Ivan's smile didn't waver.
Not even as Kaelen's hand passed **through him**.
The crimson claws tore through empty air, space rippling like disturbed water. Kaelen's eyes narrowed—not in confusion, but in **recognition**.
Ivan straightened, his form re-solidifying instantly, not a scar left behind. Golden light pulsed beneath his skin like a second circulatory system.
"You shouldn't try to intimidate me, Kaelen," Ivan said calmly. "You already felt it, didn't you?"
He lifted his empty hand, palm up.
"The moment you reached for your heart… and **couldn't recall it**."
Kaelen didn't answer.
But his regeneration—once immediate, effortless—**did not trigger**.
The torn flesh along his chest closed slowly. Too slowly.
Ivan's eyes gleamed.
"You noticed," he continued softly. "Good. I'd be disappointed if you hadn't."
He took a step back, space folding subtly beneath his feet, as if reality itself were accommodating him.
"I didn't come here to face you head-on," Ivan went on. "That would have been… stupid. Even for me."
His gaze flicked briefly toward the distant battlefield—toward the falling shape Kaelen could no longer sense clearly.
"No," Ivan said. "I came prepared."
He spread his arms slightly.
"I didn't just take your heart, Kaelen."
The golden light around him **shifted**, symbols flashing briefly—spatial runes, layered and impossibly deep.
"I separated it from the **world itself**."
The words landed heavier than any blow.
Kaelen's aura surged violently, crimson mana roaring outward—but for the first time, **it stuttered**.
Ivan smiled wider.
"Another space. Another frame of reality. Not a pocket you can rip open. Not a dimension you can force your way into."
He tilted his head, almost apologetic.
"Think of it this way: your heart still exists. Still beats. Still keeps you alive."
A pause.
"But the laws governing where it is… don't allow you to be whole."
Kaelen's jaw tightened.
"You can't regenerate fully," Ivan continued. "You can't recover what you lose. You won't die—not quickly."
His eyes softened, just a fraction.
"And I don't want you to, brother."
The word lingered between them like poison.
"But you won't truly live either."
Ivan stepped closer again, unafraid now.
"As long as your heart remains there, every wound becomes permanent. Every battle costs you something you'll never get back."
He leaned in, voice dropping.
"And eventually… even a king bleeds out."
Behind Ivan, the Apostles regathered. Their forms stabilized, halos reforging, wings spreading wide as divine authority reasserted itself.
Ivan glanced at them briefly, then back to Kaelen.
"This is the law now," he said. "Not the Goddess's. Not the Empire's."
He smiled.
"Mine."
Kaelen stared at him, crimson eyes burning—but beneath the rage was something colder.
Sharper.
Understanding.
Far below, unseen by either of them, Draven's body continued to fall—toward earth, toward awakening, toward something that would **change the balance of everything** Ivan believed he controlled.
Kaelen slowly drew himself upright.
Even wounded.
Even bound by foreign laws.
Still a king.
"You made one mistake," Kaelen said quietly.
Ivan raised a brow. "Oh?"
Kaelen's fangs bared in a grin that held **no humor at all**.
"You assumed this ends with me."
The sky darkened.
Ivan chuckled softly, almost thoughtfully, as if considering a curious idea rather than delivering a sentence.
"You know," he said, lifting one hand and examining his fingers as golden light crawled lazily along his knuckles, "I wondered about that."
His gaze returned to Kaelen—measured, clinical.
"If the only thing left of you was a **finger**," Ivan continued, voice calm and precise, "would you still be able to move?"
A pause.
"Would you still be *you*?"
The Apostles behind him remained silent, wings spread, halos steady—observers to a verdict already written.
"I ran the calculations," Ivan went on. "Your existence is anchored to that heart now. Not your body. Not your will. The heart."
He tapped his chest lightly.
"As long as it beats, you persist. Even if everything else is stripped away."
His smile sharpened.
"So yes," he said. "If all that remained was a finger—burned, broken, buried in the dirt—"
Ivan's eyes gleamed.
"—you would still *exist*."
Another step closer.
"Unable to regenerate. Unable to act. Unable to die."
He tilted his head, mock sympathy flickering across his face.
"Immortality reduced to awareness."
The air around Kaelen **trembled**.
Crimson mana surged instinctively, then faltered again—ragged this time, uneven. Kaelen felt it clearly now: the drag, the resistance, the wrongness in every attempt to assert his power.
Ivan noticed.
"That look," he said quietly. "There it is."
He lowered his voice, almost gentle.
"You should be proud. Few beings are worthy of such precautions."
Then, colder—
"But don't misunderstand me, brother. I didn't do this out of hatred."
His eyes flicked downward, toward the distant earth where Draven had fallen.
"I did it because **you're no longer the most dangerous thing connected to that family**."
Silence followed.
Heavy.
Charged.
Kaelen straightened slowly, blood dripping from wounds that no longer closed cleanly. His gaze burned—not wild, not frantic—
**Focused**.
"If I'm reduced to a finger," Kaelen said at last, voice low and steady, "then that finger will still point at you."
Ivan smiled.
"Oh," he replied. "I'm counting on it."
Ivan's smile didn't fade.
If anything, it softened—just a fraction—into something far more unsettling.
"Ah… and my little nephew," he said lightly, as though savoring the words.
"I would say—*brother*."
His golden eyes shifted—not downward this time, but **through** the world itself—past distance, past battle, past flesh—locking onto something deeper.
"You hid it well," Ivan continued calmly. "So well that even I didn't notice at first."
He chuckled under his breath.
"To think… something I once considered a **stain** would carry blood like *that*."
The Apostles stiffened.
Kaelen felt it.
Ivan raised one hand slightly, fingers glowing faintly as unseen sigils spun and dissolved around his palm.
"Do you know how rare it is?" Ivan asked, almost conversationally. "For that lineage to surface once again. Not diluted. Not broken. Not dormant."
His smile sharpened.
"But **awake**."
The air warped—subtly, dangerously.
"I thought Draven was merely… interesting," Ivan went on. "A violent anomaly. A byproduct of your excess."
His gaze darkened.
"I was wrong."
He looked genuinely intrigued now.
"That presence just now," he said, "that wasn't awakening."
A pause.
"That was **recognition**."
Kaelen's jaw tightened.
Ivan leaned forward slightly, his voice dropping.
"He didn't *become* something new," Ivan said.
"He remembered."
Golden light flared briefly in Ivan's eyes, then dimmed.
"Which means," he added softly, "that whatever you buried—whatever you tried so desperately to give a 'peaceful life'—"
His smile returned, colder than before.
"—was never gone."
He straightened, clasping his hands behind his back, his tone turning almost scholarly.
"You should be grateful, Kaelen. Truly."
Grateful.
"If he had awakened fully here," Ivan said, "this place wouldn't be standing long enough for us to finish this conversation."
Then—quietly, almost fondly—
"But don't worry."
His gaze flicked once more toward where Draven had fallen.
"I'll deal with him properly."
The words settled like a sentence already passed.
"After all," Ivan concluded, smiling,
"he still possesses something that's mine."
His eyes gleamed gold.