The fires outside the throne room were still burning.
Ronald Reagan sat slouched on the blood-slicked steps of his shattered dais, hands resting limply on the hilt of a sword no longer glowing with power.
Smoke curled from the torn banners above him the golden lion of his empire, now blackened and frayed, its proud roar reduced to tattered threads.
His once-golden armor, cracked and scorched, clung to his body like a dead man's skin.
Blood seeped through the joints, pooling beneath him in a dark stain that spread slowly across the marble floor.
He was tired. So incredibly tired.
The palace his palace trembled beneath the weight of rebellion.
Somewhere far below, a wall collapsed with a thunderous crash.
Screams echoed through the marble halls like ghosts refusing to leave, and the clash of steel against steel rang out in a discordant rhythm that never seemed to end.
The world he had built with steel and vision the unity he had carved from chaos was crumbling, stone by stone.
Twenty years. Twenty years of war, of sacrifice, of blood spilled across a dozen kingdoms.
He had crushed rebellions.
Toppled tyrants.
United a fractured continent under one banner.
He had called it peace.
Now, that peace was burning.
The door groaned open behind him.
Ronald didn't need to turn.
He knew who it was.
The footsteps were familiar steady, sure, deliberate.
The same gait he'd once taught in the training grounds, years ago.
Back when the boy had barely reached his shoulder. Back when they had sparred with wooden swords and laughed at the bruises they left on each other.
Back when they were still brothers.
"…Allen," Ronald said, voice hoarse. "So it's really you."
The steps stopped a few paces away. Silence stretched between them thick and suffocating.
The fire crackled.
The screams continued.
But in that moment, there was only the two of them.
"You should've surrendered," Allen said quietly.
Ronald gave a breath that might've been a laugh, or maybe just a cough.
Blood flecked his lips dark against his pale skin.
"And let you turn everything into dust?"
He tilted his head back, eyes tracing the cracked ceiling.
Stared down at him, her painted eyes cold and unreadable.
"No. I wanted peace… but not this kind."
"Peace?" Allen's voice shook, but his grip didn't.
"You forced unity. Crushed kingdoms. Called it peace while bleeding the world dry."
Ronald turned then.
His eyes dark and worn, ringed with exhaustion met his brother's.
"I bled for it too."
They stared at each other.
Not as emperor and rebel.
Not as tyrant and liberator.
But as two men who had once called the same woman Mother.
Two boys who had grown up in the same halls, eaten at the same table, shared the same dreams.
Allen's sword trembled at his side.
"I didn't want this," he whispered. "But you… you left no choice."
Ronald nodded. Slowly.
As if he understood. Maybe he did.
"…Then do it," he said, letting his sword fall with a clatter.
The blade rang against the marble floor and slid away into the shadows.
"End it, Allen. If you truly believe this is justice… then don't hesitate."
For a moment, Allen didn't move.
The fire crackled behind him.
The city groaned beneath the weight of revolution. The screams outside grew louder closer.
The world was ending, and two brothers stood at the center of it all.
Then steel flashed.
The blade slipped between Ronald's ribs, quiet as a breath.
He didn't cry out.
His body sagged forward, head resting gently against his brother's shoulder a strange, final embrace.
Blood soaked through Allen's tunic, warm and wet.
The rebel's sword clattered to the ground as he caught his brother's weight, his hands shaking, his breath hitching.
"I'm sorry," Allen whispered, his voice breaking. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry"
But Ronald couldn't hear him anymore.
The world faded into smoke and ash.
The pain vanished. The weight lifted.
And for a moment just a moment there was peace.
Then something stirred.
A wind that didn't belong to this world brushed against his soul. Cold. Ancient. And a voice soft, weary, and impossibly old whispered through the void.
"You are not done yet, warborn king. Another world needs you…"
Darkness swallowed him whole.
And just like that the end wasn't the end at all.