Location: Vale of Shadows, Narn – 6999 NY
The Great Tree loomed behind them like a dream already slipping into memory—its colossal form slowly fading beneath the veil of mist and snow, as if it knew its moment in the story had passed. The storm above had quieted, but it had not vanished. It lingered now like a brooding thought, low and rumbling, its fury folded into silence. The forest around them, though less hostile than before, remained shrouded in that strange hush—the kind that carries ancient secrets and the heavy stillness of things left unsaid.
Adam's steps were careful, almost reverent, as though the snow beneath him might crack and reveal yet more of the unknown. His breath steamed against the cold, but it wasn't the chill that made his chest feel tight. He could feel something new inside himself, something awakened by the vision of the Aryas and the tale carved into the heartwood of the world. It was not merely a sense of destiny. It was burden and calling, braided together.
Beside him, Kon walked with shoulders squared and jaw clenched. His striped fur bristled against the wind, though the tension in his body came not from cold but from thought. He had always trusted movement more than meaning—preferred action to allegory. But now, the tale of the Aryas scratched at something deeper in him, something he'd locked away during the long years of war. A story that had once belonged to the old world had followed him into the new. And the ring on his finger—the one he had worn without thinking—felt heavier now, as though it had heard its name spoken and stirred awake.
Trevor trailed slightly behind, his feet dragging more than before. Not from fatigue, though his body ached—but from the swell of questions he couldn't shape into words. The monkey Tracient stared at the pale sky above as he walked, eyes flicking over the curling clouds. Why me? he wondered. Why now? His tail hung low behind him, unusually still. Something inside him had changed. He could feel it like a note lingering in the air long after the music had stopped.
"I still can't believe it," Trevor finally murmured, breaking the silence. His voice didn't ring with his usual mirth. It carried the softness of someone trying not to sound too shaken. "The Aryas… the war… and this world being connected to mine. It's almost too much to take in."
Adam nodded. "I'm still wrapping my head around it too," he replied without looking back. "But it all makes sense now. The Aryas are the key to everything—the balance of the world."
Balance. That word hovered in Adam's mind like a whisper from the past. He remembered the stories his guardian used to tell beside the hearth, back when Narn was long lost and he didn't even know it.. He'd never thought the tales were more than poetic fables—until now. They were real. All of them. And the responsibility now rested on them to restore what had been broken.
Kon, a few strides ahead, answered grimly. "We can't afford to dwell on it too long. Razik's still out there."
And as if conjured by his own words, the forest betrayed them.
WHHHHIIIIIIZZZZ!!!!!!
A sharp, shrill whistling split the still air. Adam's ears twitched—instinct kicked in—and he dove to the side without thinking. A searing blast of light tore through the space where he had just stood, striking the frozen ground and exploding with a deafening boom. Snow and debris rocketed into the air in a plume of white fire, and the shockwave knocked Adam sideways, his shoulder scraping along the bark of a gnarled tree.
Trevor yelped, swinging himself upward by a branch just in time to avoid the second blast. The heat of it singed the tips of his fur as it raced beneath him, slicing a scar into the earth.
"Plasma beads…" Adam whispered, his heart hammering. "Razik."
Kon snarled under his breath, rage darkening his voice. "How could I be so careless?" His claws flexed into the snow. "I should've known. I should've seen it coming."
"I should've smelled them from a mile away," Adam muttered, narrowing his eyes. He cursed himself for letting the story lull him into a false calm. In Narn, peace was always a thin skin stretched over violence.
The forest seemed to tighten around them. The wind hushed. Shadows shifted.
And then Razik emerged—cloaked in dark green, tall and terrible in the whiteness. The edge of his cloak danced with the wind like a serpent's tail, and his eyes—cold and colorless—glinted with a malice that needed no fire to burn. His presence warped the space around him. The trees themselves seemed to lean away from him.
Hyena Tracients spilled out behind him like plague, their yellow eyes flashing in the dimness. They said nothing, but their snarls filled the air—guttural and eager.
Razik stopped a few paces ahead of them, his smile slow and cruel. "You escaped by luck the last time," he drawled, his voice low and sharp, "but that won't happen again."
Adam met his gaze steadily. He would not flinch. He could not afford to.
But Razik's eyes drifted—to Trevor. And for a heartbeat, they flickered with confusion. "A monkey Tracient?" he sneered. "I thought your kind were all wiped out in the wars."
Trevor landed lightly on the snow, balancing on the balls of his feet. His voice was calm, but it carried a bite. "Surprised? Don't worry, I'm just the last one standing. Here to ruin your day."
There was no tremble in Trevor's voice, but inside—he could feel the drum of his heartbeat against his ribs. This was Razik. The one from the stories he heard from Adam and Kon. The destroyer. The tyrant. The monster that turned matter to dust. And here he was, standing just feet away—grinning like it was a game.
But Trevor wouldn't back down. Not now. Not after everything. He squared his shoulders and curled his tail upward, like a banner refusing to bow.
Razik's smile faded. His lip curled. "One more Tracient won't change anything," he hissed. "You'll all die here today."
Trevor didn't move, didn't speak. He only stared—his orange eyes fierce and unblinking. *Let him try,* he thought. Let him see what the last Maymum is made of.
Kon's body locked into motion as Razik stepped forward, the snowfall seeming to recoil from the sheer malice radiating off him. His hand slid instinctively to the hilt of his blade—not out of fear, but duty. A vow lived in that grip. A silent promise made long ago in the ruins of another battlefield, spoken only in blood and breath.
"Stay back," Kon warned, drawing the blade with a rasp of steel that echoed across the frozen glade like a line drawn in the snow. His voice was calm, but beneath it trembled a tempest. He was not ready. Not truly. But readiness, he had learned, was a luxury not afforded to warriors born in wartime.
Razik only smiled wider. That grin—mocking, deliberate—was not the smile of a predator, but of something worse. A creature who enjoyed the game more than the prize. "You've no idea what you're up against, Kon," he said with quiet relish. "Did you ever wonder what my Arcem is?"
Kon's grip tightened. At that moment, he realised that all the time he had gone up against Razik until Adams arrival, he had never used his Arcem.
Razik tilted his head, his cloak shifting like black smoke in the wind. "Allow me to show you."
Then, without warning, the world bent.
There was no sound—just a sudden stillness so deep it cracked the sky. The air warped. Light itself distorted, and the snow around Razik suspended midair as if frozen in time. Then came the surge: violent, unrelenting—a release of Arcem that twisted the air with invisible teeth.
"ARCEM: ALBEDO."
The name did not need to be spoken. The force of it carved itself into the marrow of every living thing within reach.
Adam instinctively stepped back, his hand shooting out in front of Trevor to keep him behind. His body trembled—not from cold, but from the presence. It was like standing too near a black sun. Not just heat. Not just weight. But the feeling that something fundamental had shifted. The world no longer obeyed its own laws.
Kon stood firm, but his fur rippled from the intensity of the power radiating outward. He saw the shimmer in the air, like glass about to shatter. "He's been hiding this…" Kon murmured. "This whole time…"
Razik's voice slithered out. "I've been holding back during our previous encounters," he said. "But not anymore."
Then the ground itself seemed to sink, sagging under the crushing weight of the invisible storm Razik unleashed. Trees bent inward. Stones began to roll forward, then flew—ripped from the ground and drawn toward him. One of the Hyena Tracients gave a startled yelp—too close, too slow. In a blink, it was pulled in. There was no scream. Only a crack, a flash of blood, and then—nothing.
Gone. Like a breath swallowed by the void.
Panic flared in Kon's eyes, sharp and unguarded. It's not a fight anymore, he realized, at this rate they would be annihilated.
"This is insane!" he roared, voice breaking against the gale. The gravitational force pulled at him like unseen chains—tugging at his coat, at his thoughts, at his very soul.
He dropped to one knee, planting his blade into the earth like an anchor.
With a growl, Kon thrust his hand forward.
ARCEM: INTERIUM!!!
A radiant dome of light burst around the trio—translucent, humming with sacred energy. The air inside grew lighter, easier to breathe, but the pressure against the shield was immense. It bent and groaned like the ribs of a ship bracing for the sea.
Outside, Razik's laughter rang clear. "There's no point in resisting. You're not strong enough to withstand this."
And yet—Kon did resist. His whole body shook beneath the strain, and a bead of sweat traced the line of his jaw. His knees buckled. His claws scraped against the snow-dusted stone as he braced himself between dimensions: the safety of the shield, and the collapsing ruin of the storm outside.
Adam looked toward him, torn. "Kon—"
"Adam!" Kon barked through clenched teeth, never breaking his focus. "Take Trevor and get out of here!"
"What?! No—"
"I need to go into Grand Kaplan mode!" Kon shouted, his voice raw. "It's the only way to stop him. If you stay in this field, you'll die!"
For the first time, Adam hesitated.
He wanted to trust Kon. But the thought of leaving him, even for a moment—it cut deeper than fear. "But—"
"Do it! Now!" Kon's voice cracked, not with desperation—but command. That unshakable fire. That old general's cry.
Behind them, Trevor was scrambling, tail whipping wildly as he ducked beneath a twisting root pulled loose by the gravity. "We can't just leave you!"
"We have no time!" Kon snapped. "Get out of the field or you'll be flattened like the rest!"
Adam looked once more at the face of his friend—the tiger who had led him through war, through shadow, through all the madness of Narn's unraveling.
Then he moved.
In one clean motion, Adam grabbed Trevor and pulled him close. The air around them shimmered with his own Arcem— A blink of blue light, and the world stretched.
Then, they were gone.
A flash. A hum. And then silence.
They reappeared just beyond the reach of Razik's field, landing on the frost-covered ledge of a broken hill. The snow beneath them settled gently, as if unaware of the cataclysm below. But from their vantage, they could still see the battlefield—the Vale fractured beneath the weight of power not meant for mortals.
Trevor caught his breath, his fur singed at the edges. His voice was soft. "He stayed behind…"
Adam nodded, eyes fixed on the center of the storm. "He has to go Grand Kaplan. It's the only way."
Back within the field, Kon finally released the shield.
The barrier shattered like glass against an ocean wave.
And the moment it vanished, the full weight of Razik's Arcem struck him like a hammer. Kon's body slammed to the ground with an audible thud, the snow beneath him compacting instantly under the force. His breath left him. His limbs screamed.
But the ring on his finger pulsed.
Crimson light crawled across his form. The insignia of the Kaplan bloodline flared against his latex armor, and the hand guards began to glow. The transformation was complete—but it was slow. Slower than before.
The pressure was too great.
Every second was agony. Every breath tasted like iron and ice.
And Razik—calm, unhurried—approached. Step by step. The field parted before him like a curtain before the reaper. His eyes glowed with pitiless amusement.
"Your Arya protects you," he said, crouching just out of reach, his voice smooth as death. "But just barely."
Kon tried to rise, but his arms trembled too violently. His body was fighting its own destruction.
"You're finished, cub."
Kon's eyes fluttered. The cold reached his bones. His thoughts became scattered sparks. But somewhere in the haze of pain, he found a memory. Not of war. Not of blood.
But of laughter—childhood laughter. His father's voice.
He clenched his jaw.
___________________________________
Meanwhile, not far from the heart of the collapsing storm, another battle raged with quieter ferocity.
Adam and Trevor stood their ground against Razik's minions, the clash of force and fury unfolding beneath the frozen canopy of the Vale. Ice cracked beneath every footfall, branches snapped under the weight of conflict, and the forest echoed with snarls, shouts, and the heavy breath of beasts set to kill.
Adam moved like a phantom—his form blinking across the battlefield in a blink of light, the power of Kirin allowing him to teleport with graceful precision. Each burst of movement ended with the dull thud of a blow or the soft gasp of an enemy falling. He fought not with rage but with purpose. Efficient, focused, deadly.
Trevor, meanwhile, was a blur of limbs and laughter. Agile and uncatchable, he danced through the chaos with an ease that made the Hyena Tracients snarl in frustration. He swung from branches, flipped through the air, and dodged claw and blade with a wily grin that never quite left his face—even as sweat dripped from his brow. He moved not out of strategy, but instinct, as if his very blood knew how to evade violence.
But even in the frenzy of movement and momentum, Adam's gaze kept flickering back—to the center of the battlefield, to the storm of pressure and light, to the fading figure of Kon, pinned beneath a weight none of them fully understood.
And with every glance, a knot twisted deeper in Adam's chest.
He's dying, a voice whispered in the back of his mind. He's dying, and you're here—fighting minions like it matters.
Adam struck down another Hyena, but there was no triumph in it. Only a rising, simmering frustration. His claws clenched tight, his teeth bared. The ache of helplessness throbbed behind his ribs like a second heartbeat.
"We can't let Kon die like this," Adam growled, more to himself than to Trevor. The thought of it—the quiet courage with which Kon had stayed behind, the weight of that sacrifice—gnawed at him like a slow poison. Not again. Not another guardian. Not another brother.
Trevor swung down from the trees, landing beside him with a neat flip. The monkey's breathing was heavy, but his eyes were clear. Determined.
"We're not giving up yet," he said, voice fierce and low. There was no trace of the usual banter. Only resolve.
Adam looked at him.
Really looked.
He thought of the Great Tree. Of the glow that had gathered around Trevor when he read the ancient words. Of the surge of power that had pulsed from him, silent and fierce. It wasn't chance he was brought here, Adam thought. It was fate.
A decision unfolded inside him—not as a strategy, but a knowing. As if something older than thought had tugged at his spine and whispered, Now.
Without a word, Adam reached into the air—and from it, drew a long strip of red cloth. It shimmered faintly, as if light itself honored its form. He turned to Trevor, eyes steady.
"Put this on," he said.
Trevor blinked, surprised. "What? A headband? Now? This is hardly the time for fashion statements, Adam."
Adam didn't laugh. His voice was low. Serious. Weighty.
"It's not a game," he said. "Trust me. It's more than just a headband. Put it on."
Trevor stared at him for a long moment. Then, slowly, he took the cloth. There was something reverent in the way his fingers touched it, as though some part of him already knew what it was. The material was warm—not like fire, but like memory. Like sunlight on fur. He tied it across his brow.
Three spirals shimmered at the center.
And then the spirals began to glow.
Softly at first. Then brighter. Then brighter still.
A strange warmth flooded Trevor's chest, expanding through his limbs like the echo of a song he had never learned but somehow remembered. His tail curled reflexively. His eyes widened.
It wasn't power.
It was recognition.
The spirals thrummed with an ancient rhythm, and in his mind he saw flashes—monkeys leaping across mountaintops, staff in hand, golden laughter filling the wind. Elders chanting. A tree that reached the stars.
The warmth deepened. And then—clarity.
The words came to him as naturally as a breath.
"UNLEASH: GRAND MAYMUM."
Light erupted.
Adam had to shield his eyes. The battlefield stilled, even for a heartbeat, as if the world paused to witness what was unfolding.
When the light faded, Trevor stood transformed.
Gone was the dusty traveler with a cheeky smile. In his place stood a figure clothed in reverence—his body wrapped in a tight Spandex-like suit woven of brown and gold, glinting in the snowlight like firelight on bark. The red headband had become a golden circlet upon his brow, its ends trailing behind him like twin banners in the wind. In his hand he held a black staff, banded in radiant gold.
Trevor blinked. Then looked down at himself.
His mouth opened.
"This is amazing!" he said, his voice brimming with disbelief and bubbling joy. He spun the staff once, and it moved with a grace he hadn't known he possessed. It's like it knows me, he thought. Like it always has.
But Adam stepped forward, placing a steadying hand on his shoulder.
"Focus, Trevor," he said, though his lips curled in the faintest smile. "We need to save Kon."
Trevor nodded. He could feel it now—purpose thrumming through his limbs. This wasn't borrowed strength. It was inherited. Ancient. Right.
The monkey Tracient tightened his grip on the staff. His heart no longer trembled. It roared.
"Then let's go save him."
____________________________________
Trevor and Adam burst onto the battlefield like a sudden spring wind sweeping through the ashes of a long winter. The weight that had anchored Kon to the earth just moments ago still lingered in the air, but hope had found its feet again—and it charged on two paws and a staff.
Kon remained kneeling, half-buried in churned snow and cracked earth, his body trembling from the pressure that had moments ago nearly crushed him. His vision blurred. His limbs ached. But as Trevor stepped forward, resplendent in amber light, Kon felt that weight—both physical and unseen—begin to lift.
Razik turned at the sound of their arrival, and for the first time in a long while, uncertainty carved its way across his face. His eyes narrowed, his cloak swirling around him like smoke. He had not expected this. Another transformation? Another force he could not account for?
"Another transformation?" Razik growled, the words a snarl of disbelief and growing dread. "What is this?"
Trevor's grin was wide and irreverent, as though he hadn't just stepped into the presence of the deadliest enemy in Narn. His staff spun in his hand like it had always belonged there, responding with fluid grace to every movement. The headband-turned-circlet shimmered in the dim stormlight.
"This," Trevor said, his voice filled with a delight that was almost mocking, "is the Grand Maymum. The power of the Monkey Arya."
He dropped into a low stance, the golden trails of his circlet fluttering like banners behind him.
"And now," he added, "it's time for you to chop some stick!"
It was a phrase said with such unshakable cheer that it could only have come from Trevor—and yet, even Kon felt the shift in the air. It was not just jest. There was something deeper beneath the playfulness. Something ancient, awake, and watching through Trevor's eyes.
Razik's features contorted into something foul, something primal. "You insolent fool!" he barked. "No transformation can stop the inevitable. The pull of Albedo will crush you just like the others!" His voice surged with arrogance, and as if to prove it, he extended his hands and widened the gravitational field around him.
The air thickened.
The trees groaned.
Rocks split in place.
Snow spiraled unnaturally toward him, pulled not by wind but by an invisible force that threatened to rip the very skin from the earth.
Adam watched in alarm as the radius of destruction expanded again—enclosing where Kon still crouched, and closer now to where Trevor stood, mere steps from its edge.
But Trevor… wasn't moving.
He simply closed his eyes.
And breathed.
The edge of the gravitational field whipped at his fur. The pull clawed at his legs. But Trevor stood rooted like a mountain grown from the heart of the world.
Then, in a voice calm and low, he spoke.
"KARGASA."
The word left his lips like a note in a sacred song, and at once, the world responded.
The weight vanished.
The howling of gravity gave way to utter stillness.
The battlefield exhaled.
Where moments ago pressure and despair had ruled, a soft wind now rustled through the trees. The snow settled. The trembling earth quieted.
And all around them, as if summoned by the breath of a gentler world, flowers began to bloom. Dozens. Then hundreds. Violet, crimson, blue, and gold. They rose from the scarred ground, defying the frost, rebuking the violence that had tried to claim this place.
Kon blinked in disbelief. He pushed himself upright, strength returning to his limbs like a second heartbeat. He turned his gaze to Trevor.
*What did you do?*
Razik stumbled back, the certainty in his face draining like color from stone. "What… what is this?!" he hissed, fury giving way to fear. "How did you disrupt my Arcem?!"
Trevor turned to him, smirking. The flowers brushed against his feet as he walked forward, golden armor glinting like the rising sun. "This," he said, spinning his staff once more, "is the power of Derision—the Monkey Arya. The power to disrupt and nullify any phenomenon I choose."
He pointed the staff at Razik, whose mouth hung slightly open, unable to reconcile what he was seeing.
"Your gravitational tricks?" Trevor tilted his head. "Useless."
Razik's face twisted. The rage returned like thunder. His hands clenched, trembling with impotent wrath.
"You think this will save you?!" he bellowed, his voice ragged with desperation. "I'll crush you all the same!"
"You're welcome to try," Trevor quipped, and with a sharp twist of his wrist, he slammed his staff into the earth.
A ring of fire erupted from its point of impact—controlled, focused, alive. The gold bands along the black wood of the staff pulsed with burning light, and Trevor grinned. His Arcem had joined the fray.
"ARCEM: ELEMI!"
The flames danced in his wake as he dashed forward, a comet of laughter and fire. He swung his staff in a wide arc, flames trailing behind it like a ribbon of stars.
Razik, caught off guard, barely managed to summon a barrier of dark Mana in time. Trevor's staff crashed into it with a boom that echoed across the Vale, sending sparks flying. Razik was thrown backward, his heels carving trenches in the ground.
And then Kon moved.
Freed from the pressure, his body surged with the strength of his lineage. Twin swords, now glowing with the Aryan energy of the Tiger, flashed to life in his hands. He charged across the field, joining Trevor at Razik's flank.
Trevor's strikes were chaotic but clever—unpredictable and disorienting.
Kon's were precise and brutal.
Together, they were balance.
Razik staggered under the combined onslaught, fending off strikes with the frantic edge of a predator who had suddenly found himself prey. His confidence was gone. His movements grew erratic. He was strong, yes—but now, he was outnumbered and overwhelmed.
And he knew it.
A low growl rumbled in his throat. His body radiated dark energy. His eyes, wild and bloodshot, locked on Trevor first, then Kon.
Then he snarled.
"No… No, this isn't over."
He slammed both fists into the ground.
A shockwave exploded outward—raw force, no finesse. It threw the duo back just far enough for him to make his move. He vanished into a swirl of black energy, like a shadow curling into itself and blinking out of reality.
Gone.
Just like that.
Silence followed.
Only the whisper of the wind and the soft rustle of flowers remained.
Adam joined the others slowly, his breath catching in his throat as he took in the scene. The scorched ground. The singed cloak of Razik left behind in a heap. The unshaken figures of Kon and Trevor standing in the center of it all.
Kon exhaled, sheathing his swords.
Trevor tapped his staff against the ground and blew a small puff of hair from his eyes.
"...Well, that wasn't too bad," Trevor muttered.
For a moment, there was only silence.
Not the kind of silence that follows calamity, nor the brittle silence of fear. No—this was different. It was the hush of a world catching its breath after a great tremor, the exhale after the holding of a breath too long held. The breeze from Trevor's Arcem still whispered through the field, gentle and warm, as if the land itself had witnessed their stand and now offered thanks in the only language it could: peace.
Trevor stood with his staff still aglow, his grin so wide it looked like it might lift him off the ground. His heart thundered with the aftershock of power. His limbs buzzed with the final flickers of the Grand Maymum's might. Victory was still warm in his veins.
He threw his head back and let out a triumphant laugh. "Did you see that?!" he cried, spinning his staff in a circle above him like a victory banner. "I sent him running! We completely wiped the floor with him!"
Adam chuckled under his breath, still a few steps behind. Even with the battle over, his eyes hadn't left the spot where Razik had vanished. His thoughts churned beneath the surface like a quiet sea. *Too easy,* he thought. Too fast. He was holding back something. Or saving something. Razik never fights without a plan.
But he said nothing. Not yet.
Kon, still clad in the shimmering armor of his Grand Kaplan form, stepped forward. His expression was unreadable—flat and unreadable in a way that meant, for Kon, everything was happening beneath the surface. He didn't match Trevor's joy. Didn't echo it. He simply approached, sheathing his twin blades in a smooth, practiced motion, and spoke.
"Where did you get that Arya?"
Trevor's excitement stalled like a wind choked in the throat of a flute. His hands tightened on the staff reflexively, his golden circlet glinting faintly in the post-battle light.
"Huh?" he blinked, lowering the weapon slightly. "What, this? The headband?"
Kon's tone remained even, but firmer now. "The Arya of Derision… where did it come from?"
Trevor glanced down at the black and gold staff, as if seeing it for the first time again. The same warmth still coursed through him—steady now, like a heartbeat that had found its rhythm. That single word—Kargasa—still echoed faintly in his thoughts, its power lingering like the scent of rain on dry stone. He had known the word without ever learning it. And that frightened him, a little.
"Uh… well," he said awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck, "Adam gave it to me."
That made both Kon's ears twitch. Slowly, deliberately, he turned to face Adam. His golden eyes narrowed into sharp slits beneath his feline brow. The armor of his transformation still shimmered across his frame, but the posture was no longer battle-ready. It was inquisitive. Measured. Dangerous, in its quietness.
"Adam," he said, arms folding across his chest, "you've got a lot of explaining to do."
Adam didn't flinch.
He met Kon's gaze evenly, letting the silence between them stretch like drawn wire. The wind picked up again, rustling the newly grown field of flowers that spread all around them—vivid and soft, born from the power of an Arcem few even believed still existed.