The impact had not yet ended.
It did not spread like a thunderclap — it remained.
A deep, slow vibration that crossed the ground, climbed through bone, and refused to disappear.
The wall was still standing, but something about it felt misaligned, as if the world itself had been pushed one step beyond the correct place.
No scream followed.
No order.
The Drakkouls remained motionless, black bodies speckled by the recent rain, red eyes opened too wide to be mere waiting.
They did not advance. They did not retreat. It was as if the very concept of movement had been momentarily suspended.
The human army was no better.
Shields raised too high. Blades held too low. Short breaths, trapped in the instant after impact.
Men and women stared forward without truly seeing — as if waiting for a continuation the world had not yet decided to grant.
From atop the wall, someone watched.
The dark cloak concealed almost everything. No clear form. No defined silhouette against the gray sky.
Only two light-brown eyes, still, attentive — they did not shine, did not betray urgency.
The Black Fury tilted her head slightly.
Not in reaction.
In recognition.
Below, at the center of the suspended field, Éon remained motionless.
The shadows around him did not expand.
They did not retreat.
They simply existed — aligned too perfectly to be natural.
For an instant too brief to be perceived as time, the gaze of the Black Fury met his.
There was no smile.
No gesture.
But something passed.
Not through the air.
Through the space between one intention and another.
She did not raise her voice.
She did not need to.
"How long has it been…" she murmured, as if speaking only to herself. "Éreon."
The name fell too heavily to be chance.
"Or should I say Éon?" she added, calm. "Sometimes the world asks for simpler names."
The silence that followed was not empty.
It was too heavy for that.
Something in the field yielded a millimeter — not the ground, not the air, but the sense of position. As if, for an instant, there were doubt about who stood above whom.
The shadows around Éon wavered.
They did not expand.
They did not contract.
They simply missed their outline for a brief moment — just enough to be noticed.
From atop the wall, the eyes of the Black Fury narrowed almost imperceptibly.
Not in surprise.
In interest.
"You're still holding." she said, in a neutral tone, like someone confirming a measurement. "I thought you'd learned to yield by now."
The world did not answer.
But the pressure increased.
Not as force.
As expectation.
There was no visible displacement.
No trail.
No sound.
The shadow that wrapped Éon collapsed into itself — and, in the same instant, the world acknowledged him above the wall.
The katana was not announced.
There was no arc of blade, no gleam cutting through the rain.
Only a single, precise trace — so exact that, for a second, it seemed not to have happened.
The Black Fury did not turn.
Did not retreat.
The cut passed.
Then the cloak lost its tension.
The dark fabric split in silence, sliding from her shoulders like something that had fulfilled its function.
It fell slowly, heavy with water, gradually revealing the silhouette that had been hidden.
The pressure on the field did not cease.
It reorganized.
Éon was no longer in an attack stance.
The katana rested again, as if it had never left the sheath.
The entire field watched.
For an instant, no one could say exactly what they were looking at.
Neriah felt it first.
Not as absence — but as an error.
The rain still fell. The ground still answered.
But the point where Éon stood stopped returning echo.
It was like trying to hear a sound that still existed… but no longer came from anywhere.
"He…" Iaso began, and stopped.
The shadows did not advance.
They did not dissipate.
They simply stopped matching the space where they should be.
Lys frowned.
Not in fear.
In failure.
Something that had always reacted to Éon's presence now reacted to nothing at all.
Kaelir took a step forward without realizing it.
"He didn't retreat." he said, too low to be an order.
Then the sky above the wall seemed to darken by a shade.
Not like a cast shadow.
Like attention shifting.
Éon half-closed his eyes for an instant.
A minimal adjustment, almost imperceptible — as if something had been placed back into his field of vision without asking permission.
The shadows around him remained still.
The voice came from behind him.
Low. Clear. Far too close to be ignored.
"The last time I saw you… you were running."
The sentence carried no judgment.
It sounded like an administrative memory.
Éon did not turn.
His jaw tightened by a millimeter.
"Now you're not."
A short pause.
The silence that formed did not belong to the battlefield.
"You've gotten stronger."
The rain touched the stone of the wall once.
Then again.
"And faster."
The world seemed to hold its breath.
"She would have liked that."
The sentence fell without emphasis.
Without ceremony.
As if that "she" were too obvious to need a name.
Éon's eyes closed for an instant too brief to be read as weakness.
When they opened, they were steady again.
Then—
there was no warning.
The wall felt no impact.
The air did not rupture.
Distance simply ceased to exist.
Éon was there.
The katana left the sheath only enough to fulfill its function — a short, ascending cut, aimed at the exact point where the Black Fury should have been.
The strike crossed a space that still seemed correct — but no longer corresponded to the present.
She had never been on that line when the world decided to complete the motion.
Éon moved in the same instant.
Twisted his wrist.
The blade followed the motion, continuous, precise, meeting her again at the new angle.
Behind him, the blade met resistance.
And stopped.
Two fingers.
No visible force.No tension in the shoulders.
The Black Fury held the katana's edge between index and middle finger, as if the steel had arrived there by mistake.
Water ran down her fingers unhurriedly.
That was when Éon looked at her.
Not to recognize her — that he already knew.
To confirm.
The short black hair, restrained by habit, not vanity.
A few strands stuck to her forehead by the rain.
The eyes — light brown — far too attentive for someone who had just stopped a lethal attack with two fingers.
There was no armor.No combat stance.
The ceremonial garments — red and white, marked with golden details — did not protect the body.
They declared position.
She tilted her head slightly.
Not in provocation.
In recognition.
"You still strike first." she said, almost satisfied. "I thought you'd unlearned that."
Éon did not answer.
He twisted his wrist.
The shadows behind him collapsed inward, compressing into a single point — and exploded into three distinct trajectories, each corresponding to a possible end.
She released the blade before the world chose which one was real.
Stepped back half a pace.
The wall behind her stretched — not physically, but perceptually — as if space itself had been instructed to cooperate.
The shadows missed.
Not by little.
By diverted intention.
The first real strike came then.
Not from the katana.
From the elbow.
Short. Direct. Aimed at the base of the neck.
She tilted her head at the exact instant the blow would pass — not by reflex, but because it was already happening when Éon decided.
The impact did not occur.
The air between them vibrated, dense, as if something had been placed there to prevent conclusion.
For the first time, she smiled.
She did not part her lips.
It was a minimal adjustment, almost polite.
"You still choose to kill." she said. "Even when you know you can't."
Éon stepped back once.
Not to gain distance.
To reposition the world.
The movement sent water running through his black hair, now disordered, falling across his face and partially hiding his eyes.
It was not carelessness — it was consequence. The kind of disorder that emerges when something internal shifts.
He lifted his chin just enough to look at her through the strands.
The Black Fury remained motionless.
Then Éon spoke.
Low.
Unhurried.
"Lili."
The name was not thrown.
It was placed.
Something in the field reacted — not visibly, but in the way space seemed to adjust to the weight of that word.
"When did you decide?"
There was no accusation in his voice.
The sentence sounded like a belated realization.
He lifted his face a little more, forcing their eyes to meet.
"At what point did you and Phoebrus decide to conspire against the right of Theseus…" — a brief pause — "…and Nika?"
The rain kept falling.
No thunder.
No immediate reaction.
But something in her eyes changed.
Not guilt.
Calculation.
For an instant, it was impossible to say who was being judged there.
And, for the first time since the beginning of the confrontation, the Black Fury did not seem above the situation.
She seemed embedded in it.
She did not answer immediately.
The smile came first.
Small. Controlled.
Not of triumph — of patience.
"I could try to explain." she said, at last.
Her voice was far too calm for a suspended field on the brink of collapse.
"But you wouldn't understand."
She held his gaze.
"After all, it was never about what could be accepted."
"It was always about what needed to happen."
Something in the field adjusted out of order — not in response to her, but to him.
The voice came low, without anger.
"Listen carefully."
He took half a step forward.
"You will have a judgment."
The blade tilted by a degree.
"From now on, I will be your voice, your weight…"
Éon exhaled.
The air left his mouth cold, visible for an instant — and then the world yielded.
"And your end, if necessary."
The wall cracked.
Not by force.
Because someone decided it was no longer necessary.