Lord of the Truth

"....."

Slowly—so slowly it was almost unconscious—Robin's eyelids lifted wider… and wider… until the whites of his eyes gleamed under the shadow of his brow. His breath caught in his chest, his muscles tightening as if the sheer sight before him had struck some primal chord of disbelief.

He had witnessed many strange things in his life but what now filled his vision was in a league entirely its own.

A teenage girl—doesn't seem older than fifteen—was leading an army of specters. Not through chains or curses, not with the bloody hand of domination, but with something far stranger… she was singing. And behind her, the tide of ghostly forms spun and swayed in circles, as though caught in an unseen current of rhythm, their movements almost playful in their menace.

Her appearance was… peculiar in its contrasts. Two long braids framed her head, falling from either side like black rivers streaked with subtle reflections of blue. She wore a simple black dress with a neat ribbon tied at her throat, over which lay a short, cropped blue overdress, cut at odd, whimsical angles. In her grip was a dark blue parasol, tilted ever so slightly like a stage prop.

Her lips were painted the deepest black, making her smile seem sharper and more pronounced. Her ears were adorned with glints of silver—small rings and delicate chains that caught the light with every turn of her head. Her long nails—pointed, lacquered in alternating shades of black and soft pink—added a strange touch of charm to an otherwise unsettling figure. And beneath all that, high-heeled shoes tapped softly against the ground in rhythm with her steps.

Her outfit wasn't immaculate—there was a deliberate disarray to it, the way a storm-tossed room might still feel lived-in. But that very lack of polish only added to the weight of her presence, revealing something deeper about the person within the clothes.

🎶 My laughter's fire, my voice a snare,

My words strike deep in the wounded there!

Those who have died will never find rest,

Till they march behind me in my dark quest! 🎶

Her face was small, almost deceptively delicate in shape, but that delicacy shattered the moment she smiled. Four small, razor-tipped fangs peeked out, catching the light for just an instant. Yet no one truly looking at her smile would linger on the fangs; no—what rooted the gaze in place was the smile itself.

It was the smile of someone standing on the edge of sanity… of a mind that had already stepped off and was tumbling into the abyss. The kind of smile a lunatic might wear in the heartbeats before tearing the heads from their victims.

And those eyes… gods, those eyes. Blindingly white at first glance, yet within the white was a faint black ring, like ink bleeding through paper. And inside that ring—more white still, sharp and stark. They were eyes that seemed to move, to sway, to dance upon the invisible line between life and death.

Around her, a black aura seethed and drifted—tendrils of shadow bubbling from her skin like the froth of some abyssal sea. Robin's mind recoiled, yet sharpened at once. What is that? Could it be… her karma aura? He had seen dark karma before—men and women steeped in evil acts, dripping with the spiritual residue of their sins. But this… this was something that bent the scale until it nearly broke. What in all the realms had she done to gather such weight upon her soul?

🎶 I dance alone in the ashen rain,

I drink my fill from a death made plain,

I scatter the specters where ever I please,

And shatter all men with a laugh on the breeze! 🎶

Ba-dum.

Robin's heart gave a sharp, involuntary throb. It wasn't just his body—his soul domain quivered, its layers shivering like struck glass. No… it was deeper still. There was a disturbance in the very root of his being—in his initial soul.

That girl, spinning in place with her parasol tilting at her side, arms flung wide in mockery of a dance, wasn't merely reciting a song. The melody was no casual tune, the words no meaningless verse. They weren't shaped like spells or structured like talismans, yet there was power woven through them all the same—a force that bypassed walls and barriers, sinking its claws directly into the core of the listener.

And if he, Robin—the Soul Master with a perfected domain that could hold 810,000 units of soul essence, a domain currently brimming with 777,000 free essence units—could feel it even through his defenses… what of the specters?

Mindless, weak-minded things—how could they resist? No wonder they trailed her like moths drawn to a black flame.

🎶 I was the child that the shadows bore,

Illusion my friend, and no prison's door,

O you who left me in graves to decay,

I am the pact, the wound that won't fade away! 🎶

"...."

Robin's expression hardened. Every shred of his soul will surged upward as he reinforced his soul defenses to the utmost—walls within walls, fortresses within fortresses. His thoughts narrowed to a single, inescapable conclusion:

This woman isn't just dangerous—she's a walking calamity.

She might appear to be nothing more than a naïve, harmless teenager, but Robin knew better—this was the kind of illusion meant to disarm prey before the strike. It was the sort of deception woven not in moments, but over centuries. Even he, with all his experience, could not easily pin down her true physical age. That smooth, youthful face could be a mask worn for a hundred thousand years… or a million. There was no telling how long this girl had been walking the earth, drifting through civilizations like a shadow that never aged.

But there was one thing Robin could measure with absolute certainty—her soul force. She wasn't masking it, not even the slightest attempt at suppression. It radiated freely, thick and potent, saturating the air around her like a heavy mist. That density… no Silver Soul Master in existence could carry such weight.

There was no doubt—she was a Royal Soul Master.

The only question was: how many stars? That was the piece missing from the puzzle. From what he could feel, she did not seem to be at the higher echelons. The pressure she emitted was comparable to what he had felt when standing before Barok, the formidable Two-Star Royal Soul Master.

"Hm?" His suspicion twisted into a low, sardonic chuckle when his eyes slid to the right, drawn to an unexpected sight. There, in the middle of the endless ocean of specters, was the colossal one he had been chasing earlier—spinning like a child in a field, its massive blade sweeping the air in grand, almost theatrical arcs, as if it too were caught up in the rhythm of her song.

And then, like a cold hand gripping his spine, the realization struck.

A specter with nearly three hundred thousand units of soul force… bound so utterly, so effortlessly, from this distance?

Robin's gaze sharpened as he began to let his eyes roam over the rest of the ghostly host. The diversity was staggering—towering beast specters with jaws like chasms, diminutive goblin-like shades no taller than a child, insectile horrors with too many legs, serpentine phantoms coiling and twisting in the spectral current. Every size, every shape, a kaleidoscope of the dead.

It was a sea of muted green light, all of it rippling and swaying in chaotic harmony as it poured after the girl with the twin braids.

And the more he looked, the more his chest tightened. Beyond the massive specter he had pursued, he could instantly identify twelve others, each one blazing with a soul force that exceeded one hundred thousand units. If he took even a little more time to scrutinize the tide, he was certain he could pinpoint several more lurking among the swarm—enough to shake the foundations of any empire.

His eyes narrowed as they drifted back to the girl at the head of this ghostly procession. Royal Soul Master or not, she was flanked by a strike force that could raze kingdoms, level fortresses, and topple dynasties without her even lifting a hand.

🎶 Heeeey—can you hear my tread?

It is the Anthem of the Dead!

The living will sing, the fallen will sway…

While I lead the flock to the open air! 🎶

Her voice rose in a haunting crescendo as she reached the final line, her movements deliberate and theatrical. With a practiced flourish, she tossed her parasol high into the air, the dark fabric spinning end over end. She twirled several times in place, skirts flaring, and the entire ocean of specters behind her mirrored the motion like an army of puppets dancing to her will.

Even the colossal specter joined in—hurling its gigantic sword skyward with a booming sweep. The weapon plummeted down moments later, smashing into a knot of lesser specters with an impact like a bomb, sending ghostly bodies scattering like leaves in a gale.

But what followed made Robin's pulse spike.

Her spin ended, her parasol fell neatly back into her hand… and she laughed. Then her head turned—not toward the crowd, not toward the distant horizon—but directly toward him.

Bam.

"…!!!" Robin's hands clamped so hard onto the wheels of his chair that his knuckles whitened. Instinct drove him to roll back sharply, creating distance as his body coiled, ready to whip around and hurl himself away with every ounce of strength he had. Everything in him screamed that he was far too deep in the den of something he could not challenge.

And yet…

The girl's lips curved into a strange, knowing smile. She winked at him—a deliberate, almost playful gesture—and a low, amused laugh escaped her. Without a word, she turned her back on him, her long black hair lifting in the air like silk caught in a breeze. Dozens of small, inky-black bubbles shook free from her hair, drifting lazily before fading into nothing.

And then… she simply continued walking, her voice slipping effortlessly back into song, as though nothing at all had happened between them.

"This…" Robin's chest slowly loosened, his heartbeat finding its rhythm again as he watched her retreat. Every instinct told him this girl was shrouded in layers of mystery, each darker and more dangerous than the last. And whatever she was doing with those specters—it wasn't anything he had ever encountered in all the knowledge contained within the Soul Atlas.

"You there, you crippled bastard!!"

The sudden shout from behind ripped through the tension like a blade, snapping Robin's attention around in an instant.