[Nicholas Anstalionah.]
The reports were troubling, strange enough to rattle even me.
Malachi had come to deliver them personally, an entire Dangu battalion, one million men strong, annihilated by a single individual.
No name. No trace. Nothing left but crimson mud and silence.
And yet, even before he spoke, I had already felt it.
A cry.
A soundless, resonant wail that trembled through the fabric of my being, threading itself into my soul like an echo of my own heartbeat.
It was not merely heard, it was felt, deep and cold, a vibration that spoke in the language of destiny.
For the first time in a century, I hesitated to move. Something about that cry was mine.
I sat on my throne, the marble beneath me whispering the weight of time.
The war had entered its second year after Ouroboros slew the second prince of Drandafal.
I had expected retaliation, and Purtunah did not disappoint.
Yet, her approach was slow, deliberate, a war of attrition waged with endless soldiers and patience carved from stone.
If she continued at this pace, the conflict could stretch for a decade. Perhaps longer.
Even with my power surpassing hers, I dared not release it fully. To do so would risk unraveling the very world.
No victory was worth that annihilation.
I would win quietly, carefully, without revealing the disaster sleeping inside me.
Malachi knelt before the throne, his silver armor dimmed by ash and exhaustion.
He finished his report, reading out the casualty numbers in a low, steady tone, then looked up at me, awaiting a verdict I had not yet formed.
The options were few. Either send him, or send Makilah.
According to him, the latter had been "tamed" a cruel word for what had been done to her.
Kivana and Malachi had fractured her mind, sealed her body, restrained her soul. She was quieter now, weaker, but still dangerous.
Then there was the other matter, the one that made my blood hum uneasily.
The creature that cried out in despair, the one whose voice seemed interwoven with mine.
If I were to meet them, I might disrupt this version of the timeline.
The Set Timeline, the immutable current, the binding narrative that stretched across all realities.
Once erased, it could not be restored without my death. I had already risked that once. I would not tempt it again.
[Nicholas knew, deep within his heart, that this person was not supposed to exist. Not here. Not now.]
I clenched my fist. "Lay waste to that continent," I commanded quietly. "You will lead the assault on the dragon homeland."
I still was not ready to unleash the full calamity, the Disaster of Anstalionah.
Malachi rose halfway, his eyes darkening. "And how do you intend to deal with her?"
The her he spoke of was Nicole. My sister.
She was outside the throne room now, her presence faint yet familiar.
Once a force of chaos, now little more than a whisper of what she had been.
Her power was gone, sealed, broken, reduced to an ember.
"She is my sister," I said, leaning back. "I may yet relieve her of her crimes and grant her a quiet, dignified life."
Malachi did not laugh. "You are my second priority," he said coldly. "Do not make me regret that ranking."
Second. Even now, after all these years, he still placed Kivana first.
And perhaps he was right to do so.
I could not best Kivana, even after he gave his life for this kingdom.
Still, for Mirabel and our children, I would burn the stars themselves.
"You may leave," I said softly. "Even if she tries to kill me a thousand times, she will never succeed."
He bowed and vanished, leaving behind only the hum of silence.
Then she entered.
Nicole.
Her once-vibrant aura was gone, replaced by the dull shimmer of white robes embroidered with runes that suppressed every trace of her divinity.
She moved slowly, reverently, and when she reached the foot of the throne, she knelt and pressed her forehead to the cold floor.
"I have come," she said softly, "to ask that you allow me to leave this world."
I tilted my head. "You wish to run away? Why? I thought you sought to kill God."
[Nicholas did not yet know that beyond that, stood others, beings equal in power, yet far more terrifying.]
Now I knew. But the knowledge was hollow, an echo with no form.
The voice in my mind always spoke like this, fractured, distant, intrusive, each word a scream from somewhere beyond the veil.
[Nothingness. It is the act of nothing he despised most, while you despise everything.]
She looked up then, eyes red-rimmed, voice trembling. "Brother, I cannot kill you. And if I cannot kill you… how could I ever kill God?"
"Then you must kill me," I said evenly. "You cannot take back your word, Nicole. Nor can you surrender halfway."
The method to obtain power beyond the walls is taking a life of equal value to your own, a gruesome and cruel method to graze the divine.
I stood and descended the dais, each step pressing down on the air until the entire room seemed to hold its breath.
She flinched when I reached out, but I did not stop.
My fingers brushed her shoulder, and the runes that bound her dissolved into nothingness.
Her power surged back like a storm breaking free of its chains.
The room dimmed as shadows deepened, the marble floor cracked beneath the pressure, and the air grew so heavy it could choke the unprepared.
She trembled, biting her lip until it bled.
Her hatred was sharp enough to silence the world.
Oh, how she envied me. How she loathed my very existence.
Yet beneath that loathing hid a love so twisted and broken that it was no longer love at all.
It was only the hollow echo of something that once was.
"Brother," she whispered, tears streaking her face. "You cannot do this to me. You cannot force me to choose."
I looked down at her, my voice low, merciless. "Are you pleading for me to take away your free will?"
Her lips quivered. Then she nodded. "Yes."
Free will, what a fragile gift.
It is the ability to choose, even when you do not know why.
It is the spark given by the Heavens that allows us to define what we are.
[From above, Nicholas could feel the gaze of countless angels watching, silent and expectant, awaiting his response.]
Angels, you say? Are they powerful?
[Yes.]
"I am nothing," I said softly.
"So for me to order is almost natural. And yet… I cannot bring myself to order you. I wonder why, sister."
[Nicholas understood then what she truly desired: not forgiveness, not mercy, only oblivion. To be forgotten.]
"Nicholas," she said weakly. "Must I beg? Must I grovel? Must I fight? Please… just allow me to stop."
She wanted the simple end, the quiet release.
Was that fair? No.
But she was different, an envious, convincing serpent who longed for everything and could possess nothing.
The mark upon my body burned with quiet fury.
It was a pain that almost felt good, as though it reminded me I was still alive.
Yet deep within, I wished to do nothing, to simply let this unfold, to watch her ruin herself without my hand guiding it.
But I also knew the truth.
After all the endless years she had spent imprisoned in that place, she must have been so very tired.
"Are you tired, Nicole?" I asked.
"Are you afraid? Have you realized that all things lose meaning without God?"
She pressed her hands to the ground and screamed, voice cracking with anguish.
"Stop! Can't you see that I don't want to answer? Why must you take even that from me!"
Her rage was real, but it was born from despair.
Having turned away from God, she had cut away her own reason to live.
It is what we all do when we seek to defy the one who made us.
[Raphael wished to ease the pain that burdened them both.]
"If you wish to be forgotten, you will die, sister," I said quietly.
"And I will grieve. Do you wish for me to hold a second funeral?"
She nodded, her eyes hollow. "May my death be the release that frees the conscience of your fearful mind."
I knew this would come.
She would give up long before she could stand again.
She had lost too much, her faith, her will, her meaning.
So I made a choice for her.
"I order you to fight for Anstalionah," I declared.
"Fight regardless of your emotions. And from this moment forward, you may never again use your Regalia."
Her eyes widened as her very essence began to unravel and reform, rewritten by my will.
Her power faltered, her strength cut in half.
The Regalia that once defined her soul broke away and settled within me.
A fragment of her, lost, quiet, and waiting, now belonged to me alone.