Outside the Temple of the Flame's Heart, a storm suddenly erupted.
The gray flames had not yet died out when a cold rift silently split the void. The figure stepped forth from the shadows, as if treading upon the spine of fate. Clad in a black-and-gold divine robe, with silver-white hair, the shattered moon mark on his forehead flickered, exuding an eerie gray light.
He was Riche.
The traitor Ilea had personally buried in the abyssal rift, once the first heir to the Burning World's throne—now, he returned like a ghost, stepping into the Flame's Heart Oath she had rebuilt with her own hands.
Lucian's gaze locked onto him, gray flames swirling before him as divine power silently took shape.
Ilea merely stood slowly, her eyes complex—filled with pain, doubt, and an indescribable tremor.
"You shouldn't be alive," she murmured, her voice as if tearing through an old dream. "I was the one who opened that abyssal rift."
Riche smiled faintly, his gaze as cold as the moon: "You should know I never truly belonged to this world's 'Lord of the Burning World.' I merely… returned early to what was always mine."
He lifted his hand, and a fragmented wheel of fate appeared at his fingertips, bearing the faint gray imprint of Ilea's oath seal.
"You think you've conquered fate? No, Ilea. You've only delivered yourself to the true core of the [Shattered Moon]."
The air suddenly solidified. A dark gray moon wheel emerged in the void, its form as broken as cracked bone, surrounded by the whispers of the abyss. This was the Shattered Moon Core—the ultimate will remaining after the Wheel of Fate shattered, the primal core controlling the Gray Realm's cycles.
Riche's figure rose slowly, merging with the Shattered Moon. His aura turned frigid, hollow, and beyond mortal comprehension.
Lucian stood before Ilea, his voice low: "He has merged with the Shattered Moon's will. This is no longer the Riche we once knew."
Ilea did not retreat. Her eyes blazed with fragmented gray flames, as if the ashes of fate had become fuel.
"What do you want? To seize the Gray Realm entirely? To absorb all oath-bound souls into your fate wheel?"
Riche did not answer. He merely extended a hand, and a thread of void stretched from the Shattered Moon, pinpointing Ilea's chest—her soul core.
"I want you," he said, his voice low, devoid of all desire, only cold dominion. "You are the breakpoint in the Gray Realm's destiny, the only variable the fate wheel cannot control. You must be contained, merged, made part of the [Gray Realm Wheel Core]."
"Never to love again, never to think again, never to resist again."
As the words fell, the entire Temple of the Flame's Heart collapsed. The surrounding space turned to quicksand, and gray chains shot from the Shattered Moon Core, seeking to bind Ilea.
Lucian leaped, severing the first chain. Blood flames erupted, blazing fiercely.
"Get back, Riche!" he roared. "If you want her to submit to fate, you'll have to walk over my corpse!"
Riche raised an eyebrow, a sneer playing on his lips: "You are not worthy."
In the next instant, ten thousand blades sang in the void. The Gray Shadow Legion appeared—apostles of the Shattered Moon, sacrificed souls, the earliest rulers of the Gray Realm, now revived by Riche as tools of fate.
Ilea closed her eyes.
Then opened them slowly.
She drove her into her chest. Blood mingled with gray flames, and her oath seal transformed into splitting fire, blooming in her palm.
"I reject the fate wheel," she said softly.
"I reject the Shattered Moon."
"I reject being a vessel of fate."
Gray flames took the form of butterflies, rising beside her, transforming into a blade that burns dreams, pointing directly at the Shattered Moon Core.
"I will sever the fate wheel with my own hands, and rebuild the Gray Realm."
A flicker of emotion crossed Riche's eyes, as if he finally glimpsed the future that terrified him.
"Then you must die."
The void collapsed. Shattered Moon clashed with Phoenix, fate with oath—head-on.