The in-between realm was neither light nor shadow.
Aeon walked barefoot across a surface that fractured beneath each step. Not stone, not water — but something else. A mirror of all he had been. With every footfall, memories whispered beneath him: the clash of blades in the Berserk world, Casca's silent stare, Guts' final scream, and the weight of a god's grief made mortal.
He stopped when he saw the figure ahead.
It stood like a shadow that had forgotten how to belong. Cloaked, faceless, utterly still. But Aeon knew its stance. The tension in its shoulders. The pain behind the silence.
His own.
The future.
"Another step," the figure said, voice quiet and brittle like winter wind. "You're learning how to grieve. That's something."
Aeon remained still. "Who are you?"
"A question you should've asked ages ago." The figure chuckled. "I am what remains when the god has stopped pretending he doesn't feel."
Aeon's eyes narrowed. "What do you want from me?"
"I want you to remember."
It stepped closer — now visibly older. Not in body, but in burden. "Not the death. Not the war. But the choice you made after."
"I made a thousand choices."
"Yes. And none of them were for her."
The words landed heavy. "You kept running from the fire. But you built new worlds to burn."
Aeon turned his head. "I tried to bring her back."
"You tried to own her."
The future self knelt down. "You carried her like a broken crown. But Liora isn't a relic. She's a child."
"I just wanted—"
"To feel something again?" the figure asked, voice softer now. "Grief isn't purity. It doesn't cleanse. It stains. You kept your pain… but never let it shape you."
Aeon's lips parted. "She's gone."
"No," the figure whispered. "She's scattered."
He pointed to the space behind him.
There, floating in the black, was a familiar shape: the doll from Berserk. It fell slowly, drifting through memory like a leaf in twilight.
It touched water.
And changed.
The stitched face dissolved. Flesh replaced fabric. Small hands. A glowing golden gaze. A Little Sister.
Aeon stepped forward.
"Where is she?" he asked.
"In the places where innocence is currency," said the figure. "In the cities you made to forget her. And the one you're about to enter."
The mirror fractured further — a whirlpool of light and pressure forming below. The voice of Aeon's future self echoed one last time.
"When you find her again… don't call her back. Let her choose."
A pause.
"Even gods must learn to ask."
The Gate opened. And Aeon fell.
He landed not with a crash, but a shiver.
Cold. Metal. Wet.
The corridor around him groaned as if it were alive. Water pressed against the reinforced glass above. Coral clung to the steel beams. A flickering sign glowed in electric blue:
Welcome to Rapture.
Jazz crackled through a shattered speaker nearby — warped, melting into static. Posters peeled from the walls:
"No Gods or Kings. Only Man."
"Choose the Impossible."
Bodies floated in sealed offices — bloated, grinning, still wearing pearls and tailored suits. A child's teddy bear drifted in a flooded nursery. A man's hand still gripped a champagne glass, even in death.
Aeon walked slowly, his boots echoing in the silence. The city spoke without words — a thousand philosophies screaming in their own failure.
Then — a hum.
Soft. Innocent.
Aeon turned.
A Little Sister waddled past the glass corridor ahead, dragging her needle behind her like a toy. Her eyes glowed faintly gold. She whispered to herself as if reciting a lullaby.
Behind her, a Big Daddy followed — massive, armored, moaning lowly. Its steps were careful, not aggressive. Not yet.
Aeon stopped.
The girl turned toward him — and for a heartbeat, she looked like Liora. Not fully. But enough.
He raised a hand.
She blinked.
Then turned away.
A scream tore through the hall.
A man lunged from the dark — a Splicer, covered in surgical scars, laughing and howling, clawing at the air.
"They took my skin! They took my name! I made myself beautiful!"
He charged.
Aeon didn't flinch.
The Splicer stopped mid-run — something unseen yanked him backward into the darkness. Wet sounds followed. Then silence.
Far below, in a sealed control chamber, a man watched grainy reels of surveillance footage.
Father.
His hands trembled around an empty syringe. His eyes burned with desperation. His voice was a whisper choked by obsession.
"Ellie… I saw you. In Columbia. In Rapture. In the dark between worlds. I saw you."
He pressed a shaking finger to the monitor as a Little Sister passed by.
"They made you into something else. But I will undo it. I will find you, even if I lose myself."
He injected the Adam.
His scream shook the room.
Aeon stood before the sealed glass again, watching another Little Sister nestle beside her Big Daddy like a child seeking shelter.
"They twisted you," he whispered. "Bound you to beasts. Drenched your love in science and pain."
And yet…
She smiled.
And the Big Daddy gently placed a hand on her head.
Not as a monster.
But as a guardian.
Aeon knelt at the base of the glass, placing his palm flat.
"If there's even a spark of her in you… I'll find it. Not to bring her back. But to keep her safe."
The Big Daddy groaned — deep and low, not hostile.
As if… it understood.
Far above, the city sighed.
And beneath it, the Shadow stirred — drawn to Father's madness, to the broken rules of life and death, to the dying echoes of innocence.
The gods made monsters.
The monsters made daughters.
And the daughters made the world ache.