Kaiser jerked upright, his eyes flying wider than ever as he found himself sitting within a vast dark-gray wasteland stretched beneath pale emerald skies.
The heavens shimmered with an eerie, dreamlike radiance.
He immediately rose to his feet, brushing strange black flecks from the folds of his carmine robes before staring uneasily across the unfamiliar world surrounding him.
His mud-brown boots sank into the soft gray earth with every cautious step, the strange mire oozing beneath his weight.
Countless glittering white flowers carpeted the landscape.
Their delicate petals released soft, ethereal chimes that drifted through the air like forgotten lullabies carried upon an invisible wind.
Kaiser rubbed at his forehead with a quiet groan, trying to steady the pounding inside his skull as he wandered through the surreal wilderness.
Kaiser: "Where am I n—?"
???: "Oh? You're finally here."
The Dictator grunted as something firm stopped him in his tracks, forcing him backward with a startled frown.
Kaiser: "What the—?"
???: "You're awfully jittery. Calm down… relax."
Kaiser blinked, his pupils dilating instantly.
Every muscle in his face locked into place. A suffocating tension gripped his expression, pinning his eyes open while his thoughts collapsed beneath the impossible sight standing before him.
His mind refused to accept it. Refused to even acknowledge what it was seeing.
This… wasn't possible.
It had to be some kid of illusion. Some cruel hallucination conjured by the Titan.
It had to be.
Sooner or later, it would shatter… wouldn't it?
Standing only a few paces away… was himself.
Another Kaiser. Yet something about him was fundamentally wrong.
Long strands of silky black hair spilled untidily over loose crimson robes that hung carelessly from his body. Pale golden eyes shimmered beneath heavy lids with a tranquil menace that made the air itself feel colder. A faint smile rested upon his lips.
Kaiser instinctively took a step backward, unable to tear his gaze away from the stranger wearing his own face.
Kaiser: "Who are you…? Stay back…"
The twin's smile widened little by little until it became an impossibly broad grin.
He raised both hands in exaggerated surrender before taking a single mocking step backward. A quiet, delighted laugh slipped between his lips as he spoke.
???: "Eheheheh… your so scared. I love it..."
Kaiser's expression hardened immediately, suspicion overwhelming disbelief as his fingers curled tightly into trembling fists.
Kaiser: "Didn't you hear me? Answer the damn question."
He blinked. The twin was gone.
Kaiser whipped around so violently his robes snapped through the strange emerald breeze, only for his breath to catch halfway through the turn.
His own double now stood just behind him, slowly circling through the field of shimmering flowers with leisurely footsteps. His midnight-black hair swayed across his shoulders as he chuckled, his eyes beaming with excitement.
???: "You have no idea how long I've been waiting for this… for the two of us to finally meet. For this long-awaited confrontation to finally come to pass!"
Kaiser's eyes narrowed, confusion wrestling with the instinct screaming for him to flee.
Kaiser: "Do I… know you?"
???: "Heh… you know you do…"
The twin gradually came to a stop, thoughtfully lifting a single finger to his chin as an exaggerated pout spread across his face.
His eyes wandered skyward with theatrical contemplation before a quiet hum escaped his lips.
His leather boot tapped idly against the damp gray earth as though he were solving the world's simplest puzzle.
???: "Let's clear up all this confusion, shall we? It would be terribly inconvenient if we kept referring to each other the same way."
He tilted his head from side to side, pretending to weigh countless possibilities before suddenly snapping his fingers with childish delight.
???: "Ooo… I've got it! How about…
X.
I.
K.
A.
Xika…"
Kaiser fractured. His voice vanished before his mind could even begin to comprehend what had just been spoken. The name echoed through the silent wasteland, lingering within the hollow stillness like a curse that had waited decades to be spoken aloud once more.
It was a name he knew far too well.
A name that should never have existed.
A name that had been buried so deeply within his soul that even he had begun pretending it had never belonged to him.
Xika.
His own name.
Nearly sixty years earlier, something inside Klydien Kaiser had broken beyond repair. The horrors of the Second Ageless War had carved themselves into his mind with merciless precision.
Endless rivers of blood swallowed the battlefields.
Countless comrades vanished beneath mountains of corpses.
Men transformed into ravenous beasts before his very eyes, while monsters disguised as people tore through entire battalions with gleeful cruelty.
Above them all loomed the unbearable pressure of the strongest beings to ever walk the Realm of Rage—those whose mere presence reduced seasoned warriors into trembling wrecks.
Eventually… Kaiser simply couldn't bear it anymore.
The bloodshed.
The rolling skulls scattered across fields.
The paralyzing burden of standing before creatures masquerading as gods.
The thought of every person he cherished being swallowed by that endless slaughter… something inside him finally gave way.
Klydien Kaiser. Björn Kaiser. Leif Oscars.
On one blood-soaked day… they all ceased to exist.
What remained descended upon the battlefield like a rabid calamity. Friend and foe alike disappeared beneath his blade as reason abandoned him entirely.
First Ones.
Hell Raisers.
Elves.
It made no difference. Anyone unfortunate enough to stand before him was hacked apart without hesitation. By the time the frenzy finally ended, the frontline had fallen eerily silent. Those fortunate enough to survive could only stare in mute horror at the lone figure standing amidst towering heaps of butchered corpses.
His blade dripped endlessly beneath a sky stained the color of old blood.
It was that day the survivors bestowed upon him his sixth name.
Xika.
The living embodiment of every fear Kaiser had buried… and every ounce of hatred those fears had birthed.
Xika's grin widened as he admired the terror frozen across his counterpart's face.
Xika: "Such a pitiful expression… you truly are deplorable."
Kaiser's lips quivered before the words finally left him in a brittle whisper.
Kaiser: "Where… where are we?"
Without warning, Xika disappeared.
A heartbeat later, he reappeared nearly a hundred yards away, hanging upside down within the empty air as though gravity itself had willingly surrendered to him.
Yet despite the impossible distance separating them, every syllable that left his lips arrived beside Kaiser's ear in a conspiratorial whisper, warm enough to make the hairs along his neck stand upright.
Xika: "Where do you think, you fool? Your own mind. The place where every thought, memory… and regret you've failed to hide continues festering."
His neck slowly twisted until it bent far beyond anything a human body should have been capable of enduring.
Then—without so much as a ripple disturbing the air—he was suddenly standing only inches away from Kaiser, their noses nearly touching as that dreadful smile stretched wider across his face.
Xika: "Though… none of that really matters. Let's talk about something far more interesting… shall we?"
Kaiser instinctively recoiled, his golden eyes frantically sweeping across the surreal wasteland in a desperate search for escape.
The twisted reflection clasped his hands behind his back before walking circles around Kaiser like an old friend preparing for a pleasant conversation.
Xika: "Hmm… where should we begin? Ah, I know. How about the day you chose that precious little faith of yours over affirming your love to Hera? We could spend hours discussing that one."
Kaiser's body froze so completely he might as well have been carved from glacier ice itself. Even his breathing came to an abrupt halt.
Xika: "Or perhaps we could talk about the day you stood there… and watched your beloved father choke to death right in front of you."
He tilted his head with feigned curiosity, pale golden eyes glowing with unbearable anticipation.
Xika: "Why was that again…? Oh, yes! It was because your mother genuinely believed she'd been blessed with a divine revelation—that the Celestial Butterfly themself had descended into her dreams and commanded her to sacrifice her own husband."
Kaiser's entire body stiffened. The words struck him harder than any weapon ever could.
Kaiser: "S… stop…"
Xika: "Maybe we could talk about how you abandoned your Blessed Tool, Silfriður! Hmm, I wonder why?"
His grin became razor-thin.
Xika: "Ah, that's right! Because you needed a weapon more… in tune with the Balance's 'sacred' little teachings."
Kaiser's hands flew to his forehead as though he could physically keep his mind from splitting apart. It felt as if some colossal blade had buried itself deep within his body and begun mercilessly churning.
His breathing became ragged.
Uneven.
Every heartbeat thundered painfully against his ribs.
Xika vanished, reappearing beside the Dictator in seconds. Gone was the playful theatrics. Gone was the childish amusement. What remained upon that identical face was something infinitely worse—a sneer carved entirely from pure contempt.
Kaiser: "Stop…"
His voice cracked.
Kaiser: "Stop it now… p-please…"
Xika: "How about—"
Kaiser: "I SAID STOP!"
Xika lunged forward instead, his own voice exploding through the fields like a judge delivering the final sentence.
Xika: "How about the way you've hidden behind your devotion to the Balance your entire miserable life?!"
His finger slammed hard against Kaiser's chest.
Xika: "You use that precious faith as a shield against everything you're too frightened to confront! Stop fucking pretending like you adore that false messiah!"
Kaiser: "STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!"
His body moved before reason could restrain it. Kaiser hurled every ounce of fury, grief, and sixty years of overwhelming regret into a single punch.
His hardened knuckles crashed squarely against Xika's jaw with a vicious impact that rippled across the region, launching the twin back with tremendous force!
Xika skidded violently across the gray mire, his leather boots gouging long trenches through the soaked earth before he finally planted himself firmly enough to stop.
The flowers surrounding him bowed beneath the gust left in his wake. His head remained lowered, strands of messy black hair hanging across his face as a thin stream of crimson essence left the corner of his lips and strayed down his chin.
…Drop.
A single droplet slipped free.
It landed upon one of the pristine white blossoms blooming beneath his feet. Scarlet slowly bled across its celestial petals, staining their sacred glow until the flower resembled something caught between heaven and slaughter.
Then…
Xika slowly lifted his head, revealing eyes emptied of every human emotion save for one.
Sheer, bottomless hatred.
Xika: "Fool… I will break you apart."
With a sharp snap of his bony fingers, two sleek obsidian sword hilts materialized from the stagnant air, each forged with cold iron crossguards.
They hurtled across the wasteland like black comets before slamming violently into Xika's waiting hands, the impact detonating through the silent landscape!
The moment his fingers closed around them, foul black ichor began weeping from the empty depths of his eye sockets. It streamed endlessly down his face like tears drawn from something long since stripped of humanity. Xika slowly fell onto one knee before driving both hilts into the earth beneath him with terrifying strength.
Brilliant blades composed entirely of ghostly white fire erupted from the handles, soaring upward in shrieking pillars that illuminated the pale-green sky.
Xika: "I will split you open with my bare hands and make you drown in the blood spilling from your own worthless mouth."
His body convulsed.
A violent retch tore through his chest before torrents of thick, dark-green vomit exploded from between his lips, splattering across the grass in steaming pools of corruption.
The muscles beneath his skin twitched wildly while his eyes slowly began to warp inside their sockets.
Xika: "I will ruin you so completely, so horrifically, that agony itself will run out of names trying to describe what I've done to you…!"
Something burst from his back. Flesh split apart with wet, nauseating cracks as two monstrous wings erupted from his spine, each one stretching farther than the eye could comfortably follow.
Thousands upon thousands of ink-black feathers unfurled into the wind, drifting lazily through the air as Xika growled. They transformed his silhouette into that of a fallen valkyrie dragged screeching from the deepest reaches of a nightmare.
Xika: "I will carve you open like the filthy swine you are, and I will SMILE as I watch the last remnant of light leave your eyes."
Bones cracked beneath flesh as his feet grotesquely reshaped themselves, armored scales spreading over his skin in overlapping layers of blackened iron. Jagged spikes crawled upward from his ankles to his knees like parasitic growths.
Every movement became heavier.
Sharper.
Less human than before.
Xika: "I will savor every desperate plea, every pathetic cry, every second you spend praying for a mercy that will NEVER come!"
Kaiser's face went disturbingly pale. Xika launched himself skyward with an explosive roar, his enormous wings beating once before hurling his filthy body into the emerald heavens.
White and golden lightning crackled behind his ragged robes, curling around his ascending figure like furious serpents.
The very clouds seemed to recoil from Xika's approach.
His laughter echoed farther and farther away, yet somehow only grew louder within Kaiser's ears.
Xika: "I will BATHE these pale heavens in your ruin! I will scatter what remains of you across this shattered earth and RIP every last fear from the depths of your soul!"
Higher.
Higher still.
Until even those impossible wings disappeared beyond the ceiling of the world itself.
…
Quiet.
Everything went quiet.
…
Then, from somewhere impossibly high above creation itself, a whisper drifted gently through the sky.
Xika: "And you will watch. You will watch it ALL…"
The clouds exploded apart.
Xika hung suspended above the realm, head lowered unnaturally as thick strands of foaming saliva dripped from his mouth. His grotesquely elongated tongue lolled between sharpened teeth. Two radiant golden X's slowly manifested themselves across his eyes, burning into his gaze like hellish brands.
Xika: "Now STAND! It's time we settle this once and for all!"
Xika disappeared.
A blaring sonic boom split the clouds apart as his body corkscrewed toward the earth with apocalyptic speed, his chaotic laughter roaring louder than the thunder chasing behind him.
The snow-white flames consuming his twin blades swelled with impossible hunger, rising higher… and higher… until they towered like mountains bending across the horizon itself!
The demon wearing Kaiser's face descended.
Xika: "WHOEVER DIES FIRST… LOSES CONTROL!"
SNAP!
SNAP!
Kaiser let out an ear-rending shriek as Xika tore past him, recalling the boundless pale blazes into a single catastrophic slash. The strike carved straight through his chest, erupting into a violent torrent of mangled viscera!
The Dictator was thrown hundreds of yards across the desolate landscape. His body spun through the air like a living cannonball before his face smashed into the crooked earth with bone-crushing force!
He bit down so violent and hard that his gums ruptured, spraying hot metallic blood as his teeth splintered into jagged, chalky needles.
Desperate to stop the relentless momentum, Kaiser thrust one hand into the ground. Agony exploded through his arm the instant his fingers struck the hardened earth, every joint snapping apart and twisting into unnatural angles beneath the unimaginable strain.
Kaiser finally crashed into a towering mound of boulders, the cataclysmic impact splitting one of the massive stones clean down the middle.
Yet before the dust had even begun to settle…
Kaiser forced himself back onto his feet.
Blood streamed from the gaping wound across his chest while his dust-covered white curls lashed wildly through the storming winds, but he ignored every shred of pain flooding his body.
He burst forward without thought, tearing across the grey fields at incredible speed and leaving a winding trail of deep rose blood behind him.
Xika: "Huh?!"
Kaiser's legs blurred into little more than streaks of frantic motion. Every stride felt as though he were sprinting barefoot across molten stone!
The muscles in his legs threatened to rip themselves apart with every heavy step.
Within moments he had already crossed several miles of the wasteland, his golden eyes darting wildly across the horizon in search of anything—an opening, a refuge, a miracle—that might lead him away from this nightmare.
Xika: "KLYDIEN!"
The death-cry echoed across the skies. Unleashing a frantic roar, he hammered his expanding, burning blades down into the petrified clay, splitting the grey terrain wide open.
The ground spasmed.
Blinding firestorms tore through the wasteland like leviathans, savagely ripping open a subterranean labyrinth. The crust of the world buckled and groaned under the heavy onslaught, struggling to hold the pressure until the trapped kinetic fury blew the earth clean open.
Thousands of massive clods of torn earth were blasted into the air.
The ruptured debris hung suspended in the breathless silence—a brief, agonizing hesitation—before gravity reasserted its iron grip and dragged the ruin screaming back to the soil.
Xika: "Don't you get it?! This place is my domain! I CONTROL it all! Everything!"
Kaiser glanced over his shoulder… and his heart nearly stopped.
The sky had disappeared beneath an avalanche of gigantic tumbling rock.
He forced his failing limbs to find another gear, a bloody froth spraying from his lips as his bones threatened to snap. Behind his desperate stride, the monstrous clods pulverized the wasteland, each seismic impact detonating with a concussive roar that launched tidal waves of debris toward the clouds.
Then—
One landed directly ahead.
Kaiser's pupils shrank.
Without thinking, he threw himself over the burning rock just before it crushed the ground beneath him.
He cleared it by inches, only for his exhausted body to slam face-first into the uneven earth on the other side.
Pain exploded through his cranium as he tumbled helplessly across the mud, skin tearing open against the rugged terrain.
His lungs burned with anguish.
His vision went hazy.
…Yet none of it mattered.
Adrenaline had long since drowned everything else.
Before the dust had even settled, Kaiser forced himself upright once again and continued running.
Far above him, Xika hovered.
His entire body shuddered beneath an emotion far uglier than rage.
His fists slammed into his own head over and over again with horrifying force while thick streams of black blood spilled from his eyes. Devilish smoke rose from his black hair, swirling into the emerald sky.
His breathing collapsed into ragged, animalistic gasps.
Xika: "No… No… No… No… No… No! No! No! NO!"
⸻
Meanwhile, Kaiser paid no attention whatsoever to the creature's unraveling madness.
There was only one thought left inside his fractured mind.
Escape.
His battered legs carried him blindly over another barren hill before—
Clink.
His foot caught against something hidden beneath the grey grass.
Kaiser pitched forward, crashing face-first into the damp earth. He groaned softly as he pushed himself onto one elbow, disoriented. He then lowered his gaze toward the object that had interrupted his sprint.
Kaiser: "H-Huh…?"
Confusion overtook the panic in his eyes.
It lay nestled amongst the pale blades of grass.
His breath caught.
Silfriður.
Or rather… a piece of it.
Kaiser slowly lifted the relic from the ground, turning it carefully between his fingers. It was the Upper Crest—a heavily armored curved blade forged from deep crimson steel.
Near its base rested the upper half of an intricately embossed silver falcon, its proud wings spread wide while its noble head gazed eternally toward the heavens.
He turned the fragment over.
At its base protruded a polished silver tongue fitted with two precise locking notches.
A connection point.
Kaiser's eyes widened.
Without a second thought, he surged back onto his feet, clutching the fragment tightly in his hand as he raced down the rolling hills once more. His frenzied gaze swept across the meadows, searching feverishly through the endless landform.
Xika: "Running away again? Just like always… TCH!"
Kaiser glanced over his shoulder, and the color drained from his face.
Far above the whitened viridian skies, the King of Hatred spun through the sky like a brilliant star.
Xika's laughter rang across the world with the agonized chorus of forgotten souls, echoing over the ashen plains!
One of his blazing swords slipped from his grasp and rocketed toward the celestial canopy.
The colorless flames climbed inconceivably high before carving a monolithic wound across the heavens themselves—a rift filled not with stars, but with absolute shadow.
From within that gaping scar, dozens of glimmering lavender claws slowly emerged, dragging themselves into the world one tormenting inch at a time.
Moments later, the rest of their bodies followed.
Knights.
Directors.
Servants.
Friends.
Each drifted from the wound in translucent violet forms, suspended beneath the broken sky like wandering spirits denied their rest.
Kaiser knew every one of them.
His comrades.
His family.
Souls cast aside by his fear-stricken ignorance... and lives devoured by Xika's never-ending malice.
Charlie Orsted: "K-Kaiser… Kaiser…"
Mistress Freya: "Your tea is getting cold, my master…"
Director Viggo: "Klydien! Watch out! They're approaching from behind! GET DOWN!"
Little Ylva: "H-Here you go, m-mister… I heard you liked flowers… so I picked one of my favorites! It's a—"
Xika: "KILL HIM!"
Obeying Xika's dark decree, the spectral horde cascaded downward in a roaring, amethyst flood. Kaiser had no time to breathe; three ethereal knights collided into him like living spears, skewering his flesh with their claws. Warm blood sprayed from his torn sides, a stark contrast to the brilliant blue tears streaming down the phantoms' weeping faces.
They did not scream.
They did not curse him.
They simply wept.
Kaiser staggered, his knees threatening to give way beneath the blow, but he violently pushed through the pain. He wove through the charging ranks, tripping up a cluster of wraiths before pivoting hard. He threw himself into a desperate sprint without once breaking his stride.
His heart begged him to close his eyes.
Those faces…
The familiar smiles of those he had laughed beside.
The companions he had cherished.
The family he had failed.
Every instinct demanded that he look away.
But he refused.
Not anymore.
After everything he had done… after everything he had lost… ignorance was no longer a refuge he deserved.
He would face them.
Every single one.
Even when Little Ylva came hurtling toward him with a shrill cry, the innocent child he once knew now twisted into something unrecognizable. Her tiny hands had become hooked claws, and hatred bulged beneath the surface of her once-beautiful eyes.
She slashed across his face.
Rotting flesh peeled away with a sickening tear, tumbling across the fractured earth in wet maroon clumps. Half of Kaiser's skull lay exposed beneath the serrated wound.
He never slowed.
Not even for a heartbeat.
He pivoted around the child with practiced precision, letting her momentum carry her harmlessly past before accelerating once again.
Terror gripped his throat.
Pain consumed his senses.
There was no slowing the spectral army in his wake.
Still…
He dug deep, sprinting even faster.
Kaiser: "There."
His eyes caught the second fragment lying amongst the gray grass.
The Upper Riser.
Without breaking stride, he snatched the reinforced segment from the earth and slammed the Upper Crest onto it. Steel collided with steel before the locking mechanism snapped firmly into place with a satisfying metallic click.
Xika: "Huh…?"
Kaiser: "There!"
Another gleam flashed across the hills.
The Lower Riser.
He kicked the mechanical housing into the air, caught it cleanly with one hand, and twisted it onto the base of the Upper Riser. The components meshed together perfectly, every notch finding its place as though the weapon itself had been waiting decades for this reunion.
Xika: "WHAT?!"
Kaiser's golden eyes widened.
Another piece.
Kaiser: "THERE!"
The Spur.
The shortest limb of the great bow—the sacred piece forged to ground Silfriður's overwhelming energy.
Kaiser tore the final component from the earth, drove its notched silver tongue into the waiting socket, and shoved until the spring-lock burst outward.
The mechanism sealed.
Complete.
Kaiser's lips finally parted into the faintest smile.
Kaiser: "Yes."
Xika: "ENOUGH!"
Xika crashed into the earth directly before Kaiser, his monstrous valkyrie wings unfurling until they eclipsed the hills themselves. Savage spirals of golden and violet thunder revolved above his head like the halo of some profane god, bathing his scarred body in an unholy radiance.
Those dreadful X-shaped eyes bored straight through Kaiser's ruined heart.
Kaiser: "Wha—!?"
The King of Hatred erupted into a storm of steel, unleashing a frenzied barrage of slashes so relentless that the world itself seemed unable to keep count.
His twin blades carved across Kaiser without mercy, hacking apart everything he deemed apart of Klydien's broken body.
Chest.
Waist.
Face.
Arms.
Hands.
Legs.
Flesh burst apart beneath each strike while his crusted fingernails shattered against the sword hilts, blood running freely down his shuddering wrists. Every scream that escaped Xika's throat grew more distorted than the last, each screech becoming violent enough to rupture Kaiser's ears.
Then the beast lunged forward.
His sharpened fangs buried themselves deep into Kaiser's shoulder before tearing away a mouthful of vermillion flesh with cruel delight.
Kaiser collapsed into the marsh below, his mouth hanging open against the soaked earth as his battered body convulsed like an insect crushed beneath a careless boot.
Xika only laughed.
His grin stretched wider—far wider than any human face should have allowed—as he blasted back into the viridian skies, spinning both blazing swords around himself while gathering impossible momentum.
Xika: "Now! It ends right now! I am going to butcher you until there's nothing left to bleed!
No more running, no more screaming—just you rotting in the dark! I'm going to wipe you off the face of this earth, and nobody is ever going to say your useless name again! You'll be the one that's forgotten! YOU!"
He soared through the skies like a demonic hawk intoxicated by slaughter itself!
Brilliant streams of golden light raced over his slender frame as his fingers tightened around the twin hilts.
His knuckles slowly turned pale beneath the blood.
Far below, Kaiser could no longer truly see him.
His vision had faded almost completely.
Looking upward through the scarlet haze filling his eyes, the blazing silhouette suspended beyond the clouds resembled the sun itself.
Slowly…
He opened his arms.
Glistening tears gathered along his lashes before quietly spilling down bloodstained cheeks.
This was it.
His punishment.
The inevitable end he had spent decades running from.
There was nothing left to do.
Nothing left to fight.
Nothing—
Hera: "I'm… I'll wait for you. I'll always wait for you. Always, my love…"
SNAP.
Kaiser's fingers slammed shut.
That voice…
His fist locked, knuckles splintering anew an instant before he smashed it down, cratering the mud beneath him. Gouts of crimson tore from every open gash as he hauled himself onto shaking legs, his own blood raining around him.
None of it mattered.
Not the pain.
Not the odds.
Only one truth remained in the wreckage of Björn's mind.
…Her voice.
Kaiser: "Silfriður!"
The forgotten Blessed Tool answered its master's call.
Soft constellations of pale light blossomed across the heavens as the reconstructed bow shimmered with ancient elegance, gliding into Kaiser's waiting hand beneath a veil of silver stardust.
The weapon hummed warmly against his palm, as though greeting an old friend who had finally come home.
High above, Xika's smirk vanished.
His rotten canines ground together so violently they cracked beneath the pressure as he watched Kaiser rise to meet him—not with terror…
But with unwavering resolve.
The King of Hatred descended.
Light itself bent around his dive as he hurled toward the earth, both swords drawn back for one final cleaving strike.
Kaiser quietly closed his eyes.
A pristine black arrow slowly materialized within his fractured hand, glowing with a tranquil brilliance unlike anything else upon the battlefield. His mangled fingers trembled violently as he guided the shaft toward the waiting bowstring.
Click.
Turning his body sideways, Kaiser planted his feet firmly into the earth, every movement measured despite the agony threatening to rip him apart.
Xika: "Disgusting worm!"
He drew the string.
Inhale…
Exhale.
Xika: "Don't you get it?!"
The bow curved to its fullest extent.
Xika: "YOU'RE FUCKING FINISH—!"
Release.
BOOM.
The arrow departed without fanfare.
Yet halfway through its flight, darkness erupted into impossible radiance as the slender projectile unfolded into a colossal pillar of immaculate white light. It swallowed the realm in an instant before crashing directly through the King of Hatred's chest, piercing cleanly through his blackened heart.
For one breathtaking moment…
Everything became white.
Then the sky exploded.
A cataclysmic bloom of emerald ash and celestial fire detonated across the pale expanse like the birth of another world, scattering rivers of luminous embers throughout the wasteland.
Kaiser could only stare.
Tiny shards of fading light drifted gently back toward the ground like silent rain, dissolving into glittering dust the instant they kissed the grass.
——
Xika struck the ground with a wet, hollow squelch.
The King of Hatred had become scarcely recognizable beneath the ruin of his own body. A foul, obsidian sludge drained continuously from his split skin, leaving shredded muscle to hang like tattered banners from his scorched skeleton… One arrow…
Only one…
Had reduced him to this.
His colossal wings were completely gone, incinerated down to charred joints and weeping ribbons of flaming meat.
The shrieks he had unleashed moments earlier had utterly shredded his throat, reducing his voice to a wet, strangled rasp beneath a deluge of blood.
He tried to stand.
His body refused.
Instead, he crawled pitifully across the grey earth, twitching helplessly as though even his limbs had abandoned him.
Hatred still lingered.
Between ragged breaths he cursed Kaiser's name over and over, burying his bloodied face in the mud, desperate to hide from the unbearable humiliation of defeat.
Step.
Xika's head jerked upward.
His pupils widened.
Long strands of black hair spilled across the grass as a familiar figure emerged through the settling ash.
Klydien Kaiser.
Standing above him.
He looked less like a man than something dragged back from death itself. Splintered bone gleamed through countless gashes carved across his body, while blood poured steadily from wounds that should never have allowed him to remain standing.
Yet his face…
Was calm.
Silent.
Something about that unbearable stillness made terror seize Xika's heart more fiercely than any blade ever could.
Xika: "Get… G-Get away from me! Stay the fuck back! Don't you DARE come any closer."
He clawed frantically through the mud, scrambling backward with all the strength his grotesque body could gather.
Step.
Xika: "S-Stop! I said stop!"
Step.
Xika: "STOP IT! I swear if you don't… Fucking stop!"
Step.
Step.
Step.
Xika: "Please! D-Don't! S-Stop! Please… stop… I-I—!"
Thump.
Kaiser collapsed onto both knees before him.
His shredded crimson robes slipped gently from battered shoulders as he reached forward…
…and quietly wrapped both arms around the broken King of Hatred.
Xika froze.
A…
Hug?
The embrace was warm.
Unwavering and soft.
Kaiser held him without a shred of hesitation. His trembling hand traced slow, soothing circles across Xika's shuddering back, treating him like a terrified child rather than the architect of his ruin—the very monster that had tried so desperately to erase him.
Only then did Kaiser finally speak.
His exhausted voice was barely more than a whisper.
Kaiser: "You were right… about everything. All of it."
He closed his eyes.
Kaiser: "And for that… I'm sorry."
His embrace tightened ever so slightly.
Kaiser: "I'm truly sorry."