Ilias ran through burning streets, following the resonance signatures that tore through the air like thunder.
He could feel them from blocks away—two massive presences clashing with the force of gods. Vaen's cold, synthetic power. And Silas's void, that terrible absence that swallowed everything it touched.
They were still fighting. Still tearing the city apart.
Ilias pushed himself harder, the Osh'Kora staff blazing with golden light in his grip. His body ached. His lungs burned. He'd left Kojo and the others behind to protect civilians, and part of him wondered if he'd made the right choice.
But this was his fight. His responsibility.
The Entity wanted him. Silas was its weapon. And Vaen—Vaen was the root of all this suffering.
Ilias rounded a corner and stopped.
The old cathedral plaza stretched before him, half-destroyed from their earlier battle. Rubble and bodies scattered across cracked stone. And in the center, two figures circled each other like wolves.
Arch-Lector Vaen looked terrible. His white robes were torn and bloody. One arm hung useless at his side. His face was a mask of bruises and cuts. But he still stood, still fought, synthetic resonance crackling around his remaining hand.
And facing him was Silas—Maestro Quiet, the man who'd orchestrated so much death. He looked almost calm, darkness flowing around him like living shadow, ready to strike again.
"You should be dead," Vaen snarled. "I killed your family. I burned your village. You should have STAYED DEAD!"
"So should you." Silas's voice was cold, emotionless. "But here we are. Two monsters, still breathing."
Vaen launched another attack—a spear of compressed sound that should have pierced Silas's heart. But darkness swallowed it, consumed it, left nothing but silence.
Silas moved forward, and Vaen stumbled back.
That's when Ilias felt it. The staff in his hands grew hot, almost burning, and he remembered—
This is it. This is the moment
"ENOUGH!"
Both men froze. Turned toward him.
Ilias stepped into the plaza, staff blazing with divine light, and met Silas's eyes across the distance.
For a long moment, no one moved. Then something shifted in Silas's expression. Recognition. Understanding.
"It was you." Silas's voice was barely a whisper. "You're the one. The silhouette I saw."
"I am." Ilias walked forward, steady, certain. "And I'm here to stop this."
Vaen laughed—a bitter, broken sound. "How touching. The Blessed boy playing hero." He swayed on his feet, exhausted. "Come to save the day? Come to stop the bad men from hurting each other?"
"No." Ilias didn't look at him. "I came to stop you from destroying more lives."
"ME?" Vaen's eye twitched. "I'm not the one who unleashed an army of demons on this city! I'm not the one who—"
"You killed my parents." Ilias's voice was flat, cold. "You separated me from my brother. You turned this city into a prison. You experimented on corpses. You created the conditions that made monsters like him possible." He gestured toward Silas. "So yes. You."
Vaen stared at him. Then he started laughing again. "Oh, this is PERFECT. Two broken toys, blaming me for their problems. You're both the same—pathetic, weak, crying over—"
Ilias moved.
One moment he was standing ten feet away. The next, his staff cracked across Vaen's jaw with the force of a hammer.
The Arch-Lector's eyes rolled back. He collapsed like a puppet with cut strings, unconscious before he hit the ground.
Silence filled the plaza.
Ilias stood over Vaen's body, breathing hard, the staff still humming in his grip. "Someone needed to shut him up."
Silas stared at him. Then, slowly, something that might have been a smile crossed his face. "Thank you for that."
"Don't thank me yet." Ilias turned to face him fully. "The Main Church is coming. They've heard about what's happening here. They'll take him, arrest him, make him face justice for what he's done."
"Justice." Silas said the word like it was foreign. "Will that bring back the dead? Will it heal the broken?"
"No. But it's better than letting him walk free."
"Is it?" Silas moved closer, and Ilias tensed—but the man made no aggressive moves. Just walked slowly across the plaza until only twenty feet separated them. "You stopped me from killing him. Why?"
"Because killing him wouldn't fix anything," Ilias said. "It wouldn't bring your family back. It wouldn't heal you. It would just make you a murderer."
"I'm already a murderer." Silas's voice was hollow. "I've killed hundreds. Maybe thousands. The Entity used me, and I let it, because I wanted Vaen to suffer the way I suffered."
"I know." Ilias met his eyes. "I know what he did to you. Your wife—Eleanor. Your daughter—Roslyn. The village massacre. The Entity finding you afterward, manipulating you."
Silas's expression cracked, just slightly. "How—"
"Because he did the same thing to me." Ilias's grip tightened on his staff. "He killed my parents. Separated me from my brother. Turned my childhood into a nightmare of survival and fear. We're not that different, Silas. We're both victims of the same monster."
"Then you understand." Silas took another step forward. "You understand why I did this. Why I had to—"
"No." Ilias shook his head. "I understand the pain. I understand the rage. But I don't understand choosing to hurt innocents because of it."
"Innocents?" Silas's voice hardened. "The people of this city supported Vaen. Followed his orders. Turned a blind eye while he butchered villages and experimented on corpses—"
"They didn't KNOW!" Ilias's voice rose. "They were fed lies! Propaganda! They thought the Church was protecting them! You can't blame them for not seeing the truth when it was buried under decades of deception!"
"So I should forgive them? The people who lived in comfort while my family burned?"
"No. But you shouldn't have made their children into monsters!" Ilias gestured at the ruined city around them. "Look what you've done! Look what you've unleashed! The Pities are killing indiscriminately—gang members, Church soldiers, civilians, CHILDREN! Is that justice? Is that revenge?"
"It's necessary." But Silas's voice wavered. "The Entity said—"
"The Entity USED you!" Ilias stepped forward. "Just like Vaen used you! You traded one monster for another, and you were too broken to see it!"
Silas flinched. "I had no one else. No one came for me. No one saved me. I was alone in the darkness, and the Entity was the only thing that offered me power—"
"I was in darkness too," Ilias said quietly. "After my parents died, I was alone. Scared. Angry. I could have become you, Silas. I could have let that rage consume me."
"But you didn't."
"No. Because I found light." Ilias thought of Kojo's laugh. Mira's kindness. Seraph's strength. Rhea's wisdom. All the people who'd pulled him back from the edge. "I found family. Friends. People who reminded me that the world had good in it, even when everything felt dark."
"I'm happy for you." Silas's voice was bitter. "Truly. But some of us don't get that luxury. Some of us fall, and there's no one to catch us."
"You could have found someone." Ilias's voice softened. "You could have looked for help instead of revenge. You could have chosen differently."
"Could I?" Silas's darkness flared. "Could I really? When every night I close my eyes and see their faces? When I still hear Roslyn calling for me as she burned? When Eleanor's last words were 'save our daughter' and I COULDN'T?" His voice broke. "You talk about choice like it's simple. Like I wasn't screaming inside my own head, begging for someone to stop me, to save me from what I was becoming. But no one came. No one cared. So I stopped fighting it."
"That's the difference between us." Ilias raised his staff. "I was in darkness, but I found light. You were in darkness, and you accepted it. You let it consume you. You became the thing you hated."
"Maybe." Silas's expression hardened. "Or maybe I became what I needed to be to survive. To fight. To make them PAY."
"And how many innocents paid instead?" Ilias asked quietly. "How many families did you destroy? How many children lost their parents because you couldn't let go of your grief?"
Silas said nothing. Couldn't.
"I'm sorry for what happened to you," Ilias said. "I'm sorry Vaen destroyed your family. I'm sorry the Entity used you. I'm sorry you were alone." He took a breath. "But I can't let you keep hurting people. I won't."
"Then you'll have to stop me." Silas's darkness expanded, filling the plaza like smoke. "Because I'm not done yet. The Entity wants you, Ilias. Wants your power. Your body. And I made a promise to deliver you."
"You don't have to keep that promise."
"Yes, I do." Silas's voice was sad, tired. "It's all I have left. The only thing that gives my suffering meaning."
"That's not true—"
"It is." Silas raised his hands, and constructs of darkness began forming around him—blades, chains, shadows given terrible shape. "You had people who saved you. Who pulled you back. I'm happy for you. Truly." His eyes met Ilias's across the distance. "But I'm too far gone now. Too deep in the dark to find my way back."
"Silas—"
"I'm sorry." The words were barely a whisper. "I'm sorry it has to be this way."
Then he attacked.
Darkness erupted across the plaza like a tidal wave. Constructs of shadow and silence came at Ilias from every direction—blades to cut, chains to bind, hands to drag him down.
Ilias met them with light.
The Osh'Kora blazed gold, and he moved like wind through the attack. His staff shattered constructs, scattered shadows, turned darkness to mist. Orun-Fela's power sang through him, and for the first time, Ilias felt the locks strain.
Not break. Not yet. But strain.
Soon, the god seemed to whisper. Soon you'll be ready.*
Ilias pushed forward, closing the distance between him and Silas. The older man was powerful—Master-level Silence manipulation, constructs that could tear through buildings—but Ilias was Blessed.
Even with his power locked, even at fifteen percent, he was stronger.
His staff connected with a shadow-blade, and the construct shattered. He spun, deflecting chains, and lunged forward. Silas barely dodged, darkness wrapping around him like armor.
They clashed again. And again. Each impact sent shockwaves through the plaza, cracking stone, bringing down what was left of the cathedral walls.
"You can't win!" Silas shouted over the roar of their battle. "Even if you beat me, the Entity will come! It will take you! Use you!"
"Then I'll beat it too!" Ilias's staff caught Silas across the ribs, and the man stumbled. "I won't let it hurt anyone else!"
"You don't understand what it is!" Silas recovered, sent a wave of cutting darkness at Ilias. "It's not just powerful—it's ANCIENT! A fragment of something that existed before gods! Before music! Before EVERYTHING!"
Ilias dodged, struck back. "I don't care what it is! It's hurting people! That's all that matters!"
They crashed through a building wall, the fight spilling into the streets beyond. Civilians scattered, screaming. Ilias tried to be careful, tried to direct the combat away from bystanders—but Silas had no such restraint.
"You still think you can save everyone!" Silas's voice was mocking, desperate. "You still think there's a way out of this that doesn't end in blood!"
"There has to be!" Ilias deflected another strike and drove his staff toward Silas's chest. The man dodged, but barely. "I won't accept anything else!"
"Then you're a FOOL!"
Darkness exploded around Silas, and for a moment, Ilias lost sight of him. When his vision cleared, the man was standing on a rooftop three buildings away.
He was running.
"NO!" Ilias launched himself after him, using resonance to leap between buildings. "You're not escaping! Not this time!"
Silas didn't respond, just kept moving, darkness carrying him across the city in great bounds. But Ilias was faster. The blessing gave him speed that mortal Tuned couldn't match.
He closed the distance. Twenty feet. Ten. Five.
His staff lashed out, wrapping around Silas's ankle with threads of golden light. The man cried out, tried to break free—but Ilias yanked hard.
Silas crashed down onto a rooftop, and Ilias was on him in an instant. His staff pressed against the man's throat, pinning him.
"It's over," Ilias said, breathing hard. "Stop running. Stop fighting. Just... stop."
Silas looked up at him with eyes that were ancient and exhausted. "I can't."
"Yes, you can. You just have to choose—"
"The Entity won't let me." Silas's voice dropped to a whisper. "It's already here, Ilias. It's been here the whole time. And it's coming for you."
Ilias felt it then. A presence rising from beneath the city. Something vast and terrible and WRONG.
The ground trembled. Buildings groaned. And from somewhere deep below, something ancient began to wake.
The Entity.
It was time.