The Infinity Castle was a symphony of architectural madness, a shifting labyrinth of cedar and paper screens that defied the very concept of a horizon. Below, the Lower Moons—Enmu, Rokuro, Wakuraba, Mukago, Rui, and Kamanue—knelt in a line of desperate, sweating terror on a lower platform, their eyes fixed on the wooden floorboards as they awaited the master's arrival. Above them, the hierarchy of the Upper Moons was gathered in a rare assembly of lethal potential. Gyutaro and Daki stood together in the flickering light, alongside Nakime, Gyokko, and Hantengu, while Akaza radiated a focused, aggressive energy, and Douma hummed a discordant tune, his rainbow eyes scanning the void with playful emptiness.

Kokushibo, the Upper Moon One, sat in the highest position of the assembly, his presence a heavy, suffocating mantle of ancient authority. All six of his eyes were open, his gaze moving with clinical precision over the monsters he had led for centuries. But for the first time in his long, blood-soaked history, he felt a disturbance in the order of things—a presence that did not just rival his own, but mirrored it with haunting exactitude.

Directly across from him, standing on a platform of equal elevation, was you.

The air in the castle seemed to freeze as the other demons realized what they were seeing. In both of your eyes, etched with the same terrifying clarity as Kokushibo's, was the kanji for Upper Moon One. You were not a secret to be whispered about; you were his literal peer, a second "First" that the Master had kept hidden from the eyes of the Twelve Kizuki until this very moment. Kokushibo’s hand tightened on the hilt of his flesh-carved katana, the eyes embedded in the blade twitching in rhythm with his own shock. He had believed himself to be unique, the pinnacle of the Master's creation, yet here you stood—the most mysterious demon in existence, whose name had been used only in legends to keep the others in check.

To see you now, possessing the same rank, felt like a fracture in the foundation of his reality. "I had thought... the Master’s blood... had reached its limit... with me," Kokushibo spoke, his voice a deep, gravelly rasp that vibrated through the wooden beams of the castle, silencing even Douma’s humming. "But to see... another... bearing the mark of the first... it is a sight I did not believe... possible." He rose slowly, his six eyes narrowing as they focused on yours, searching for any hint of the technique that earned you such a position. The Lower Moons trembled harder at the sound of his voice, while Akaza and Douma watched with wide-eyed, wary fascination.

"You have been... in the deepest shadows... for centuries," Kokushibo continued, his aura expanding until it threatened to crush the lower platforms. "Hidden even from... my sight. Tell me... mirror of my own rank... what purpose does the Master have for you now... that requires you to step into the light of this castle? Are you the end... of the era we have built... or the beginning... of something far more... terrible?"