Once Zayden and Devin had departed, Theodore requested the remaining people to leave too.

In the quiet ward, with only a faint beam of light filtering through the window, he sat alone in a chair, seemingly lost in thought.

His gaze shifted to the white curtain dancing in the gentle wind, as if he perceived a familiar outline within it’

A sudden wave of intense pain overwhelmed his mind. Theodore grimaced, his skull pounding as if under a hammer's strike. The agony was so severe that he found himself silenced.

Instinctively, he groped for his medicine in his pocket, but the echo of Aldus's parting words restrained him from taking them.