The sky was clear on the day of my execution.
That detail would later bother historians. Clear skies were considered an omen of divine approval, and the gods—according to the priests—never blessed the deaths of the unjust. The sun stood high, unashamed, bathing the capital in light as if nothing remarkable was about to happen.
Yet the city had never been so quiet.
Millions had gathered, but no one spoke.
They stood packed along marble streets and towering balconies, filling plazas, roofs, and spires. Flags hung from every structure, bearing the sigil of the united kingdoms—a symbol forged in blood, war, and fear. Bells that once rang for coronations now waited to toll for my end.
At the center of it all stood the execution platform.
White stone. Sacred runes. Twelve pillars engraved with divine scripture, each glowing faintly as they drank from the spellwork beneath my feet. This was not a stage built to kill a man.
It was built to erase one.
Chains wrapped around my arms, my legs, my torso—layer upon layer of divine alloy and curse-thread. Each link carried a different authority. Suppression. Binding. Denial. Even thought itself felt heavier inside them.
I could still think, of course.
They had failed at that.
I stood straight despite the weight, despite the blood drying at my temples where the priests had carved sigils into my skin. My black hair hung loose down my back, untouched by ritual cleansing. They had wanted the crowd to see me as I was.
Unrepentant.
Across the platform stood the High Executor, robes white as bone, face hidden behind a veil of light. He held the Blade of Verdict—a weapon said to be incapable of killing the innocent.
That irony was not lost on me.
A voice echoed across the city, magnified by magic and faith.
"Behold," the Executor declared, "the end of the Calamity Sovereign."
A murmur rippled through the crowd.
Some faces twisted with hatred. Others with relief. A few—very few—with something closer to doubt.
Titles followed. They always did.
Devourer of Kingdoms.Blasphemer of the Heavens.Architect of the Long Night.
Each name was recited like scripture, each crime delivered as absolute truth. They spoke of wars I had ended, not started. Of cities I had destroyed to prevent something worse. Of gods I had defied because they demanded obedience instead of reason.
None of it mattered now.
History was already written.
I looked out at the masses and searched for something—anger, regret, satisfaction.
I found none.
Only clarity.
This execution was not justice.It was correction.
The gods had made a mistake once. Allowing me to exist, to rise, to question them. And like all beings accustomed to worship, they could not accept being wrong.
So they decided to end the argument.
The Executor raised the Blade of Verdict. Light spilled from it, so bright the front rows shielded their eyes.
"Do you deny the charges laid upon you?" he asked.
A ritual question. The answer did not matter.
I opened my mouth anyway.
"I deny your authority," I said calmly.
The sound carried farther than expected. The runes flickered. For a brief moment—just a heartbeat—the air felt unstable, as if reality itself had paused to listen.
The Executor stiffened.
"You stand before gods and mortals alike," he said sharply. "Your words are meaningless."
"Then why ask?"
A whisper spread through the crowd.
The Blade trembled.
Interesting.
The High Executor recovered quickly, slamming the weapon into the stone. The platform ignited with light. Chains tightened around my body, drawing blood. Pain flared—sharp, precise, calculated.
They wanted suffering. Not for punishment, but for spectacle.
"By decree of the divine council," the Executor proclaimed, "you are sentenced to absolute erasure. Soul, name, and legacy—unmade."
Absolute erasure.
That was new.
My gaze lifted slightly, past the Executor, past the banners and towers, toward the sky itself.
I felt them then.
Eyes.
Not watching from above, but pressing down—vast, ancient, curious. The gods had not descended in form, but their attention was unmistakable. They were close enough now to ensure the ritual succeeded.
Good.
Let them watch closely.
The Blade rose.
Power surged through the platform, through the runes, through the chains. My senses blurred as magic tore into me—not destroying, but dismantling. I felt my strength unravel first, then my authority, then the deeper things layered beneath.
They were not killing a body.
They were killing a position.
I exhaled slowly.
Fear never came.
Instead, a realization settled with unnatural calm.
This ritual was imperfect.
Not flawed—but incomplete.
They were erasing me from history, not from reality.
That distinction mattered.
The Blade descended.
Light swallowed my vision.
Pain arrived—not as agony, but as separation. Like being pulled apart along lines I had never noticed before. Memories surfaced in fragments: a throne carved from obsidian, a battlefield frozen in time, a child kneeling in ashes and promising the world would never burn again.
Then something snapped.
Not in me.
In the spell.
For the briefest moment, I felt… resistance.
As if something beneath the ritual refused to let go.
The gods noticed.
Their attention sharpened, crushing, invasive. The pressure intensified. The Blade screamed as it cut through layers it was never meant to touch.
And then—
Silence.
No darkness. No void. No afterlife.
Just nothing.
Sound returned first.
Dripping. Slow. Irregular.
Cold followed. Not the ceremonial chill of divine magic, but the damp, biting cold of stone soaked in centuries of neglect.
My eyes opened.
The world was dark.
I lay on a stone floor, my body twisted unnaturally, lungs burning as if I had been drowning. My chest convulsed, dragging in air that tasted stale and rotten.
Pain exploded everywhere.
This body was wrong.
Too light. Too fragile. My limbs shook violently as sensation rushed in. I tried to move my fingers—only three responded. The others were numb.
Chains rattled.
Real chains. Rusted. Physical. Wrapped around my wrists and ankles, anchored to the walls of a narrow cell.
I coughed, and blood splattered onto the floor.
It wasn't mine.
At least… not originally.
Memories that weren't my own surfaced—flickers of hunger, cold, despair. A nameless prisoner. Forgotten. Left to die.
So this was where they put the remnants.
I laughed softly, then choked on it.
The sound echoed strangely, as if the stone itself recoiled.
I took stock of myself with professional detachment.
No power.No authority.No strength.
This body could barely survive another hour.
And yet—
I was alive.
Not reborn. Not summoned.
Unfinished.
I reached inward, expecting to find nothing.
Something answered.
Not energy. Not magic.
Recognition.
A deep, ancient acknowledgment, like the world itself hesitating before denying me.
I closed my eyes.
So this was the result of divine certainty.
They had erased my name, my throne, my legacy.
But they had failed to erase me.
A slow smile pulled at cracked lips.
"Very well," I whispered into the darkness.
"If the world believes I am dead…"
Chains creaked, ever so slightly.
"…then I will learn what it does with the lie."