mysterious secret till the end.'

'Damn him!'

"Huf... Huff..."

Meanwhile, Aurelius's breathing steadied as the last waves of pain subsided, his vision clearing as he took in the frozen scene before him. His gaze kept darting back to Evangeline, wariness and anger flickering across his features. The memory of her "experiments" was still fresh, the burns on his body a testament to what she'd done. She literally tortured him.

Although he was somewhat feeling comfortable, he wouldn't just forgive her.

'Gotta free him first.'

With a gesture that seemed almost casual, he reached out toward Adrian. The ice encasing him began to melt, not gradually but instantly, as if it had never existed. Steam rose from the puddle forming at Adrian's feet, the only evidence of the prison that had held him moments before.

'Woah!' Aurelius looked at his hands with disbelief. 'W-Wasn't it too easy? There was no resistance either...'

"Thanks," Adrian said softly to Aurelius, his eyes fixed on Evangeline—or more specifically, on her eyes. Something in his expression shifted, a knowing look crossing his features. "It's about time now."

Then, louder, with commanding force: "Now!"

"Now wha-!"

Before Aurelius could process what was happening, darkness erupted beneath them—not the gentle dark of shadows, but something alive and liquidlike. It surged upward like a tide of liquid night, swallowing everything on it. The masterpiece vanished first, then the glass coffin artifact, and then Aurelius, all consumed by the darkness without a sound.

"S-Siste-!"

At the entrance, where Rhea had been secretly watching the entire scene unfold, the darkness claimed her too, giving her no time even to cry out.

Evangeline's black eye widened in shock, and then—

"Kekeke... Kekeke!"

A laugh erupted from her throat, but it wasn't human.

It wasn't even close.

The sound was wrong, twisted, like metal scraping against bone, like a thousand voices screaming in harmony. "Alright, I'll use your body after all!" Kalin's voice emerged, but it had changed, becoming something monstrous and ancient.

Before Evangeline could even comprehend what was happening, darkness flooded her vision once more. Her sensing nulling, the connection with her body cut off.

From the outside, both her eyes turned pitch black, like windows into the void itself. The ice surrounding her body shattered, not merely breaking but seeming to disintegrate into particles too fine to see.

"You..."

'Kalin' turned toward Adrian, and the killing intent that radiated from those obsidian eyes was almost physical—a wave of malevolence so pure it made the air itself feel toxic. The thing wearing Evangeline's body moved with unnatural fluidity, her joints bending in ways that human bones were never meant to allow.

"You are the one who ruined my plan, so..." The voice that emerged was a chorus of nightmares, each word dripping with centuries of hatred.

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"DIE!"