The inside of the Spire pulsed with a heartbeat not its own.
As Aeron and Kael stepped into the main corridor, the air grew heavier. Not just with pressure, but intent. Every wall bore glyphs of failed civilizations—symbols carved in anguish, etched by those who had attempted this climb before and perished, either physically or spiritually.
Kael's expression tightened. "This place... it's alive."
Aeron nodded slowly, scanning the corridor with narrowed eyes. "It's not just alive—it's observing. Calculating."
The deeper they moved, the more the Spire responded. Platforms reshaped themselves underfoot. Pillars shifted subtly. Lights blinked in patterns that seemed almost... expectant.
Then came the voice.
Smooth. Measured. Familiar.
> "You made it farther than expected, Aeron. Truly, I underestimated your will."
Aeron stopped dead. Kael went on high alert, blades half-drawn.
> "You've walked through trials meant to break anyone touched by the old gods. But perhaps that was your advantage—Nyxus was never meant to survive. And neither were you."
Aeron clenched his jaw. "Vex."
> "Not anymore." The voice echoed from everywhere and nowhere at once. "That name belongs to a man with limits. I have none now."
Aeron's system flared a warning. A cascading surge of data filtered through his interface, foreign protocols interlacing with his core. A prompt appeared:
> You are entering: The Ascension Protocol – Tier 0
– All system permissions unlocked
– All passive restraints lifted
– Mortality scale: irrelevant
The room transformed in response.
They now stood in a vast chamber suspended in a void of spinning data and fractured reality. Above them, like a god descending, floated a being no longer human—once Vex, now a thing of code, divine fragments, and ambition incarnate.
His body was draped in cybernetic robes laced with shifting runes. Where his eyes once were, endless lines of processing code streamed endlessly.
> "You're early," he said. "The final stage wasn't meant to trigger for another cycle. But I suppose this is... educational."
Kael snarled, stepping forward. "You killed your own team. For this?"
Vex tilted his head. "I liberated them from stagnation."
Without warning, pillars of light shot toward them, each one laced with null-energy designed to strip away system links. Kael weaved between them with deadly grace, but Aeron raised his hand—and the aura around him responded.
Nyxus surged through him like a furnace.
> New Skill Unlocked: Nullbrand Mantle
— Temporarily nullify hostile system interference within aura range.
— Duration: 20 seconds. Cooldown: 2 minutes.
Aeron's aura exploded in a ring of deep violet and gold, warping the light strikes mid-air, unraveling Vex's attempt at severance.
"Not this time," Aeron said coldly.
They launched into battle.
Kael blurred into motion, engaging sentinels that emerged from rifts in the data floor. Meanwhile, Aeron and Vex clashed midair, surrounded by algorithmic storms. Each strike exchanged between them wasn't just a blow, it was a test of belief.
"You want to rewrite the world," Aeron growled, fists crackling with divine flame and system force, "but you've forgotten the price of power without purpose."
Vex smiled—a cruel, broken thing. "I didn't forget. I erased it."
Their collision lit the void with shattering sound.
Aeron activated Veilburn Requiem, channeling every piece of corrupted energy he had absorbed from the Hollow Convergence. His aura spiked—unstable, monstrous and lashed out like a tidal wave. It slammed into Vex and sent him spiraling back.
For a moment, the god-machine faltered.
"You've changed," Vex admitted, stabilizing mid-air. "You're becoming something... other."
Aeron's breath was ragged. His system screamed from within. But he held steady.
"I'm becoming necessary."
Suddenly, Vex reached out and tore at the void. A massive black spike of reality-inverted metal burst from the rift and aimed straight for Kael. Aeron's instincts surged—he teleported, aura dragging him between dimensions, and slammed into the spike before it could hit.
Pain exploded in his ribs.
Kael called out, fury in his voice. "You idiot!"
Aeron coughed blood, gritting his teeth. "Get to the core. Shut it down from inside."
Kael hesitated—but nodded, then vanished toward the heart of the tower.
Alone now, Aeron stood tall, despite the blood seeping from his mouth. Vex hovered above him, unreadable.
> "If you kill me," Vex said, "you inherit the sequence. You'll be next. This is bigger than revenge or justice. This is destiny by code."
A final prompt echoed within Aeron's mind:
> Do you wish to initiate System Override?
– Warning: You may overwrite your humanity.
– Confirm? [Y/N]
Nyxus was silent.
For once, this decision was entirely his.
Aeron's fingers twitched toward the prompt.
But he didn't answer—yet.
Because the story wasn't over.
Not here.
Not yet.
---
The silence following the prompt was oppressive. Aeron floated in the void, limbs trembling, systems in flux. His aura flickered, destabilized from the impact of Vex's spike and the chaotic energy threading through the Spire.
Vex watched him carefully. Not out of fear but out of anticipation.
"Will you do it?" Vex asked softly. "Will you become what I couldn't? A perfect fusion of man and machine, god and system? There's no turning back if you choose yes."
Aeron's mind raced.
The System Override wasn't a simple evolution—it was annihilation of the self for something greater. His memories. His pain. His choices. All potentially overwritten to become a tool of cosmic balance. Or imbalance.
His hand hovered over the prompt.
> System Override: Pending
Remaining time to choose: 30 seconds…
Suddenly, a familiar voice cut through the void.
"You're not ready to become like him."
Kael's voice. Not just in his ears, but through their linked auras—bonded in combat, in trust.
He wasn't alone.
"Don't trade your soul for a shortcut," Kael continued, his voice strained, laced with urgency. "We've made it this far because we endured, not because we gave in."
Aeron's trembling stopped.
The prompt blinked once more.
He exhaled, slowly… then turned his hand away.
> System Override: Canceled.
A second later, his aura solidified again,less raw, but sharper, honed.
The system responded to his resolve:
> Skill Upgraded: Nullbrand Mantle → Nullbrand Dominion
– Now extends control over spatial system interactions.
– Aura becomes a beacon of resistance.
– All allies within aura radius gain temporary immunity to external override attempts.
Vex flinched. "You refused perfection?"
"No," Aeron said, voice like steel. "I chose control."
He surged forward, unleashing a flurry of empowered strikes—not with brute force, but with deliberate, crafted intent. Every blow carried traces of his history: the betrayal in the dungeon, the pact with Nyxus, the pain of rising alone.
He wasn't chasing power anymore.
He was mastering it.
Vex tried to respond, but his attacks were now slowed,dragged down by Aeron's growing dominion over the space around them. The void, once Vex's playground, now resisted him.
"You turned the Protocol against me…" Vex hissed.
Aeron landed a clean strike to the center of Vex's chest, cracking the protective shell that housed his core.
"The Protocol was never yours," Aeron replied. "You just triggered it. I'm rewriting it."
With another surge of his aura, Aeron drove Vex backward. The false god screamed as the Spire responded—not to Vex, but to Aeron. Glyphs changed. Algorithms warped. A new stream of code filtered into Aeron's HUD.
> New Authority Gained: Tier-1 Ascendant Node Access
– Partial command over system functions within Spire Network
– Begin assimilation?
"Yes," Aeron whispered.
Vex roared in fury and desperation. "If I can't be a god… I'll tear this world down with me!"
He dove straight for Aeron, the remnants of his power igniting in a suicide burst.
But Aeron's aura, now refined and dominant, spread its wings—literal extensions of Nyxus's essence flared behind him like divine shadows. They intercepted Vex's explosion, compressing it into a singularity of fractured system matter.
A moment later, it collapsed… leaving only silence.
And Vex was gone.
No corpse.
No scream.
Only the flickering remains of corrupted data.
Aeron slowly descended to the ground as the chamber reformed around him. The Spire's core now pulsed in sync with his own rhythm.
Kael appeared from a hallway, bloodied but alive.
"It's done," he said.
"No," Aeron answered, his eyes narrowing. "It's just beginning."