The world hadn't stopped shaking, not really.
The temple lay broken around them, moonlight pouring through the fractured ceiling like a silent requiem. Aurel sat with his back against a fallen column, Lysandra leaning weakly against his chest, breath unsteady. Dust clung to her hair. Blood stained her sleeve.
She should have looked fragile.
She didn't.
Even wounded, she stared at Aurel like he was the only real thing in a collapsing world.
"You're thinking of leaving," she whispered.
The words cut sharper than any blade.
Aurel didn't answer — and that was an answer.
Lysandra exhaled shakily, fingers curling around his shirt. "Aurel… don't punish me because you don't know how to forgive yourself."
He shut his eyes, jaw hardening.
"It's not about forgiveness," he said. "It's about safety. Arion was right about one thing — my power reacts to emotion. If I lose control—"
She grabbed his collar, pulling him closer, eyes burning. "Then learn control. With me. Not without me."
Her voice trembled, not with weakness — with fury at the idea of him giving up on himself.
Aurel's heart twisted. He didn't deserve her loyalty, her faith, her stubborn light — and yet she stayed.
That terrified him more than any prophecy.
He gently touched her cheek, brushing away a streak of dust. The moment froze — close enough to feel her heartbeat, close enough to kiss if either dared.
But neither did.
Not yet.
Aurel looked toward the shattered entrance of the temple. "He said 'Citadel of the First Light.'"
Lysandra nodded. "Old scripture mentions it. It's beyond the northern pass… past the Astral Scar."
Her voice shook at the name — everyone knew the Astral Scar wasn't a place people returned from.
Aurel swallowed. "That's where we're going."
"We," she repeated — daring him to correct her.
He didn't.
He helped her stand, supporting her weight with quiet care. The world outside the temple glimmered with the blue glow of nightflowers, their petals reflecting the stars like fallen sky. Two exhausted souls stepped into the cold wind, but they didn't look back.
There was nothing left behind them worth remembering — only something ahead worth fearing.
Somewhere beyond time — Arion
The masked man — no, the future Arion — sat on a floating shard of broken reality. Stars wheeled beneath him like dust in a cosmic storm. Time itself crackled across his skin like static.
He watched them through a rip in the veil — Aurel carrying Lysandra out of the temple.
Arion's expression shifted — not joy, not sadness, something colder.
"So he still clings to her," he murmured. "Even now."
Magic flickered through his golden scar, lighting the void.
He hadn't lied.
Aurel did destroy the world once. He watched it, lived it, survived it. He watched hope die because of a god who loved too deeply a world too fragile.
Arion remembered holding a bleeding friend at the end — someone whose name he could no longer say without breaking.
Loss had forged him.
Hatred had sharpened him.
Time had twisted him.
But what hurt most wasn't the destruction…
…it was that Aurel — the god he once called brother — didn't regret it enough.
Not enough to stop himself.
Not enough to stop destiny.
Arion clenched his fist, shadows spiraling. "Love is the poison. Attachment is the shackle. She will break him. She will break the world."
He closed the tear in the veil with a sweep of his hand.
"I won't let her do it again."
His voice cracked — barely.
"If I must be the villain in his story to save existence, then I'll wear the mask without hesitation."
The golden scar burned brighter.
He teleported — toward the Citadel.
Toward war.
Back to Aurel & Lysandra
The desert night stretched like an endless wound. Every step north was deeper into the unknown. Aurel walked ahead, but Lysandra didn't let distance grow too far — staying at his side, even when the wind howled.
Hours passed.
The sky turned from black to silver.
No monsters, no bandits — just silence.
That made Lysandra nervous. "The beasts should be active at night."
"They are," Aurel muttered, eyes narrowing. "They're avoiding us."
A terrible fact settled between them.
Even the monsters sensed what Aurel was becoming.
Aurel stopped walking suddenly. "Lysandra… if Arion is right — if I'm the reason the gods vanished — then we're not walking toward answers."
"We're walking toward the beginning of the end."
Lysandra stepped in front of him, gripping his shoulders. "Then we change the ending."
Aurel laughed bitterly. "You don't understand. I don't get to choose. Fate—"
"Fate," she snapped, "is just the excuse people use to avoid fighting for what matters."
Her voice was a spark in a dead world.
Aurel stared at her — really saw her — the storm in her, the warmth in her, the stubborn belief that the world could still be saved if someone just refused to give up.
He touched her forehead lightly with his own.
"I'm terrified of losing you," he confessed — barely a whisper.
Her breath caught.
"You think you're the only one scared?" she murmured. "I'm scared every minute. But I'd rather walk into the fire with you than watch you burn alone."
The world paused — fragile, beautiful, almost soft.
Then the ground trembled.
Aurel tensed. "Something's wrong."
The sand ahead cracked — light bleeding through like molten gold. A figure rose from the rift — robes swirling, eyes burning silver, staff carved with ancient symbols.
Not Arion.
Another being.
A relic of the old divine world.
The Oracle of Dust.
Legends said it appeared only when destiny shifted.
Its voice echoed like stone grinding on stone. "Aurel of the Forgotten Flame. You walk a path that no god should ever walk."
Aurel didn't flinch. "Tell me how to stop what Arion claims I become."
The Oracle gave a slow, sorrowful shake of its head. "To stop your ascension… you must remove the catalyst."
Lysandra stiffened. "Catalyst? What does that mean?"
The Oracle's hollow gaze fell on her.
Aurel's blood turned to ice.
"No," he whispered. "No — don't say it."
The Oracle did.
"She is the catalyst."
The wind died.
The world vanished into silence.
Aurel's breath shattered. "Lysandra is not the reason—"
"She is," the Oracle said. "Your love will awaken your full power. Your grief will unleash it."
Lysandra's eyes widened in horror — not for herself, but for him.
"Aurel," she whispered, stepping closer, "don't listen—"
The Oracle lifted a hand. "There is only one path to save the world. You must sever the bond. You must abandon her — or she will die by your hand."
Aurel staggered back as if stabbed.
"No— I won't— I would never—"
"You already have," the Oracle said softly. "In the future he comes from."
Aurel collapsed to his knees.
Lysandra dropped beside him, grabbing his hands. "Aurel, look at me. I am not afraid of you. I am not running. I am not leaving."
He didn't speak.
He couldn't.
He stared at their joined hands like they were the trigger of an apocalypse.
The Oracle's voice fell quiet — a verdict rather than a threat.
"This world will break if you choose her."
Lysandra swallowed tears. "Aurel… please… don't leave me."
His heart cracked in real time — visibly, painfully, quietly.
He cupped her face with shaking hands, memorizing every line, every freckle, every piece of her he was being asked to sacrifice.
Then he forced himself to stand.
Lysandra tried to rise, but he gently pressed a hand to her shoulder, keeping her down. Not violently. Not cruelly.
Tenderly.
Devastatingly.
"Aurel—" she choked.
He didn't look back.
If he did, he wouldn't survive the choice.
The wind swallowed his voice but Lysandra heard it anyway:
"I love you more than fate allows."
Then he walked away.
Every step was agony.
Every step was wrong.
But he didn't stop.
Behind him, Lysandra broke — soundlessly, knees hitting the cold sand.
She reached out to him with one shaking hand…
…but he never turned.
End of Chapter 11 Cliffhanger
Lysandra sobbed alone under the dead sky.
Aurel walked toward the Citadel of the First Light — toward his future enemy, toward his own destruction — believing it was the only way to save her.
Far above them, watching through the folds of time, Arion whispered one word…
"Good."
And the world moved one step closer to war.