The sky tore open.
From the rift spilled a blinding cascade of script, letters so vast they dwarfed mountains. Each symbol burned as though reality itself was being erased and rewritten in real time. The hand that emerged was pale, impossibly large, its veins glowing like ink rivers, fingers curling as if to pinch Clara from existence.
The void trembled. Clara staggered back, wings flaring instinctively, sparks and letters dripping off her like dying stars. The Codex half of her screamed recognition—it wasn't just a hand, it was an editor's correction. A direct attempt to erase her paradox from the page.
Yurin stepped forward. His crimson aura erupted outward in a violent shockwave, coiling into threads that shot skyward and latched onto the descending hand. The sheer force of his will bent the threads like steel cables, halting its descent by mere inches. The entire void groaned under the strain.
"You will not take her," Yurin declared, his voice carrying not as sound but as decree. His words bent the air, forming unshakable law.
Clara's chest tightened. For a heartbeat, she felt shielded. But then—she caught the way Yurin's threads hooked around her too, binding her wings to his presence. Her breath hitched. His protection and his control were indistinguishable.
The Author's hand flexed. Ink gushed down its knuckles, forming spear-like quills that rained upon them. Evelyn leapt aside, laughing like she was front-row at the apocalypse. "Now this is what I call a rewrite! Try not to get deleted, darlings!"
Quills stabbed into the void around Clara, each one hissing with power. Where they landed, pieces of the world blinked out of existence, erased without resistance. Clara instinctively raised her hand, flame colliding with the ink spears. The fire hissed, guttered—then flared brighter, infused with Damien's lingering resonance.
Her wings spread, burning, writing over the void itself: Refuse. Defy. Burn.
The hand recoiled slightly, as if stung.
Yurin's gaze flicked to her, threads surging in response. "With me, Clara."
The words should have anchored her. Instead, they grated. With him. Always with him. Her fire rose higher, threatening to spill beyond his threads, threatening to shape itself.
She screamed, unleashing a column of flame-script upward. Her Codex eye burned with furious light, writing across the descending hand: You cannot erase me.
The script seared into its flesh. The colossal hand writhed, black veins surging as the Author's will buckled for a heartbeat.
But then the hand retaliated. The letters inscribed onto it dissolved into shreds, unmade as if Clara's words had never existed. Her eye burned, tears spilling as blood.
"Clara!" Yurin's threads wrapped tighter around her, reinforcing, holding her upright. "You're not strong enough yet. Don't push—"
Her body shook under the strain. His voice, steady and commanding, pressed against her mind like chains.
Something inside her snapped.
"I don't need you to tell me when I'm strong enough!" Clara shouted, ripping her wings against his threads. Flames burst outward, searing through several crimson lines. The recoil struck Yurin, forcing him a step back for the first time since the battle began. His eyes widened—not in anger, but in calculation.
Evelyn clapped from the sidelines, shrieking with glee. "Yes, darling! Break the leash! Show him you're not his puppet!"
The void cracked deeper. The Author's hand reached again, faster, angrier.
Clara's fire spiraled upward, carving a blazing script across the sky. Yurin's crimson aura surged to meet it, threads lashing around the colossal fingers. For a fleeting moment, their powers braided together—flame and script, crimson and defiance—pushing the hand back.
The Author's grip faltered. The sky fractured further, bleeding words and screams. The hand withdrew, vanishing back through the rift with a furious lurch. The silence afterward was heavier than the battle itself.
Clara collapsed to her knees, panting, her wings dimming. Blood streaked down her cheek from her glowing eye. Yurin moved toward her at once, crimson aura curling, but she flinched away.
"Don't," she whispered.
His steps slowed. His eyes—crimson storms—studied her carefully. Not anger. Not pity. But something colder: acknowledgment of a variable he hadn't accounted for.
"You resisted my threads." His voice was calm, even—but the edges were sharper now. "That should have been impossible."
Clara trembled, clutching her chest. "Maybe it's time you stop deciding what's possible for me."
The silence that followed was suffocating. Evelyn broke it with a sing-song laugh. "Oh, this is delicious. Our darling paradox just bit the hand that binds." She winked. "And maybe, just maybe, she'll bite harder next time."
Clara's gaze flicked from Evelyn's grin to Yurin's unreadable face. For the first time, she wasn't sure who she feared more—the Author above, or the crimson figure standing in front of her.