Nain kept staring at Jhed. Jhed's eyes drifted toward her too.
"Coward," Nain's words from before echoed in his memory.
"What must she be thinking. I ran away. So why did I come back." He started spiraling in his own thoughts.
He felt ashamed, wanted to hide from her. But his hands were still bound by rope. Even if he wanted to, he couldn't hide.
"Idiot doesn't even know how to run properly. Of course the guards caught him," Nain thought to herself, watching Jhed.
"So, Your Majesty, what should we do with them? This one's like some weird zombie — he just won't die." Mite said this, calling Jhed a zombie.
Miruth — the king — kept his eyes fixed on the two of them.
"Luccos, you know what this means. The prophecy is coming again." Miruth said this, still staring straight at Jhed.
The moment Miruth said it, the entire room broke into murmurs.
"What prophecy could it be, after all these years. But the second prophecy can't happen until the first one comes true... which means the hero has already arrived in this world." Luccos was thinking out loud to himself.
"What's the prophecy going to be? And when?" a guard asked.
"It means the hero has already set foot on this land," another guard said.
"But where is the hero? Which continent?" The guards kept talking amongst themselves like this.
Jhed turned his head, looking around at everyone.
"What is even going on here." Jhed couldn't make sense of any of it. He looked over at Shine.
Shine was lost in deep thought.
"It's been over eighteen years since the war ended. And now the hero's finally coming." Shine said this. Eighteen years, and where had the hero been all this time. Why show up now — after everything was already destroyed.
There was a hidden fury buried in his eyes.
Nain looked at her father's face.
"Dad... are you smiling?" she asked him.
Luccos turned to her.
"Nain... I'm so happy today. The hero has arrived. We'll finally be free, and soon." Everyone turned to look at Luccos.
"He's going to free them..." Something stirred awake inside Jhed — the Sin hidden within him.
"The hero is the one who's supposed to save them. So I don't need to save them at all. They'll be free on their own, soon enough." He kept talking himself into it.
"Your Majesty, why are you so happy about this? He's our enemy." Mite raised his voice.
"All of you — silence. No one speaks of this again. Or I'll put a hole through every one of your bodies with your own hair." Mite was furious, growling as he said it.
Everyone fell silent.
"Answer me, Your Majesty," Mite said.
Miruth turned to look at Mite. He wasn't smiling anymore. Instead, his face held something between calm and a deep darkness. He listened to everything peacefully, as if he weren't even present in the room.
"Speak, Your Majesty. I don't want your calm, I want an answer," Mite shouted.
Quietly, Shine began undoing the rope. Everyone's attention was on Miruth. Taking advantage of that, Shine moved over to Jhed and untied his ropes too.
"Jhed, this is the moment. Time to take them down." Shine said.
"What? Now?" Jhed was scared. "Didn't you hear, Shine — the hero's going to free them soon anyway. We don't need to worry about any of this anymore. Let's just get out of here." Jhed said this and tried to make a run for it.
"We're about to die, Mite," Miruth said.