Thirty years.
Thirty years since I opened my eyes in this world with the Time Stone beating quietly against my chest and a destiny that practically begged to be abused. Now Kamar‑Taj was thriving, the sanctums were stable, and my students had grown into proper Masters who could handle daily operations while I pursued my own research. For the first time since my reincarnation, things felt… contained.
Naturally, the universe hates when things feel contained.
That was why I found myself wandering through a small, quiet town tucked between two mountain ridges—silent in the sort of way that made my skin crawl. I hadn't come here on purpose; I'd sensed something twisted, something wrong. A magical disturbance so foul and chaotic it was practically cackling.
The moment I entered the town limits, the stench of death hit me like a physical wall.
Bodies. Everywhere. Men. Women. Children.
All sprawled across streets and sidewalks, not a drop of blood spilled, not a wound in sight. They'd simply… stopped living. Souls snuffed out like candles.
And in the middle of that carnage stood a boy.
Maybe eight years old. Pale skin, sharp features, raven hair with a streak of blood‑red cutting across his bangs. Bare feet. A smug grin carved onto his face like it was the only expression he'd ever learned.
I froze.
Because I knew that face.
"Oh, you have got to be kidding me," I muttered under my breath.
Klarion the Witch Boy.
A Lord of Chaos.
A disaster wearing the skin of a child.
He turned to me with a delighted little gasp, as if I were a present wrapped just for him."Well hellooooo, newcomer~! I don't recognize you," he said, tilting his head. "Are you another mortal who wandered into my playground?"
I immediately activated half a dozen buffing spells. My aura roared into life—strength, speed, reflexes, mana amplification, layered magical armor, dimensional anchors. Then I summoned my Eldritch Shields—six orbiting disks of obsidian and gold that burned with runic fire.
"No," I said. "I'm the adult who's about to send you to your room."
Klarion blinked. "What?"
"You heard me," I replied. "Time for a time‑out, brat."
He snarled—an inhuman, feral sound—and the air split like torn fabric.
The battle began instantly.
Chaos sigils erupted around him, swirling like a miniature storm. I felt the distortion in reality—raw, unpredictable, destructive. Klarion always fought like someone playing with matches around gasoline.
He flung the first spell: a jagged crimson bolt that warped gravity itself. I twisted, letting two Eldritch Shields intercept it, their surfaces fracturing before reknitting. My feet barely skimmed the ground before I retaliated.
"Eldritch Bolt," I whispered.
A beam of golden‑black energy ripped forth, spiraling like a drill. Klarion flicked his wrist and sliced the spell in half with a blade of pure antimatter‑chaos.
"Oh! You're not boring!" he giggled. "Most mortals scream before they die."
"Most children don't commit mass murder," I shot back.
He pouted. "Children? I'm older than your entire lineage!"
I snapped my fingers and teleported behind him, conjuring a binding seal infused with temporal stabilizers and spatial locks. "Still act like you eat glue."
Klarion shrieked in fury and unleashed an explosion of red lightning. I raised my hands, forming a dome of hardened mana that absorbed the brunt of the attack. The shockwave still sent cars flipping and windows shattering across the town.
We clashed again.
And again.
And again.
Spells collided like fireworks. My Eldritch Shields ricocheted attacks away while I danced through the chaos with decades of battle experience. I'd fought demons, dimensional horrors, magical anomalies—but Chaos Lords? That was new.
Klarion opened a rift beneath me."Oh look! A pit that leads nowhere! Go fall into despair, mortal!"
"Hard pass," I said, stepping onto thin air as my boots lit with levitation sigils.
I fired chains of binding light—he shredded them.
He hurled a ball of condensed chaos—reality screamed as it flew—I deflected it upward where it detonated into a bloom of red stars.
He summoned living shadows—snarling, hissing shapes—I dispelled them with a wave of pure solar mana.
We fought from street to rooftop to mid‑air. The sky churned with warped colors. The world trembled around us. Each of us pushing, striking, countering, destroying and rebuilding the battlefield in equal measure.
And despite everything, I was calm.
Focused.
Experienced.
Klarion was strong, undeniably—raw, unrestrained power—but his fighting style was sloppy, emotional, childish. He knew chaos but not discipline.
I, on the other hand, had discipline in spades.
And patience.
And the Time Stone.
He lunged again, screaming in frustration. "WHY WON'T YOU DIE?!"
"I'm having fun," I said cheerfully. "And you're surprisingly good cardio."
He sputtered with outrage.
I ducked beneath a blast that erased a building behind me. My hand flicked out—a portal snapped open—his next attack bounced back toward him like a magical boomerang.
He yelped and swerved.
"Stop copying my tricks!"
"Stop throwing tantrums."
He screeched.
We clashed mid‑air, my eldritch gauntlets locking against his taloned chaos‑hands. Energy crackled around us, spirals of gold and red twisting violently.
"You think you can beat me? ME?" Klarion hissed. "I am CHAOS! I am DESTRUCTION! I—"
"You," I interrupted, "are about to cry."
He did look about one second away from it.
I pressed forward, blasting him backward with a focused burst of kinetic mana. But he flipped mid‑air and landed lightly—legs bending in a way that was definitely not human.
And then I saw it.
Sitting lazily on a streetlamp behind him.
A cat.
Black fur. Red eyes. Tail swaying with unnatural rhythm.
Teekl.
His familiar.
His anchor to the material plane.
Without her, his presence here would shatter and he'd be forced to flee back to the Chaos Realm.
Klarion noticed where I was looking.
His grin vanished.
"Oh no you don't—!"
I didn't give him the chance.
My hand lit with swirling black lightning—one of my custom spells, a creation so potent it disintegrated matter on contact.
"Black Lightning: Obliteration."
I fired.
The bolt tore across the street in a split-second.
Teekl hissed—but she didn't have time to move.
The spell engulfed her.
When the light faded, there wasn't even ash left.
Klarion froze.
"...Teekl?"
His voice cracked.
A heartbeat later—Reality convulsed.
His form flickered, breaking apart into streaks of red static.
"No! NO! YOU—YOU—YOU CHEATER!" he screamed, voice twisting unnaturally. "THIS ISN'T OVER! I'LL REMEMBER YOU! I'LL FIND YOU! I'LL—"
"Uh huh," I said. "Send a postcard."
He dissolved—chaos essence ripping away as he was forcefully ejected back to his own realm.
And just like that…
Silence.
The ruined town lay still. Smoke drifted from shattered buildings. The air shimmered with residual chaos magic slowly fading.
I exhaled and lowered my shields.
"Great," I muttered. "I just pissed off a Lord of Chaos. That'll definitely not bite me in the ass later."
I looked around at the devastation, running a hand through my hair.
Fighting him had been… intense. Dangerous. Exhausting.
And kind of fun.
But I'd also saved the world from whatever crusade he had planned today. That counted for something.
I pulled my cloak tighter and prepared a dimensional jump back to Kamar‑Taj.
As the spell circle formed beneath my feet, I sighed.
"I swear, if tomorrow throws another universe‑destroying maniac at me, I'm charging admission."
Then I vanished, leaving the broken town behind.