It was quiet after that. He took another breath and stepped forward, the fog swirling beneath his feet.
"I don't want this life and death to be limited. I don't want to die again in the arms of those I love again. I don't want that to be the way my story ends."
His voice deepened. There was pain in it.
"And my destiny, Suffering Before Reward, it's flawed and unfair. I want it to balance, not to be dictated by a never-ending scale where the suffering keeps tipping. I want the reward to match the pain. One for one. No more, no less."
Destiny's light pulsed. Fate's pillar darkened, as though in thought. And then, together, they answered.
"We accept," they said in tandem, and the weave of reality subtly shifted. Fate reached into some realm and Destiny plucked a strand from the golden thread. A new line began to form, one no longer bound by the imbalance that had haunted Vastarael for two lifetimes.
Vastarael let out a breath he didn't realize he had been holding. He had fought, bled, suffered, and now… he would rise. But one final curiosity weighed on him still.
"But what exactly does a Split do?"
Thyrexxa spoke almost immediately.
"A Split is more than a successor and a piece of power. Splits are those chosen to inherit our mantles, the next line of Supreme Entities. Across the galaxies, hundreds of thousands are chosen. They are our future."
She paused.
"But I…" Her light dimmed, as if sighing. "…have only chosen one."
Death's voice confirmed it from across the void.
"She is the third oldest Primordial. After Space, and Existence, the First. She rarely chooses. She does not need to."
"And yet," Fate added, "in the planet of Spheraphase, both Time and Space have each chosen."
Space's voice was low and resonant like the echo of the void between stars.
"Vastarael of Richinaria and Narisva of Starisnova. You are the only two Splits we have selected in this realm. And to ascend, to become what we are, there are eight challenges."
The fog curled into fractals of enlightenment, each one towering like temples.
"These Eight Trials will come only as you ascend through the Divine Stages of Enlightenment. And each will test whether you are worthy… or merely surviving."
Fate's voice returned.
"You must go to the Islands of Inexpelcae, five years after your return to the present. Until then, you must not interact with anyone outside your family. No friends. No students. No rivals."
"And why?" Vastarael asked.
"Because your Fate will change there," she answered. "It must. Otherwise, it will not change."
Vastarael closed his eyes, calculating, feeling the rhythm of possibilities branch through him.
"No," he said softly. "I don't want to return to the present. Not yet."
The Primordials stilled.
"I will go to the Obsidian Runic Spire in the Erna Isles. I will remain there for 7,700 years. I will sleep until the time catches up."
Space pulsed with sudden intrigue. "Why?"
"To grow. For one to become a Nexus, they must be over five thousand years old. I want that power. I want the reach, the presence and authority of a being beyond mortality. When I rise, I want no confusion about what I am."
"And the souls?" Death asked, curious now.
"I'll try bring them back. The Obsidian Spire still contains their essence. I harvested them, yes but I didn't erase them. Their souls are intact. And as a Divine, as an Aeterium, I can reconstruct their mortal souls from their Soul Energy, rebuild them and let them live an afterlife."
And then, something almost unimaginable happened. The Primordials were amazed. A voice whispered from Life herself.
"You were willing to disappear from the world and let your name vanish, to sleep while others forgot you. All… to bring them back?"
Vastarael didn't respond. He didn't need to. They knew.
Destruction muttered, "He was free. He won. And still, he chose penance."
Death exhaled, "Souls… turned into living energy… only to be returned once the power was his…"
Creation's tone was heavy, reverent. "He planned this from the beginning. Even death was part of the equation."
Space murmured, "A plan spanning eras."
Time was quiet. But if Vastarael looked carefully, he might have seen a small glow beneath her pillar. A spark of pride. It was Life who said it, finally.
"You are peculiar, Vastarael. A Split unlike any other."
He closed his eyes. For the first time, he believed her. As the echoes of his final wish drifted across the eternal dominion of fog, Thyrexxa's voice came again.
"Then sleep you shall. For 7,700 years, you will lie dormant in the Spire. When you awaken, you will be returned to Anqerise. But you will not return alone."
The fog behind her parted, revealing the faint silhouette of another soul tethered to his fatem it was a woman with long, shadowy dark hair and chains bound to her wrists.
It was Erna.
"She was bound to the moon," Thyrexxa said. "You changed that. Now she is bound to you. If you choose this path, she will remain with you until death."
Vastarael stared at the silhouette. He knew her story and knew what she had suffered. And now… this was another burden. But he didn't hesitate.
"It's not an issue. Let her rest too."
For a moment, the Primordials said nothing. Only Time stirred. Then, Destiny stepped forward.
"Then may your path be one of clarity," she said. "No more interference from us. No more trials…"
"Unless you do something stupid again," Space muttered under his breath.
"I make no promises," Vastarael replied with a faint grin.
Unexpectedly, Death let out a low chuckle that reverberated through all the stone totems.
"Now you've done it. You've made me laugh."
As the final judgments were sealed, the colossal pillars began to dissolve, crumbling into threads of that cascaded into the void like shooting stars folding into silence.
And then there was only Life. She stood at the center as Vastarael's soul hovered like a fading outline.
"I will restore your body now. But before I do… would you like it to be whole? Your heart can return. Your right arm too. You could still have the nine pseudo-cores with a heart, ten now that you have the Divine Core."
Vastarael looked down at his form, translucent and weathered by pain. He could feel the emptiness in his chest, the severed threads where his right arm should be. And yet, he shook his head.
"No. Let it be the same. These scars are reminders. They are part of me now."
Life's glow dimmed in quiet approval. "You truly are… peculiar."
"Also," he added with a small smirk, "turn off my Mystic Eyes of Awareness by default. I don't want to see everything all the time."
She chuckled and nodded, extending her palm.
"You really like hoarding. Done."
As she reached out, his soul lit with emerald light, and his body began to reform. Muscle, bone and flesh all returned, but not as perfection.
And then he vanished, swallowed by the fog.
In the real world, on the shattered plains of the Erna Isles, beneath the ruins of a forgotten temple, the Obsidian Runic Spire activated, glowing with symbols no one living could decipher.
Vastarael's form descended into its core, cradled in time. He saw the Minafallen students vanishing. Then he saw Phaenora disappearing next.
"Well, I guess it's time for me to sleep. Thankfully, Sleep Runes are there for a reason. And the Orchestral Vialex should make it easier for me."