Diego stood there, dusting himself off after his emotional conversation with the Stallion. His mind was still swirling with half-baked thoughts, broken dreams, and lingering shadows of guilt. He shook his head, as if trying to dislodge something stuck inside his skull—an idea, a memory, or maybe just the absurdity of this twisted reality.
Diego: (nonchalantly) "Oh, right... Amir's dead, by the way."
The Stallion blinked, its dark eyes widening in shock.
Stallion: (voice trembling) "What? How? You just... drop that like a casual afterthought?"
Diego: (shrugging) "I don't know! I'm standing in some hellish, techno-nightmare dimension, talking to a talking horse, while my body's basically turning into jelly, and I have no idea what's real anymore. And you want details?"
The Stallion shifted uncomfortably, pawing at the ground as it tried to process the news. The weight of it hung in the air like a storm cloud, ready to break and drench everything in chaos. Amir Kuwait, the man who had been at the center of their entire existence, was... gone? Just like that?
Stallion: "We need answers..."
Diego: (nodding) "Yeah, we do. That's why we're going back."
Stallion: (frowning) "Back where?"
Diego turned his head, his eyes narrowing as he stared into the distance, where the twisted, shadowy outline of the Kuwait Mansion loomed.
Diego: (grimly) "To the mansion. To find out what the hell happened. Even if there's no one left to give us the answers we want."
Stallion: (whispering) "It doesn't feel right. Going back there..."
Diego: (grinning darkly) "When has anything in my life ever been right?"
With that, Diego pulled himself up onto the Stallion's back, his legs trembling as they strained to move without the Gyro Sphere. Every muscle in his body screamed at him, the disease wrapping itself around his bones like a serpent, squeezing tighter with every passing moment. But Diego pushed the pain aside, burying it deep within himself like he always did. The ride to the mansion was going to hurt—hell, it might kill him—but that didn't matter now. Not anymore.
As they galloped toward the Kuwait Mansion, the landscape around them seemed to warp and twist, the world bending and contorting in ways that defied logic. It was like reality itself was malfunctioning, glitching out, as if the fabric of existence was held together by nothing more than frayed threads. Trees grew sideways, buildings stretched and shrank, the sky flickered between day and night like a faulty neon sign.
Diego: (muttering to himself) "Futuristic... haunted... glitch dimension... yep, definitely not in 1946 anymore."
Stallion: "You're handling this surprisingly well."
Diego: (laughing bitterly) "When your father creates life out of thin air and your brother dies in your arms, reality kind of... loses its grip, y'know?"
Stallion: "Fair point."
The mansion grew closer, its towering spires and cracked windows resembling the skeletal remains of some long-dead beast. It sat there like a forgotten god, looming over everything, suffocating the air with its presence. The gates were rusted, hanging off their hinges like broken bones, and the once-beautiful gardens were overrun with twisted vines and strange, mechanical creatures that scuttled through the underbrush like rats.
Diego and the Stallion entered the courtyard, the sound of their approach echoing off the empty walls. Diego's heart pounded in his chest, the memories of his childhood here flooding back like a tidal wave. The games he played with Mikhail, the lessons from Amir, the constant pressure to be something more, something greater than himself. And now... all that was left was silence.
