Velrosa's vision swam again.
Her mind scread. Please, Ian. Don't.
If she was bleeding—
If they all were—
The Void was demanding. And Ian was answering.
"Fuck," she whispered.
———
The scent of iron saturated the air, subtle yet overwhelming.
It was the kind of scent that didn't just cling to the nostrils—it coiled around the soul aswell. In the Spiral Chamber, nobles clutched handkerchiefs and pressed trembling hands to their faces, eyes wide with mounting dread.
Blood dripped down cheeks like crimson tears, silent and damning.
And In the center of the room, the God-Chosen tilted his head.
His pale eyes surveyed the spectacle of bleeding aristocracy with the idle curiosity of a man watching ink spread on parchnt.
And then, he spoke.
"What could this be?"
His voice was soft. Almost amused. As though divinity itself were playing a ga, and he rely observed the rules unfolding.
Velrosa didn't answer. She couldn't. Her lips were cold and slick with blood.
She turned slightly, eyes locking with Eli's behind her. Her voice was a whisper—desperate and brittle.
"Ian is going to attack. Intercept him. Stop him."
Eli didn't hesitate.
"Understood."
The chamber flickered.
Or perhaps it was sothing else—the mont before motion, where the world stutters in anticipation.
And then Eli moved.
He vanished from sight, an afterimage swallowed by wind and silence. One breath, he was standing behind her. The next, gone. The wind shrieked in his wake, howling through stone corridors and balcony railings.
---
The rooftops of Esgard blurred below him—slates and spires a sar of color as he raced across them faster than most eyes could follow.
Dust and broken shingles trailed in his wake like falling stars. He felt the pressure building ahead—a pulse in the fabric of the world.
It was like gravity, like heat, like death.
And he found him.
Ian stood on a rooftop overlooking the Council Hall's high do.
His black coat was still, yet power curled around his form like storm winds. Shadows moved beneath his skin. His eyes glowed pale gray—not like fire or light, but like the color of a forgotten tombstone.
Old. Silent. Absolute.
The Prophet of Death.
Eli ca to a stop five paces away, the wind behind him dying as if the air feared to breathe in Ian's presence.
The two stood like statues beneath the open sky—gods in the flesh, poised on opposite ends of an invisible blade.
"What are you doing?" Eli asked, his voice calm but edged with warning. "Do you want to kill us all?"
Ian didn't blink.
"No," he said, the word simple and flat. "Just Mark. Or the God-Chosen. Whatever he calls himself now."
Eli narrowed his eyes.
So. It was personal.
"I don't know the history between you two," Eli said. "But I know enough about you. And about him. Stand down, Ian. This isn't a battle you can win. Not here. Not now. If you strike, we all die."
Ian's eyes didn't change. "He doesn't belong here, ill send him off."
"You think I don't want him gone?" Eli's voice rose slightly, his stance shifting. "You think I didn't feel what he is the mont he stepped through those doors? But there are lines you cross when you're ready—and you're not ready, Ian."
Ian's hand twitched by his side.
"No," he repeated. "I am."
Eli's expression darkened.
He exhaled slowly. And with it ca a weight—like the stillness before a storm. His fingers curled at his sides.
"I always wondered," he said, voice now low and hard, "when I'd have to go all out with you."
And then he was gone.
Not vanished—but everywhere.
A blur of golden motion, impossibly fast, impossibly quiet. Ti folded.
Before Ian could even draw breath, Eli was already there—arm cocked back, eyes glowing like twin suns—and his palm struck forward.
It landed square in Ian's chest.
The world exploded.
The shockwave shattered windows for blocks.
Stone cracked, and pigeons scattered in terror. Glass rained down like falling stars. For a single instant, all of Esgard froze—eyes turned to the heavens as a black silhouette streaked across the sky like a cot.
Ian was launched backwards at impossible speed.
He tore through the rooftops like a bolt from a divine sling. Tiles and wood shattered in his path. Walls collapsed behind him.
He reached the edge of Esgard.
The outer ward. Beyond the rings of nobility, past the last gates. The ground there was dusty and wild, a place of outskirts and quiet.
He hit the earth hard—tumbling once, twice—before his feet dug in, carving a trench through the dirt. His boots scread against the stone as he skidded to a halt.
Dust hung in the air.
Then blood hit the back of his throat.
He spat it out. It hissed on the ground like sothing alive.
His chest still burned where Eli had struck him.
A flicker. A presence.
And then Eli was there again—standing before him, arms loose at his sides, dreadlocks drifting in the wind.
Unbothered. Untouched.
"You want to prove to you're ready to fight the God-Chosen?" Eli said, his voice iron now. "Then defeat first."
Ian didn't reply imdiately.
His hand reached up, brushing the blood off his chin. It stead where it touched his skin, like his body was boiling from within.
He planted both feet firmly into the earth. The wind coiled tighter around him. His aura deepened into sothing colder, more ancient—sothing that spoke in the language of mausoleums and death bells.
He glared at Eli, gray eyes burning brighter now.
The Prophet of Death stood.
And across from him stood the Plague of the Western Front—the man who shattered armies and broke champions.
Two forces.
Two ends of the sa abyss.
The wind roared. The earth cracked beneath them. Insects fled. Birds took flight. The trees on the edge of Esgard wilted.
And in the silence that followed, only a single sound could be heard—
Ian's voice, quiet, breathless, deadly:
"Then co."
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