The mirror shattered in a storm of splinters.
The Judge of a Thousand Tongues emerged fully, his cloak of murmuring tongues rippling like angry serpents. But now, in the ghostly light of the quicksilver garden, Kael saw the truth: his sword was not metal, but a void weaponized, a crack in the air itself that left a trail of nothingness behind every movement and revealed doomed realities and worlds.
Lirya stepped back, her quicksilver tears forming a shield before her.
"That sword should not exist," she whispered, and for the first time, Kael heard fear in her voice. "It cuts the Roads to their roots... and those who wield them."
The Judge raised his weapon. On its blade, Kael saw his own face reflected, stripped of power, like an ordinary man.
"Kael Arcanis," the tongues of his cloak chanted. "I did not come for you." I came for what you carry inside.
The first blow was almost imperceptible.
The Judge swung his sword, slicing through the shield like a hot knife through butter, and Kael felt a sharp pain in his chest. He looked down: the seal he'd been branded with was bleeding.
"What...?"
"The Paths are veins," the Judge explained, moving forward. "And I know how to cut them."
Kael tried to steal a power, any power, but nothing responded. The Judge's cut had severed the vein of his ability, if only for seconds.
Lirya acted. With a gesture, the mercury statues came to life, melting into fluid creatures that launched themselves at the Judge.
It was useless.
The sword danced, and every statue it touched vanished, not as if they died, but as if they had never existed. Despite being surrounded by hundreds of these figures, like a master swordsman wielding his weapon in a beautiful and sinister way, no humanoid creature made of mercury had the slightest opportunity.
Seeing this, Lirya spoke. "Use this!" Ly tossed a mirror shard to Kael.
Catching it, he saw a reflection: himself, but... whole.
The Judge stopped, their tongues murmuring in disarray.
"You're interesting, copy... Or perhaps I should say subject 3," he acknowledged. "The original made you different. He gave you a piece of his will... and that makes you the best bait."
Kael understood too late.
"You don't want to kill me..."
"I want him to come for you," the Judge confirmed. "When he senses his shard is in danger, the original will come." And then...
The sword flashed with black light.
"...the Council of Realities will sentence him."
Kael didn't think about it.
He lunged forward, not to attack, but to steal. Not a power... but the Judge's most precious memory.
The pain was like fire in his brain.
Images came in bursts: the Judge wasn't always an executioner. He was once human. Once he had a name. Once, the original betrayed him too.
The Judge screamed, not in pain, but in rage.
"You have no right!"
The sword descended, but Kael had already leaped back, the shard of Lirya's mirror glittering in his hand.
"Now I know why you truly hate the original," Kael gasped. "Not because he's a criminal... but because he made you like him."
The garden shook. The mercury statues began to scream madly.
Lirya took Kael's arm.
"We have to go. Now."
But it was too late.
The Judge raised his sword... and severed the vein in Lirya's path that held everyone in the garden.
The world began to crumble.