PART II: AFTER THE SEALING OF THE BLACK MAGE

Chapter 19: Chaser of Darkness

• In Toolen City, a city on Savage Terminal, a mercenary company called the Drakas kept order in the city. The Drakas captured those who defaulted on their debts, taking away their memories as collateral, and forced them to work as members in order to repay their debt and get back their memories.

• The Drakas were led by the boss, Luska, and supported by a psychiatrist named Dr. Y, who evaluated their members’ mental states because of the nature of their violent work. In order to have the edge over their enemies, the Drakas used powerful Malice Stones, which boosted their powers.

• One of the top-ranking Drakas agents, Kain, worked in order to get back his memories. From the few vestigial memories he had left, he recalled himself as a child hugging an older girl on the beach. During one of his missions, Kain encountered a pair of chameleon Anima children named Romina and Royce. Unable to bring them in out of empathy, Kain let them go, leading to an investigation within the Drakas to find the children, who had stolen an object of great value from headquarters.

• Meanwhile, several members of the Drakas began planning to overthrow Luska in order to seize control of the company and use their Malice Stones to profit off the war being waged on Grandis by the High Flora. For this reason, the traitorous Drakas members attempted to steal Dr. Y’s notes on Malice Stones, which made a reference to an ‘original’.

• Though they attempted to recruit Kain to their side, Kain refused to get himself involved in their plan. This drew the anger of their leader, Tirag, who remained jealous of Kain and his reputation, as well as the special treatment that Luska would give him, such as special dinners with exotic foods.

• At the same time, Kain’s investigation led him to discover that the Chameleon Siblings were being employed by the Biters, a local gang which had once been defeated by Kain. Kain also learned that the siblings had been tasked by the leader of the Biters, Kudan, with recovering the original Malice Stone, but that they had instead stolen a Memory Stone containing Kain’s memories of one of his dinners with Luska.

• Hoping to recover his memories, Kain helped the siblings break into Dr. Y’s office, where they discovered more of his notes about Malice Stones. Just as security arrived, Kain took the notes and told the siblings to escape and inform Kudan that he was willing to trade the notes on Malice Stones in exchange for the Memory Stone.

• After the siblings escaped, Kain quickly implicated a member of the traitorous Drakas as the one who had broke into Dr. Y’s office. During this time, Tirag and the other traitors discovered that Luska was wearing the same choker as all the other Drakas agents, which tracked their location at all times. Because of this, they realized that Luska was also a prisoner of the Drakas, despite being their boss.

• Meanwhile, Kain traveled to Biter territory and met with Kudan, who revealed that he had been investigating the power of Malice in great detail. He explained that during the era of the Ancient Gods, a god named Satiras the Devil Dragon had bestowed the power of Malice to his followers, a cult called the Black Nova, who had used their Malice to conquer Grandis.

• After the end of the Ancient War, Satiras had fallen into dormancy by the Transcendents. Without their god, the Black Nova had been hunted down by the ones whom they had enslaved. Kudan revealed that he intended to seize the power of Malice in order to conquer Toolen City. Kain then offered Dr. Y’s notes on Malice Stones in exchange for his Memory Stone.

• Just then, a Drakas ambush arrived to secure Kain, with one of the officers stating that ‘the original’ was secure. During the battle, Kain’s Memory Stone shattered, filling everyone’s minds with a memory of Kain eating dinner with Luska and Dr. Y. In the memory, Luska revealed to Dr. Y that she had wiped the Drakas members’ minds several times already at the end of their repayment, forcing them to work endlessly in order to regain memories that they would never get back.

• Additionally, Luska had also implanted false memories into the Drakas’ minds as motivation to keep them working in order to get back the rest. Just as Luska wished Kain a happy birthday, Dr. Y used his powers to extract Kain’s memory of Luska’s revelation into the same Memory Stone that Kain had just shattered in the present day.

• Realizing that Luska had tricked them into being her slaves, the furious Drakas members rose up against her and attacked headquarters. Meanwhile, Kain recalled the officer’s words about ‘the original’ being secure, causing him to realize that he himself was the original template for all Malice Stones, and that he was also a Black Nova.

• In this moment of clarity, Kain’s sole memory of his past - the false memory Luska had given him of his younger self hugging an older girl at the beach - transformed into his real memory of himself and the older girl instead being surrounded by armed soldiers in a burning village. Realizing that he needed to face Luska in order to recover the rest of his memories, Kain fought his way past the Drakas and faced Luska, who had already defeated Tirag and the other leaders of the insurrection.

• Luska easily managed to defeat Kain, but just as she subdued him, she collapsed in pain, causing him to realize that she had been fatally wounded in the battle against the Drakas. Kain then recovered the rest of his memories within another Memory Stone, causing him to see his memories of the burning village. There, he discovered that not only was the older girl Luska, but that she was also his sister.

• He then saw Luska pleading with the leader of the soldiers to spare their lives, to which he gave them both a pair of Drakas chokers. As Luska began dying, she told Kain that she had become the boss of the Drakas and used Kain’s Malice to create Malice Stones, just as the man had ordered, in exchange for their lives. With her dying breath, Luska hugged Kain and told him to live his life freely.

• With the Drakas being wiped out, Kain decided to leave Toolen City in order to travel and contextualize his memories, for which he met with the Shadowdealers. In Savage Terminal, Kain met Cadena, with whom he felt a strange sense of kinship. Unbeknownst to them both, Kain and Cadena were both Nova without their Nova features. After getting acquainted with Gen, Kain was recommended to travel to Maple World.

• Meanwhile, Dr. Y and his aide arrived at the Drakas headquarters, where they found Luska nearly dead. Dr. Y then took off his mask, revealing himself as the same man who had first enslaved Kain and Luska many years ago. When his aide asked whether he would be able to save Luska, Dr. Y replied that though he could extract memories or Malice or anything else, extracting death itself would be too much for him. Seeing that Luska was still barely alive, Dr. Y used his powers to extract the damage which would have led to Luska’s death, causing her to awaken, fully healed.