THE UNSEEN VEIN-EDGAR

CHAPTER 3 — THE SHADOW THAT ANSWERS

Edgar hit the ground hard. Cold metal. Sterile air. Harsh, white light. He blinked rapidly, disoriented, panic already rising. “Where, where am I?!”

“Calm down,” Aria’s voice said somewhere to his right. “You’re safe.”

Edgar turned, she stood beside him, breathing heavily, clutching her dagger like she’d been holding it the entire trip.

Shin stood a little further away, arms crossed, face tight with something between relief and worry. Then Edgar realized something.

His ankle was bleeding. Deep gouges from the scout’s claws. “Hey—uh—guys?” Edgar stammered. “I think I’m… leaking.”

Aria crouched beside him. “Hold still.”

She reached for her belt, then froze. “Shin,” she whispered. “Look at the wound.”

Shin approached, fast. Edgar forced himself to look, and immediately regretted it. Black smoke curled from the edges of the wounds, not blood, not steam, shadow.

“What, what is that?!” Edgar cried.

Aria backed up. “The entity reacted. It protected him.”

Shin’s jaw clenched. “Or it took over.”

Edgar’s pulse spiked. “Took over?! What does that mean?!”

Shin didn’t answer immediately. He studied Edgar’s wounds with a frown carved from stone. At last, he said, “When the scout grabbed you, the entity pushed back. Hard. It overrode your body to survive.”

Edgar swallowed. “So… I wasn’t in control.”

“No,” Shin said.

Aria added quietly, “But you’re stable now. The Vault suppresses awakened resonance.”

Edgar finally noticed the room, windowless, metallic walls, heavy doors, glowing circuits running across panels like veins. Machines hummed low, vibrating through the floor. “Where… is this?” Edgar asked.

Shin exhaled. “The Vault. A secure Awakened Enforcement facility.”

“It’s a jail,” Aria corrected. “A nice one. But still a jail.”

Edgar’s voice cracked. “Why am I in a jail?!”

“You’re not a prisoner,” Aria said gently.

“Then why does the room look like it’s designed to contain explosions?”

Aria hesitated. Shin didn’t. “Because you’re dangerous.”

Edgar’s stomach dropped. “I didn’t ask to be dangerous!”

“Danger doesn’t wait for permission,” Shin said.

Aria shot him a glare. “Shin. Ease up.”

He ignored her and faced Edgar fully. “If your awakening continues to escalate, your entity could overwhelm you. And that would kill everyone in this building.”

Edgar’s throat tightened. “Stop… talking like I’m some kind of bomb.”

“You are,” Shin said.

“SHIN!” Aria snapped.

Shin’s gaze softened, but only barely. “Edgar, understand: I’m not saying this to shame you. I’m telling you because you deserve the truth.”

Edgar shook his head. “Truth? I don’t even know what the entity is. Or why I have it.”

Aria sat on the edge of a console. “Then we start from the beginning.”

“No,” Shin interrupted. “We start from the first rule.”

Edgar blinked. “Rule?”

Shin pointed at him. “Rule one: Never black out.”

“That’s not a rule, that’s a fear!”

“It’s both,” Shin said.

Aria sighed. “Okay, Edgar. Here’s the simplified version. The entity inside you? It’s not a ghost, not a demon. It’s… a remnant. A fragment of an ancient awakened consciousness.”

“Fragment of what?” Edgar whispered.

Shin answered. “The Umbral Guardian.”

Edgar stared. “That sounds like a video game boss.”

Shin didn’t smile. “It was the strongest awakened entity ever recorded.”

Aria added, “The Syndicate’s been hunting for its remnant for decades.”

“And now they think I have it?” Edgar said.

“They don’t think,” Aria replied. “They know.”

Edgar’s dizziness spiked. “This can’t be real. I’m just… I’m just some guy.”

Shin knelt in front of him. “Edgar. Listen carefully. You said earlier you’ve never been in a fight. Never trained. Never learned martial forms. Correct?”

“Yeah,” Edgar said softly.

“Then how,” Shin asked, “did you strike me in the alley with a technique lost for generations?”

“I told you, I don’t know!”

“That technique belonged to the Umbral Guardian.”

Edgar froze. Shin’s voice lowered. “The entity gave you that instinct. It used you. Borrowed you.”

Edgar whispered, “I don’t want something living inside me.”

Shin placed a hand on his shoulder. “I know.”

“No, you don’t!” Edgar snapped, raw emotion cracking through. “I woke up today thinking I was going to work! Not that I was carrying around some ancient… shadow-thing that wants to take over my body!”

Aria’s voice softened. “Edgar… it doesn’t want to take over. It wants to survive.”

Shin nodded. “And so do you. Which means you must learn to control it.”

Edgar let out a shaky breath. “How? I don’t even know how to control myself.”

Shin stood. “That’s why you’re here. I will train you. But first”

A loud THUD echoed from the hallway. Aria instantly drew her dagger. “That came from the access corridor.”

Another THUD. Then a metallic screech that vibrated the entire Vault. Edgar flinched. “That… does not sound friendly.”

Aria whispered, “Someone’s breaching the facility.”

Shin’s eyes narrowed. “That was fast.”

Edgar stared in panic. “Fast?! We just got here!”

Aria cursed under her breath. “Syndicate trackers must’ve followed the portal resonance.”

“Which means,” Shin said, “they know he’s in the Vault.”

Another deafening impact rattled the door, bending the steel inward. Edgar stumbled backward. “They can break in?!”

Aria pressed her badge. “Control, this is Agent Vale, requesting emergency lockdown of Vault Sector C”

Static. She hit it again. “Control, respond”

More static. Shin’s face hardened. “They’re jamming us.”

The door dented inward again, deeper, the metal groaning under enormous force. Edgar choked out, “Shin, what do I do, what do I”

Shin grabbed him by the collar. “Listen to me. You survive. That is all.”

“That’s not helpful!”

“It’s honest.”

The door buckled. Aria turned to Edgar. “You’re going to feel your entity react. Don’t fight it, guide it. Keep control.”

“I don’t know how!”

“Learn,” Shin said. “Right now.”

The door blew open. A massive figure stepped inside, armor like black granite, face obscured by a masked hood. Behind him, five scouts crawled in on all fours, eyes glowing like coals.

Edgar’s breath caught. “Who, who is that?”

Aria’s voice trembled. “The Executioner.”

Shin stepped forward. “I’ll hold him. Aria, protect Edgar.”

“No,” the Executioner rumbled. “All three of you will fall. The boy comes with me.”

Edgar backed up until his spine hit the metal wall. The scouts hissed. The Executioner lifted a massive, serrated blade. Aria whispered to Edgar, “Your pulse, feel it.”

Edgar’s hands shook violently. “I, I’m trying”

The scouts charged. Aria lunged to intercept. The Executioner rushed Shin, blade colliding with Shin’s staff in a shockwave that split the floor tiles.

Edgar felt heat swirl in his chest, A burning, A pressure. Something ancient stirring, His wounds hissed with shadow. Aria shouted, “Edgar, NOW!”

The nearest scout leapt at him, and the entity inside Edgar answered. Shadows erupted from his arms like wings, slamming the scout into the far wall with bone-crushing force.

Edgar gasped. “I—did I do that?!”

Aria yelled, “Yes! Keep going!”

The entity surged up his spine, stronger than before. Too strong. Shin glanced back mid-fight, eyes widening. “Edgar, don’t lose control!”

“I’m not, I’m trying!”

But the shadows rippled violently around him, responding to fear, not intention. The Executioner noticed.

He smiled beneath his mask. “There,” he rumbled. “There it is. The awakening of the last Umbral Guardian.”

“Stay away!” Edgar shouted.

The Executioner raised his blade. “I will take what you carry. Even if it kills you.”

The shadows around Edgar flared, For a moment, he wasn’t standing. He wasn’t breathing. He wasn’t himself.

A cold whisper echoed in the back of his mind: “Let me in.”

Edgar shivered. “N—no…”

The entity pressed harder. “Let. Me. In.”

Aria shouted something, but Edgar couldn’t hear. Everything was drowned in the voice. The Executioner charged him. Shadow exploded outward, And Edgar screamed, As the entity finally pushed through.

Everything went dark. And the chapter ends.