The world moved again.
Days passed though time no longer passed the same for Kael.
From his throne beyond time, Kael watched the threads of destiny like a weaver at a loom. His eyes no longer saw just the present, but every possibility that danced beside it each choice a ripple, each ripple a world.
He wasn't a god. He had refused that title. But he was something else now.
A balance between light and void. Between time and the Abyss.
And something… was wrong.
Kael opened his hand, and reality obeyed. A vision bloomed in the air: the world below. Peaceful, for now. Lyra teaching orphaned warlocks how to read star-runes. Valen rebuilding the Skybound Archive. Nations trying to unite.
But at the edges where time faded and existence grew thin something moved.
"Do you feel it?" came a voice. One Kael hadn't heard in a long time.
He turned, slowly.
A man stepped out of the shadows behind the throne. His face was familiar Kael's face. But older. Tired. Wearing black armor that shimmered like dying stars.
"You're… me," Kael said, tightening his grip on his sword's hilt.
"I'm one of you," the man answered calmly. "One version. A future that was then wasn't."
"Impossible. Chronovain is dead. The timelines are stable."
The man smiled grimly. "Chronovain was a wound. But what he opened… didn't vanish. It awakened something. Something deeper than time. Something that existed before reality understood itself."
Kael stared. "The Abyss?"
"No." The man pointed upward.
And Kael saw it not through his eyes, but through the Core's connection.
A shape, vast and slow-moving. Slithering outside the walls of creation. Watching.
"It's called the Endbringer," the future-Kael whispered. "It doesn't devour like the Abyss. It doesn't reshape like Time. It simply... ends. Stories. Realms. Gods."
Kael narrowed his eyes. "And it's coming?"
The man nodded. "Across every version of us, in every future I've seen, it comes. And only one Kael stands a chance at stopping it."
Kael stepped off his throne, cloak sweeping the stars.
"Then tell me how."
The future-Kael looked at him with pride, and sorrow. "You'll need more than the Abyss. More than Time. You'll need to gather every fragment of yourself every piece of power you rejected. Every self that could've been."
Kael's brow furrowed. "You mean... I have to unite my multiverse echoes."
"Yes. All of them. The tyrant. The savior. The coward. The conqueror. Every Kael that ever was."
Kael's jaw tightened. "Then I'll find them."
The future-Kael started to fade. "Be warned. Some will not want to join you. Some will want to replace you. And the Endbringer… it already knows your name."
Kael watched him disappear into light.
He stood alone again but the stillness had gone.
Because far beyond the stars…
Something ancient had begun to stir.
And Kael would need more than fate to survive what was coming.
He'd need himself. All of them.