Chapter 17: The Vow in the Dark & The Echoes in void
The sterile silence of the hospital wing was shattered
by the rhythmic, frantic screech of a heart monitor.
Inside the isolation room, Aoi lay tangled in her sheets,
her body slick with a cold, feverish sweat.
She was no longer truly still.
Beneath the surface, her parasitic tentacles twitched
with a violent, independent life,
snapping against the bedframe like coiled vipers.
"Her synchronization is spiking!"
a doctor yelled, his voice thin with panic.
"Get the ventilation mask on her!
Move!"
Through the observation glass,
the remaining members of the Wrappers stood in a grim silhouette.
Their eyes—filled with exhaustion and a mounting dread—
watched as the mechanical hiss of the respirator
attempted to drown out the sound
of a body evolving past its limits.
Inside the darkness of her mind,
the hospital didn't exist.
Aoi walked through a landscape of fractured reality,
her boots crunching on the debris
of broken buildings suspended in a starless sky.
She wasn't alone.
Sitting upon a jagged piece of ruins
was the figure from her dreams—
the translucent, green slimy entity.
They sat together in the hollow quiet of the void.
The green object turned toward her,
emitting a series of low, unintelligible vibrations.
"I know,"
Aoi replied, her voice barely a whisper.
The entity drifted closer,
its form shifting like liquid emerald
as it peered into her face.
It watched her—
studying the darkness taking root in her expression—
as the first hot, lonely tears began to fall.
Chapter 17: The Vow in the Void
The silence of the void was thick,
broken only by the sound of Aoi's muffled sobs.
As she knelt amidst the debris
of a world that no longer existed,
she felt a sudden, cool pressure atop her head.
She looked up, her eyes blurred with tears,
to find the green entity gently patting her hair
with its translucent, slimy limb.
It was a gesture of alien comfort—
primitive, yet profoundly sincere.
Slowly, they began to walk.
The landscape was a graveyard of memories,
where the skeletal remains of buildings
floated in the starless dark.
Aoi stopped,
her gaze snagging on a small object in the dust:
a pair of broken spectacles.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
As her fingers brushed the shattered glass,
the air rippled.
A phantom image flickered into existence—
a man, his body wreathed in a fierce, protective Blue Aura,
standing as a shield before a small child.
Recognition flared in Aoi's chest,
a sharp, agonizing heat
that made her breath hitch.
Terror, cold and absolute,
flooded her senses.
She recoiled,
turning her face away from the ghost of her father.
"No..."
She bolted.
Sprint-ing through the ruins
as if she could outrun the past.
The green entity glided behind her,
a silent shadow in the wake of her panic.
"Leave me alone!"
Aoi screamed, her voice echoing into the nothingness.
The entity stopped.
It seemed to shrink,
its vibrant green hue dimming
as it lowered its face toward the ground.
It turned,
its movements heavy with a palpable sense of hurt,
preparing to vanish back into the darkness.
But before it could move away,
it felt the sudden, desperate weight
of a hug from behind.
"No... wait,"
Aoi whispered, her forehead resting
against its cool, gelatinous back.
"Don't leave me alone."
The entity turned,
its form rippling as it returned the embrace,
its slimy body acting as a cocoon against the void.
"We should stop looking,"
Aoi murmured, her eyes fixed on the gray earth.
"We don't need to see unnecessary things.
We can just... stay here."
The entity shifted anxiously.
It began to vibrate,
its unknown, incomprehensible language
filling the air with frantic clicks
and low-frequency hums.
To anyone else, it was noise.
To Aoi, it was a desperate plea for the truth.
"We are fine!"
Aoi replied, her voice rising in desperation.
"We can just be like usual!
We don't need the truth!"
Suddenly, the temperature of the void plummeted.
From the deepest shadows of her mind,
a pair of sapphire eyes ignited.
They were cold.
Absolute.
Filled with a weight
that made the space itself buckle.
It was a gaze that mirrored Mitsuo's,
yet here, in the dark,
she didn't recognize the man—
only the authority.
Her body betrayed her.
Her knees hit the debris.
Her head bowed low
before she could even process the thought.
"Master..."
she whispered, the word spilling out
as a primal reflex.
The spell broke as quickly
as it had taken hold.
Aoi gasped,
her eyes widening
as she realized what she had just done.
She stood up,
her shaking hands curling into fists.
She turned back to the green entity,
her expression no longer clouded by fear,
but hardened by a new, lethal clarity.
"You're right,"
she said, her voice steady.
"We have to see it through."
Back in the Physical World
Inside the hospital chamber,
the chaos reached its peak—
before abruptly falling
into a deathly still.
The doctors,
who had been struggling to restrain
Aoi's rampaging tentacles,
watched in awe
as the obsidian appendages
suddenly went limp,
retracting back toward her spine.
The monitors,
which had been shrieking
in red-lit panic,
settled into a calm, rhythmic hum.
"Readings are... normal,"
a medic breathed,
wiping sweat from his brow.
"She's stabilized."
Outside the glass,
a collective breath was released.
The Wrappers,
still leaning against the walls
in their battered gear,
shared silent looks of relief.
The storm had passed—
but the girl waking up
would no longer be the one they knew.
To be continued...
? MYukH. All rights reserved
SEASON 1 FINALE.
Thanks for reading the season 1 of AWH. Season 2 coming on 11th March.
Bonus Bloopers: -
[The Camera pans to the Training Hall where everyone is in full Cosplay]
Mitsuo:
(Adjusting a blindfold over his raven hair, leaning back with an insufferable smirk)
"Yowaimo. Honestly, these demons are so weak, it's boring. Lol."
Fans:
(Frantically snapping photos)
"GOJO-SAMA! LOOK THIS WAY!"
Harry:
(Looking deeply uncomfortable in Subaru's iconic orange and black track jacket)
"Why am I the one who keeps dying in these scenarios?
It wasn't in the mission documents."
Aether:
(Propping a massive red sword over his shoulder, wearing Dante's red trench coat)
"Easy mode is now selectable, kids.
Don't make me use the suit."
Aldric:
(Standing perfectly still with a cool, detached expression, rocking Shiba Tatsuya's school uniform)
"I don't need a Space Core.
I have a CAD."
Rose:
(Walking past them all in a standard school uniform, looking at the camera)
"They're all idiots. Lmao."
