At the break of dawn, Arya stood on the edge of a steep cliff overlooking the Java Sea. The cold wind whipped across his face, carrying the tang of salt and faint traces of smoke from the battle behind him.
The eastern sky glowed crimson, streaks of light cutting through the clouds and dancing over the restless sea below. Waves crashed against the rocks with fury, echoing the storm still churning inside him.
His body ached with every breath—black veins pulsed beneath his skin, his eyes still flaring red when he blinked. The scars on his back throbbed, wings long burned away, but the pain remained. In his hand, the silver locket felt heavier than ever. Cold. Solid. Human.
Serambi Nusantara was no more. Its leaders—Lena Wijaya among them—were dead or scattered. Their secrets were exposed, their twisted empire toppled. But Arya knew better than to celebrate. The war hadn't ended. The parasite still whispered.
It lived in his blood.
"We did it, didn't we?" he said aloud, his voice hoarse, nearly lost to the wind.
"Yeah," Bayu replied softly, his voice drifting into Arya's mind like morning fog. "We stopped them. But it's not over. You feel it too, right? The parasite… it's still watching. Still waiting."
Arya nodded, staring into the mist where sea and sky met. The Anima Terrae writhed quietly inside him—alive, ancient, patient. He wasn't just a man anymore. But he wasn't a monster either.
He was something in between.
"Let it wait," Arya muttered. "As long as you're with me, we'll keep fighting. For the others. For us."
He opened the locket, letting the sunrise spill onto the photo inside—two young men in uniform, grinning on graduation day. Untouched by the horror that would come. Arya smiled, quietly, honestly.
"Always together, right?"
"Forever," Bayu said.
Arya could almost feel his friend's hand on his shoulder—warm, steady. A bond stronger than blood. Stronger than death. Stronger than whatever came next.
Behind him, the jungle waited—alive, breathing, wild.
Below, the sea thundered.
And deep within Kalimantan, in a cave older than humanity, Anima Terrae stirred.
But not yet.
For now, Arya turned from the cliff's edge and stepped into the trees, the locket clenched in his fist, a fading heartbeat in a world that had already changed forever.