Outside, the world hasn't stopped.
Cars roll by, headlights painting lazy lines on cracked pavement. Neon signs buzz and blink above fried chicken stalls, weapon shops, and an interdimensional parcel service that never runs on time. Somewhere, a horn blares and a dragon swoops past a billboard.
It's loud.
Crowded.
Alive.
And somewhere between a ramen cart and a blacked-out music bar that claims to serve alien whiskey, there's a narrow doorway made of weather-warped wood.
No sign. No name.
Just a faint red glow above the frame, and a brass bell that rings when the door opens.
DING.
The bartender doesn't look up right away. He knows that walk.
Heard it before he saw it. Felt it.
Heavy boots, slow stride, thick leather dragging faintly across tile.
The man who walks in is tall. Built like stone that remembers fire.
A thick cloak drapes over his frame, fastened with old metal and battle-scars. Hood up. Beard tucked. Voice silent.
He stops just inside.
Smells the air.
Wood. Smoke. Something older.
Then his eyes settle on the sign above the shelf behind the bar. Handwritten. Carved into raw wood.
The House Rules:
1. No fighting. Ever.
2. No rewriting your past.
3. First drink's on me.
4. The bartender decides when your story's over.
He reads them.
Twice.
And then—
"...You know who I am."
Not a question. Just quiet, heavy fact.
The bartender's already watching him.
"Yeah. I do."
The man pulls back his hood.
And even here, in a world that now shrugs off the impossible—there's something about that face that silences the room.
Shaved head. Long beard, weathered grey.
Eyes like dried blood beneath a sky that's seen too much.
A long scar cuts down from the brow, past the eye, stopping just short of his jaw.
The God of War doesn't look like a god.
He looks like what comes after one.
He takes a step forward. Slow. Careful.
"This place... was not here before."
The bartender nods.
"Been here a while.
You just didn't need it before."
Kratos narrows his eyes.
"You hiding it?"
"Nah. Just not loud about it."
"It has no name."
"Not officially."
The bartender gestures behind him. At the cracked mirror above the bottles, there's faint lettering, half-scrubbed, barely visible.
The Last Round
"People call it that when they leave.
I just pour drinks."
Kratos steps up to the counter. The stool creaks beneath him as he sits.
He glances around, shoulders still tense like he expects something to lunge from the shadows.
But there's only warm light. Slow music. The hum of stories past.
"I've walked this street before," he mutters. "I do not remember this place."
"Five years changes a lot," the bartender replies.
"Five years," Kratos echoes. "Yes. That day."
The glass is poured before he asks. The drink's dark. Thick. Tastes like smoke and firewood.
He downs it. Grimaces faintly. But not because it burns.
Because it reminds.
"I was in Midgard," he says. "That morning.
The sky cracked open like a blade through cloth.
Realms tore apart. Yggdrasil itself… split."
The bartender listens, quiet, leaning just enough to show he's there.
Kratos continues.
"And then I was here.
But not just here. Not the forest. Not the house.
It was Earth. The Earth.
But wrong.
Full of names I didn't know. Faces I'd seen in dreams I never had.
Spider-men. Steel gods. Creatures I'd once killed… smiling in posters."
He shakes his head.
"Atreus—he understood faster.
He said it was like the stories.
Said the worlds had merged."
Another drink.
"He saw it as a chance.
I saw it as a curse."
The bartender speaks finally, voice low.
"And now?"
Kratos sets the glass down.
"Now I see it for what it is.
A punishment... or a test.
Maybe both."
He glances at the rules again.
"You know me.
But I do not know you."
The bartender smirks faintly.
Not mocking. Just honest.
"Not many do. That's kind of the point."
"You watched me."
"I watched everyone."
"Why?"
The bartender doesn't answer right away.
He grabs a new bottle. Uncorks it. Pours just a little.
Then he says, almost casually—
"Because someday, someone like you was going to walk through that door.
And when they did… I had to be here."
Kratos studies him again. Really studies.
"You are not a god."
"Nope."
"Not a hero."
"Definitely not."
"Then what are you?"
The bartender looks him dead in the eyes.
"A reminder.
That the end isn't always loud."
Kratos breathes out slowly.
Then—unexpectedly—he laughs.
Just a soft one. Barely there. But real.
"You sound like Mimir."
"Hopefully taller."
They share a brief moment of stillness. The kind that says: I see you.
Then the door rattles behind them. Wind pushes it open an inch, then gives up.
Outside, the traffic roars. The world keeps spinning.
Inside, the bar stays warm.
And Kratos?
He pours himself another drink.
For the first time, in a long, long while...he's not at war.