The plains before the walls were roaring.
The clash between Awakened, Beasts, and humans shattered the air — steel against flesh, magic against dust and screams.
But in the forest not far away, another war was unfolding.
Smaller.
Quieter.
Far more personal.
And lethal.
A flash cut between the trees and the falling rain as Éon surged forward.
His movements were fluid, disciplined, precise — every step calculated, every turn converting weight into momentum, every strike unfurling as a natural continuation of breath itself.
There was no hesitation.
No waste.
He fought like someone reading the enemy's dance before it even began.
Pixy laughed.
Laughed loud.
Laughed like she was dancing at the end of the world itself.
"Oh, honey…" she sang, balancing on one leg atop a fallen log, her smile far too wide to be healthy. "If you stay this serious, you'll die of boredom before you die by my hands!"
Éon didn't answer.
He launched.
Pixy dodged as if playing, every evasion marked by a nearly theatrical spin, an exaggerated tumble, a leap that made no sense whatsoever — but worked.
An aura of chaos vibrated around her, as if she fought for fun, not victory.
"Oooh, that one was almost good!" she sang, tilting her body in an impossible angle as a blade passed two hairs from her cheek. "If you'd trained with your little Awakened girlfriend, you might've hit me!"
Éon's next strike came like thunder — a perfect impact, channeling strength, rotation, and focus in one brutal line.
Pixy blocked with both hands.
And slid back, leaves exploding beneath her feet.
Her smile flickered.
Just a little.
"Easy, easy…" she murmured, shaking her fingers as if they were tingling. "So you really did learn how to hit."
Éon raised his katana.
Set his stance.
Breathed deep.
She tilted her head, eyes glowing with a sickened excitement.
"Good. Because I learned how to kill."
And the forest trembled when they collided again — focus against madness, discipline against chaos.
The exchange of blows intensified.
Éon advanced with a sequence that seemed impossible to follow — short steps, sharp rotations, his body flowing as if every attack were merely the start of the next.
Pixy retreated laughing, but the sound began to fracture at the edges.
A thread of irritation crept in between the giggles.
"Easy, easy…" she hummed, slipping under an arc of the blade that cut two trees clean in half. "If you keep that up, I'll think you really want to kill me!"
She twisted her body in an absurd motion, flipping over Éon.
Before her feet touched the ground, she launched an attack with her fingers like stilettos, aiming for his throat.
Éon lifted his forearm.
The impact cracked through the entire grove.
The force dragged him three meters back, the ground crumbling under his boots.
Pixy landed lightly — far too lightly for something so deadly — and tilted her head, smiling as if she'd just broken a toy.
"Hmm… you can take more than I was told."
Éon didn't answer.
He vanished.
The air around him fractured as he burst forward, and Pixy had half a second to cross her arms in front of her body.
The blow hit.
The sound echoed through the trees as if someone had slammed a hammer against a colossal bell.
Pixy flew.
Through one trunk.
Then another.
Then a third.
She only stopped when she hit a boulder — and the impact was so violent her body opened like a broken marionette.
From the waist up, she was lodged halfway into the stone.
From the waist down, she crumpled to the ground, bent at an impossible angle, a thread of blood running down the rock like thin paint.
The forest fell silent.
A cold silence.
Pure.
Cut only by Éon's heavy breathing.
Then… something shifted.
A vibration rippled through the air.
Faint.
Sharp.
Metallic.
The cracked stone began to tremble.
And Pixy's broken body… began to move.
Her torso slid out of the rock, hitting the ground with a dull thud.
The two halves began pulling toward each other, as if invisible hands were stitching flesh, bone, and energy back together with distorted threads.
The sound — a wet crackling, a friction that shouldn't exist — echoed through the woods.
And then everything aligned.
The skin closed.
The spine straightened.
The body rose in one fluid movement far too smooth to be natural.
Pixy stepped out of the dust… laughing.
Her smile was wider.
Wronger.
Sharper.
"Ahhh… finally, Éon."
She lifted an arm.
The energy rising from it wasn't light, or sound, or aura.
It was distortion — as if the air were being twisted into invisible spirals, ready to tear open.
"Now it's fun."
The vibration grew.
Echoed through the forest.
Snapped in the air like the world was about to split in half.
Éon took the first step to react—
— and froze.
Something cut through the air.
An ancient pressure, violent, impossible to ignore.
The ground shivered beneath his feet.
Pixy's crooked smile widened, as if she'd been waiting for exactly that.
Above the trees, a warped flash formed — a spiral of shadows spinning at impossible speed.
And then—
The whirlwind spun faster.
And the shadows began to shift shape.
The blades returned — faster, sharper, more numerous.
They came like a serrated storm, a swarm of living darkness, all aimed at the same point: Brianna.
The dome protecting her reacted instantly.
Each hit produced a thin crack, which sealed the moment it appeared — click, click, click — like living glass regenerating on the rhythm of breath.
But there was something new.
Something subtle.
Something only Brianna felt.
Behind the sound of shadows striking, behind the ragged heartbeat of the battlefield, behind the rising fury of her own magic…
…she felt a thread.
Too fine to see.
A thread of weakness.
Her magic hesitated.
Didn't break — not yet — but for an instant the dome didn't respond with its usual speed.
A microsecond.
A stumble.
A misstep.
Enough for her to know.
"Too late for that…" she muttered through her teeth, feeling the pressure tighten around her.
The blades kept coming.
And her shield… was starting to give.
They kept striking — fast, relentless, sharp as murderous intent.
The dome groaned.
Cracked.
Sealed.
Groaned again.
And then—
A voice echoed.
Low.
Slow.
Venomous.
With the weight of embers crushed between teeth.
"It seems… your death is finally drawing near, Brianna."
Brianna smiled — tired, but sharp.
"Brígida. What a surprise… and almost comforting hearing your voice."
A soft, rough, serpentine laugh answered —
"ahahhahaha," muffled, like smoke sliding over stone.
"Oh, Brianna… my dear. We both know you underestimated him. Or rather… you underestimated his mother. And that's why you fell into her game. Look where that put you."
"If you haven't noticed," Brianna shot back, another blade slamming into the dome, "I'm a bit busy. Go back to your vow of silence."
The spiritual form began shaping before her.
Pale skin with a coal-like glow.
Amber-gold eyes burning like molten metal.
Slate-red hair waving like slow fire.
Ancient-forge garments.
A presence heavy and hot, like the air of a deep mine.
Brígida lifted her chin.
A ghost of a smile touched her lips.
And then she spoke — each word marked, carved, sharpened:
"Even if you win here… you will lose, Brianna."
The blades shattered another layer of the dome.
Brígida watched the cracks spread like dead veins.
"You stopped being an opponent. You became… a piece. A trembling piece, lost on this board… ever since the moment you abandoned the Prince."
"Sorry, but I'm not anyone's babysitter," Brianna replied, dry.
Brígida exhaled a short breath, almost a humorless laugh.
"That was just the final step, Brianna. The descent started long before."
Another flurry of blades fell.
The dome vibrated.
The impact made the magic scratch inside, as if trying to escape.
Brígida continued — low, cutting, pronouncing each word like a verdict:
"And that is why you will lose. You know… ever since you were cast into the Abyss to escape your people's massacre. Or when you sealed me. Or when you were taken in and shaped by the Hive. Even when you betrayed and abandoned Ekaterina… I said nothing. Because, deep down, you made the right choices."
She tilted her head slightly, golden eyes narrowing.
"But there was one thing, Brianna… one thing you let slip."
Brianna stared back, her face tight with strain.
"Feel free to tell me."
Brígida smiled — small and devastating.
"You brought your heart to the war."
Her voice deepened, heavy as splitting stone.
"And worse… you exposed it to your enemies."
The sound struck like glass shattering inside Brianna's mind.
A dry snap.
A brutal understanding.
A bloodless cut.
Brianna smiled — incredulous. Almost breathless.
The same instant she understood everything — every move, every intention, every trap laid by her mother —
— an explosion shook everything around her.
The ground trembled.
The whirlwind warped.
The shadows twisted.
And the world seemed to turn inside out.
The explosion didn't just come from outside.
It came from within.
The impact shook the air, but Brianna barely heard it — because, at that same second, something inside her… fell.
It didn't break.
Didn't crack.
Didn't bleed.
It fell.
Like a blade slipping from the hand mid-strike.
Like a final breath that never completes.
Like a light dying before it can even flicker.
Brianna felt the emptiness.
A dry silence.
Raw.
Absolute.
The kind of silence that exists only when something alive stops being alive.
Her lungs failed on the first attempt to draw air.
And the second.
And the third.
The dome shuddered — a deep, heavy sound like bones grinding.
Brígida watched her.
Head slightly tilted.
Eyes of liquid ember fixed.
No surprise.
No doubt.
Only… confirmation.
"Ah…" Brígida's voice came out like heavy smoke, too hot to breathe, "…so it happened."
Brianna opened her mouth.
Tried to speak.
Nothing came.
A tremor ran through her fingers, then her forearm, then her entire shoulder.
The weight of the pain wasn't physical — it was an internal blow, torn out, stolen, severed in silence.
A thread that had always been there — from the first touch, the first smile, the first "it's going to be okay" — simply wasn't anymore.
And the world wavered.
"What you're feeling now…" Brígida murmured, each syllable dragged like hot metal, "…is the thread being cut. A bond you should never have allowed to exist."
The dome cracked.
One line.
Then another.
And another.
Brianna tried to breathe again.
The air entered like ice.
Cutting.
Brígida's voice deepened, grave and hot, like embers speaking:
"Remember this, Brianna. Never — ever — carry a human heart into a war between gods."
The dome gave.
Exploded outward in shards of dead magic.
And the instant the fragments touched the air—
Whirok lunged.
Fast.
Relentless.
A living shadow, a crooked, cruel smile spreading across his face as his claws came straight for Brianna's chest.
But Brígida moved only one finger.
Nothing more.
A minimal gesture.
Precise.
Surgical.
The air vibrated.
The ground marked.
Magic responded as if trained for centuries to obey her.
And Whirok was thrown aside like an animal struck by an invisible hammer — his body scraping across the ground in a harsh, brutal arc.
Brígida didn't even look at him.
"I wasn't finished," she said, her voice slow, deep, carrying a gravity that crushed even silence.
Then she looked back at Brianna.
"Breathe."
Brianna tried.
And failed.
And tried again.
And it hurt.
The air snagged inside her chest, as if something had pulled her entire spine downward.
Karna was dead.
And the world… was far too small to hold that absence.