Silence held the chamber tight again — brittle, heavy, and expectant — as Ulykart let the moment settle.
A thousand breaths hung in waiting. No one dared shift, blink too loudly, or clear their throat.
Even the torches seemed to burn quieter, flames shrinking like they too feared what would be said next.
Ulykart's shadow stretched behind him like a beast waking beneath his skin.
"You wonder," he murmured, his voice low but vast, "why you were summoned here. Why tonight. Why now."
A collective inhale.
Simon's fingers brushed the rim of his cup, careful, calculated — nothing in his posture betraying the razor-edged curiosity cutting through his calm facade.
Ulykart continued, each word deliberate and weighted:
"A kingdom of the abyss has fallen."
The reaction was immediate — gasps, sharp and disbelieving, shuddered across the room like a shockwave.
Karuel froze mid-blink, hand halfway to her temple.
Feje, for the first time that night, sat upright, ears perked, tail stilled, expression uncharacteristically serious.
Rusnumalung's sunken eyes widened, then narrowed, pulling deep furrows into his aged brow.
And Simon — despite years of training and disguise — felt his pulse spike.
A kingdom? Fallen? Impossible — unless…
Ulykart raised his hand, silencing the rising whispers.
"The kingdom," he said slowly, "of the third abyssal sovereign."
Every muscle in the room tightened.
"Gehenmbel."
And like a blade through glass, the atmosphere shattered.
Chairs scraped.
Whispers surged, not controlled, but panicked.
Voices rose, overlapping in terror and disbelief.
"Gehenmbel? Impossible—"
"He possessed impregnable wards—"
"His dominion was untouched since—"
"Who— how— what force—"
Simon kept his head bowed slightly, not in respect — but so his lower gaze could sharpen unseen.
Gehenmbel — Abyss Sovereign Rank Three.
Untouchable.
Immovable.
Unchallenged for eras.
And now… erased?
No battle scars. No rumor. No warning. Nothing...
Ulykart let the chaos churn for a breath — then spoke again, quiet yet thunderous:
"He is gone. His fortress, his land, his legions — gone."
A beat.
"Not conquered."
His eyes glowed like cooling magma.
"Deleted."
A chill crept into the hall.
This was not war — war left evidence. This was removal. Erasure. An annihilation without trace.
Feje whispered, voice trembling with an unfamiliar tone: dread.
"All of it… poof?"
Karuel's elbow jabbed her sharply, but she didn't argue. She couldn't. Not with her own heart pounding loud enough for the abyss to hear.
Rusnumalung leaned forward at last, his haunting stare breaking away from Simon.
"Erased…" he murmured hoarsely. "Not slain, not conquered… but unmade."
His voice trembled. Old fear. Ancient memory.
Simon glanced in his direction — subtle, fleeting.
Even this one is shaken. Whoever he is… he has witnessed eras of carnage. And yet this unsettles him.
Ulykart turned, cloak stirring like living storm cloud.
"Do you understand now why Arkal withdrew?" he asked softly.
Not arrogance — sorrow hid beneath that tone, buried deep beneath authority older than kingdoms.
"This is not a challenge for power," Ulykart continued. "This is survival."
He stepped down from the dais, each footfall echoing.
"We believed ourselves eternal. Peerless. Apex predators at the throne of creation."
His gaze swept across every sovereign, piercing through pride and bone.
"And yet a king among us has vanished without resistance. Without mark. Without rumor."
He paused.
"The world has changed."
Feje hugged her tail now — not playful, but for comfort.
Karuel's fingers drummed her armrest in deep thought, golden eyes narrowed.
Rusnumalung whispered an incantation under his breath — a detection spell, perhaps, or a prayer in an ancient abyssal tongue never meant for mortal ears.
Simon exhaled through his nose silently.
Something erased a fortress on par with natural disasters. With cosmic forces. If this is mankind…
His thoughts twisted.
What kind of humans exist now? What force did I slip into?
A new fear grew — not for himself, but for the world as he knew it.
Ulykart raised his voice again, calm but trembling — a tremor only those perceptive enough could hear.
"The barriers around Gehenmbel were absolute. Reality-woven. Blessed by primordial abyssal blood."
Soft gasps again.
"And yet they fell as though they never existed."
He clenched a fist — knuckles cracking like thunder.
"This was not the work of gods. They merely watched."
That alone sent electricity through spines — gods watching silently implied consent… or helplessness.
"So who then?" whispered a trembling warlord near the back. "Who has such power?"
Ulykart answered without hesitation.
"Humans."
Silence.
Absolute, suffocating silence.
And then —
Hysterical laughter burst from a lord somewhere in the crowd — desperate, terrified, unhinged.
"Humans? Humans? The frail cattle? The insects who die by the millions when one abyss lieutenant sneezes—?"
His laughter choked.
"No. Impossible. Impossible!"
Ulykart did not blink.
"Believe what you must. But the signs are clear. The seals of the Divine Pantheon stir. Old swords awaken. The mortal world arms itself while we slept in pride."
The hall felt suddenly smaller — like the abyss itself pressed inwards, forcing confrontation.
Karuel finally stood, tail cutting the air like a whip.
"If mankind did this," she said, voice cold as forged steel, "then they have advanced beyond our arrogance."
Feje's voice trembled again.
"I… I thought humans were fun. Weak but fun. They… did that?"
Ulykart nodded slowly.
"Yes."
Rusnumalung rose for the first time, robes rustling, ancient horns casting long shadows behind him. His voice was soft, but it held weight enough to silence even power.
"If mankind can erase Gehenmbel… then their rise is not new."
He stared into empty space as if seeing ancient horrors long forgotten.
"It has merely begun anew."
Simon's blood ran cold.
The rise of humanity…?
That single word implied a cycle.
A forgotten age.
A level of mortal power erased from history — returning now.
Ulykart turned toward the thrones flanking the main aisle.
"The abyss must prepare. If we do not unite, we will fall one by one as Gehenmbel did."
He paused, voice deepening.
"Arkal grows bored, but boredom alone does not explain his timing. He withdraws when the world stirs — as if waiting to see who survives this cycle."
Stirring murmurs again.
"Those who believe humanity remains beneath us," Ulykart said, "clutch arrogance. Arrogance Gehenmbel shared."
His crimson gaze hardened, slicing into the hearts of every sovereign.
"And arrogance is dead."
The words landed like a funeral bell.
Simon forced his breathing steady. He chose a single subtle motion — placing his goblet down — because doing nothing at all would be unnatural.
Inside, though, his mind spun.
Humanity didn't grow stronger — the abyss regressed.
Or perhaps something — someone — woke humanity up.
He remembered Earth.
He remembered magic awakening.
He remembered whispers of worlds colliding, of old forces returning.
And suddenly, this world felt much larger.
Ulykart raised one hand sharply.
"Enough."
A command — and silence returned.
"Now," he declared, "we will hear counsel from the fifth sovereign. He has witnessed the ruins firsthand."
He turned toward the right side of the hall.
"Sebath. Come forth."
Whispers surged anew — not panic now, but dread.
Even Simon felt something constrict around his chest.
Sebath — Rank Five.
A name associated not with glory but with dread.
Whispers called him The Eater of Silence.
The Mourner of Forgotten Thrones.
A figure stepped from the shadows at the far end of the chamber.
Tall, solemn, draped in tattered gray cloth that clung like funeral shrouds.
His presence was not overwhelming like power-drunk warlords — but empty.
Completely, terrifyingly empty.
Like a hole in existence wearing the shape of a king.
He did not walk so much as glide — steps silent, eyes half-lidded with eternal sorrow. And though he moved without sound, every abyss lord straightened in instinctive fear.
Even Karuel stilled.
Even Feje's playful tail dropped limp behind her.
And Rusnumalung — ancient, unreadable Rusnumalung — lowered his gaze in respect.
Sebath stopped below the dais, shadow cloaking him like a veil.
Ulykart inclined his head slightly — the closest thing the second sovereign ever gave to deference.
"Speak."
Sebath lifted his head, and the hollow darkness behind his eyes swallowed light.
When he spoke, it was not loud — but every soul in the hall felt it in their bones.
"The abyss," Sebath whispered, "has tasted oblivion."
His voice shook the chamber not with volume but with weight.
"And what consumed the third sovereign's realm…"
He paused, eyelids lifting just enough to reveal a flicker of… something. Fear? Recognition? Memory?
"…was not mortal steel."
A ripple of shock — because that contradicted Ulykart.
But Ulykart did not react with anger — he watched calmly, expecting this.
Sebath continued, voice hollow as a tomb:
"It was mortal magic."
Not steel. But magic.
A force beyond physical destruction — a force that shaped fate itself.
For the first time in the night, Simon's hand nearly trembled.
What kind of humans exist now? What kind of world am I in?
Sebath raised his face fully — pale, haunted, as if he had walked through death and returned with truth too heavy for existence.
"Humanity," Sebath murmured, voice like a soul weeping, "has remembered itself."
The hall froze.
No one spoke.
No one breathed.
The fifth abyss sovereign turned his head slowly, gaze sweeping every king present as though mourning them already.
When his eyes reached Simon — they paused.
And for a fleeting moment, Simon felt as though Sebath looked through the disguise, into the truth beneath.
But Sebath said nothing.
Instead, he turned toward the podium, cloak whispering like mourning wind as he ascended.
And he faced the abyss sovereigns — not as a ruler, but as a prophet of death.
"Prepare," Sebath whispered. "For the world that comes does not belong to gods."
A whisper like lungs collapsing.
"It belongs to mankind."
And with those final words, the hall felt as though it had been plunged into eternal dusk — suspended on the edge of a blade between eras.
The tension held — razor-thin, breathless. Sebath claimed the podium, drawing every gaze, every heartbeat, every future into the gravity of his presence.