Asher’s chest tightened painfully, the air leaving his lungs as he turned slowly to face the haunting presence behind him.
There stood the Ti Wraith, a fractured remnant of the woman he had once cherished more than life itself. Her sickly radiant-white hair shimred like dying starlight, each strand appearing fragile enough to snap at the gentlest touch.
Jagged spikes of bone erupted cruelly from her skull and shoulders, physical reminders of endless battles against the unyielding currents of fate.
Her skin, pale as porcelain yet etched with luminous white scars, pulsed silently with a sorrowful rhythm. Each scar marked a failed attempt to reshape destiny, the consequences of tampering with the fundantal laws of reality. Her eyes blazed—two radiant voids, infinite and cold, devoid of pity, devoid of hate, filled only with a profound, unending emptiness.
The bloody trail she left upon the earth from her long, crimson-stained fingers told stories Asher dared not fathom. Around her hovered orbs of pure radiant mana, their calm, unwavering luminescence paradoxically terrifying in its purity. They were capable of annihilating entire tilines, eradicating worlds without remorse or hesitation.
He opened his mouth, his voice barely a trembling whisper.
"Aira...what has happened to you?"
She regarded him silently, her expression devoid of anger, sadness, or compassion. Instead, she seed infinitely weary, an eternal being burdened beyond what any soul could bear.
"I’ve beco what I needed to beco, Asher," she finally spoke, voice resonating softly yet echoing like a whisper through eternity. "For you."
The weight of her words struck Asher like an icy blade, embedding deep into his heart. He stepped closer, compelled by a lingering hope, desperate to reach out to her.
"You didn’t have to do this...this isn’t what I wanted for you," he pleaded gently. "You deserved peace, happiness—not this eternal tornt. All this suffering...because of ."
The Wraith’s gaze softened ever so slightly, yet remained distant, almost clinical.
"Your misunderstanding is natural. I’ve seen countless tilines—lifetis upon lifetis—where you fought, loved, and inevitably suffered. Each ti I intervened, you suffered more. Every mont I sought to protect you rely prolonged your agony."
Her voice remained calm, composed, almost academic in its clarity. Her emotions had long since dissipated, ground away by relentless centuries of watching him suffer again and again.
Asher clenched his jaw, grief choking his voice. "Forgive , Aira. If I’d known—if I’d had any idea of the burden I placed on you..."
"You never placed it upon ," she corrected softly, almost gently. "I chose it. You, my love, were my choice. Even as I watched you perish endlessly, I chose to believe the cycle could end. That hope, that persistent faith, transford into my burden. Now only one answer remains. To erase all tilines."
Asher’s heart twisted bitterly. He saw no resentnt in her words, only a quiet acceptance. That hurt far worse—knowing how completely she had surrendered to this fate.
"I will never forgive myself for making you choose such a path," he admitted hoarsely. "But this—erasing all tilines? Destroying everything—is not the answer."
She tilted her head slightly, contemplating his words as if genuinely weighing their rit. But her eyes never wavered, still blazing with radiant, rciless inevitability.
"The countless universes I’ve traversed taught one immutable truth," she explained quietly. "Every path where you survive leads inevitably to unbearable loss, suffering, and death. You are cursed, beloved. Bound eternally to tragedy by the Damned One. I have tried for eons to trick or circumvent that being. But there was none but one solution to release you from your curse."
Her words carried no malice, no bla. They were simple statents of fact, observations from countless lives and experiences.
He struggled against a rising panic, pleading, "You’ve fought so long to save . You believed there was hope. Why stop now?"
The Ti Wraith regarded him almost tenderly, a tragic shadow of compassion flickering briefly across her radiant eyes.
"Because, in every tiline, my interventions only multiplied your agony. I am no longer driven by hope, Asher. I have transcended such naive concepts. There is only one act of true compassion left—to spare you the pain of existing altogether."
The icy finality of her words chilled Asher to the marrow. Still, he persisted, desperate to find even the smallest sliver of the woman he once knew hidden within her.
"Aira, I accept my suffering—I embrace it if necessary. But destroying everything is not compassion. It’s surrendering to despair. You are letting the Damned One win by doing this. That thing is the real enemy."
She appeared to consider his words carefully, her expression eerily serene, her eyes burning softly.
"No," she finally murmured. "Compassion is sparing you endless cycles of tornt. This is not despair. It is my ultimate act of love, stripped of emotion and selfish desire."
Her words stunned him into silence, realization dawning like cold sunlight.
"You...you genuinely believe this is rcy," he breathed, voice barely audible.
"Yes," she replied simply. "If you no longer exist, you can never suffer again. It is logic distilled through an eternity of trial and error. I have to release your soul from the wrath of ti."
Asher fought against the overwhelming anguish filling his chest. He could hardly reconcile the woman he once loved with this profound, calculating figure before him.
"Is there truly nothing left of the woman who gave a purpose to live, who laughed with , who shared dreams beneath endless stars?" he pleaded brokenly.
She paused, hesitating for the first ti. Sothing stirred deep within her radiant eyes, a fleeting spark of sothing long gone.
"She lived countless lifetis trying to shield you from pain," the Wraith spoke softly, almost wistfully. "She watched you die, watched you break, watched every cherished mont torn apart before her eyes. I carry those mories...but that woman no longer remains. Her sacrifice created ."
Guilt and pain stung Asher’s eyes, burningwithin his sockets. He stepped closer, reaching out instinctively, desperate to find any part of her still alive beneath the radiant shell.
"Then I refuse to accept this," he said defiantly, sorrow and resolve mingling fiercely. "I refuse to believe you’ve lost all hope. If you truly carry her mories, you must rember the happiness we once shared. The love we once held. That love is stronger than any curse or cycle."
The Wraith regarded his outstretched hand, her expression unreadable, distant. Her radiant mana orbs shifted silently around her, their purity like cold stars drifting through a dark, empty cosmos.
"Love is the very reason I must do this," she whispered softly, as if speaking to herself. "My mories of us are the chains that bind to this path. Because I rember, I must spare you from any further suffering. This cycle must be broken permanently."
His heart fractured as he felt the imnsity of her sacrifice—the depth of her conviction. She had beco this impossible, sorrowful being because of him. He was trying to plead, to beg so hard and yet she wasn’t moved.
And now, in her twisted perception, the greatest kindness left was to erase him completely.
Yet Asher refused to surrender. He couldn’t. Not after everything she had endured.
"If your mories chain you to this choice," he said softly, voice filled with desperate hope, "then let my mories of you free you from it. Let bear the pain this ti. You don’t have to carry it alone."
The Wraith looked into his eyes, an eternity of silent contemplation compressed into a single, profound mont. Her expression remained resolute yet haunted, burdened yet unwavering.
"You misunderstand," she murmured finally. "This burden cannot be shared, my love. It is mine alone. And it has led to the only logical conclusion: if I remove your existence, I free you from tornt, myself from eternal failure, and possible future tilines from endless suffering." But then her expression began to warp into sothing chilling as she added, "But those who stop or stand in my way, including you...will suffer or nothing. Is that what you truly want? To suffer more before the inevitable? Just give in without struggle and let finish this for you. You will know a peace you have never known before."
Asher stood frozen, helplessness clawing desperately at his soul. He saw no hate or anger, only absolute, chilling resolve—a logic refined and sharpened through countless centuries of sorrow and pain.
He realized with a heart-wrenching clarity that he was no longer speaking to a woman at all, but a being forged of cold, relentless truths, bound inexorably to her terrible mission.
But still, Asher clung desperately to hope, to love. The human part of him refused to abandon the last echo of the woman he loved.
"Then I will defy your logic," he declared softly, fiercely. "Even if it costs everything, I won’t let you erase . Because sowhere deep beneath that infinite pain and sorrow, I still see you, Aira—and I refuse to let go," The Void Reaver manifested in his hand, the blade blazing with dark green flas as he added, "So I am going to bring my Aira back even if it ans I have to hurt you."
The Ti Wraith’s lips began to curve into a cruel, crazed smile, "You have no idea how badly you are going to regret those words...again."
Reviews
All reviews (0)