Her hand caught my blade mid-swing and, with impossible strength, hurled me backward.
In the next instant, the battlefield dissolved, replaced by an alien horizon, jagged mountains rising over silver oceans beneath a sky of fractured glass.
The air itself felt foreign.
Annoying. I couldn't sense him anymore. This wasn't just another planet; it was an entirely different world.
"Hey," she said, her tone calm yet cutting, her gaze sharp enough to pierce through thought. "I'm not one to save sleeping men, but I must ask… why?"
Her voice carried a strange curiosity, almost sincere. Truth be told, I didn't want to fight her. Makilah was one of the few I wasn't sure I could ever defeat.
"I want power," I said simply. "I want to grow into the absolute strongest."
She tilted her head, a faint, knowing smile ghosting across her lips. "And afterwards?"
I raised my sword toward the burning sky and laughed quietly. "I will kill God."
Makilah froze. For a heartbeat, disbelief crossed her face, as if I had just uttered the most absurd ambition imaginable.
Then her expression shifted, her smile widened, cruel, wild, filled with the promise of ruin.
"Before that," she murmured, her voice low and deliberate, "you can try to kill me."
"Shit."
I formed my rib-cage armor, bones wrapping around me like a living fortress.
But she shattered it in an instant, a single, fluid strike of her fist sent me hurtling skyward.
I barely caught my breath before retaliating.
I thrust my hand down and conjured a colossal wind serpent, it howled toward her, slicing the air, but Makilah dispelled it with a lazy wave.
Then lightning burst from her mouth, too fast for even sight to follow. It struck me head-on, blinding pain ripping through my nerves.
Three more bolts followed in rapid succession, each one faster, heavier, crueler.
When my vision cleared, she hovered above me, palm raised. "You expect to kill God with this?"
Her hand closed into a fist, and agony tore through every vein and bone in my body. I felt myself unravel under the sheer pressure of her power.
Using the brief opening her arrogance granted me, I reached for her life force.
Vitality surged from her body into mine, her once-peaceful form faltering, trembling as her eyes widened in disbelief.
"Hm," she breathed, almost amused. "Being on the receiving end of my own power… how irritating."
I laughed, reckless and hoarse. "Yeah, it is!"
We met again, steel against steel. Her sword moved like a natural disaster given shape: precise as lightning, violent as an earthquake, relentless as a storm.
Every strike carried the weight of a collapsing world.
I unleashed everything I could muster, arcs of slicing wind and potent beams of light.
However, her radiant beams of light, torrents of scalding water, shards of sharpened earth.
As a result, Makilah had countered all my spells.
The elements bent to her will, not mine; she commanded them like the birthright of a god.
Her sword came down like a comet. I barely blocked, my arms shaking under the impact.
Summoning the remnants of my mana, I called forth the skeletal form of Hastur, what remained of him, at least.
The serpent half had long been lost.
The colossal frame emerged, bones glinting like silver chains, and lunged forward, seizing Makilah in its bony grasp before hurling her skyward.
I drove my spear into her chest, the one we had once used together so carelessly.
Space itself twisted, shattering into a storm of splintered light as she was flung across the desolate world.
Falling to my knees, I exhaled, sweat and blood mixing on my lips. "I'll… need a moment to rest," I muttered, exhaustion thick in my voice. "Getting back shouldn't be too hard."
Then a voice cut through the silence, soft, mocking. "Don't tell me you still haven't mastered dimensional travel."
My blood ran cold. I rolled aside just as her sword pierced the ground where I had been lying.
I sprang to my feet, raising my blade as Makilah pulled herself free from the rubble.
Dust and divine light shimmered across her as she smiled.
"Come now, Nicole," she teased. "Surely you didn't think an attack like that could put me down?"
I gritted my teeth. I couldn't waste too much energy.
Mirabel would awaken soon from Nicholas's spell, and if Nicholas himself stirred, my single chance would vanish.
"Fine!" I roared. "Then I'll unleash my most powerful spell!"
Makilah smirked, letting her sword fall, arms open as if inviting an embrace. "Come. Let me witness it, bask in its glory, bathe in its grace."
I drew in a deep breath, one that trembled through the fabric of time itself.
A small orb of pure white light began to form between my hands, encased in skeletal fingers of shimmering bone.
It pulsed softly, beautiful and horrifying, a dying star trapped in crystal. It drank the last drops of my mana until I stood hollow, emptied.
"This is White Death," I declared, voice echoing across the void.
"The hand that holds your very being, the hand that will slaughter all!"
The orb flew straight into her chest.
And vanished. Makilah then exhaled lightly, closing her arms.
An invisible force crushed me where I stood, shattering bone and spirit alike. I couldn't even scream; my vocal cords had been destroyed.
I hit the ground hard, choking on blood as she placed her foot gently on my throat, leaning with an almost affectionate smirk.
"That could have been a disaster," she said softly. "Fortunately, I can reduce all phenomena to nothing."
Tears of laughter streaked her face as she looked up to the heavens. "That name… what did that bastard call me again?"
Her smile widened, radiant and terrifying. "Ah, yes. Empress of Disaster, Clades."
The words echoed like a death knell. The worst possible outcome had come to pass.
Blood gushed from my mouth as I forced a weak laugh.
There was still someone I had to reach. Someone I had to kill.
I let the pain consume me, embracing it fully. Through that agony, something ancient stirred, envy, not of a person or life, but of existence itself.
How could the world stand there with such beauty, such power, such infinite vastness, while I remained so small?
Countless timelines. Endless planets. Infinite layers of reality. Too much for any single being to hold.
And so I wished to become it.
The thought alone made the air tremble. My body convulsed as space collapsed inward, reality folding over itself.
The world bent to my envy, my desire, my will. I became the center, and the cage.
Makilah's expression twisted with fury as the world sealed around her. "Don't be too happy," she hissed through the tightening void. "I give it a minute. Better hurry."
Then she was gone, swallowed by the imploding world.
I staggered, flickering through dimensions until my feet struck familiar ground. Cracks spread along my fingers like fractured porcelain. I shouldn't have made it this far.
She'd given me a minute. I had expected a second. Mercy? No, cruelty disguised as grace.
I stumbled toward Nicholas's sleeping form.
Then his eyes opened.
"Nicole?" His voice was dry, distant. "I see… so this is it. The result of your efforts. You mean to kill me, don't you?"
I pressed my sword to his neck. His aura flooded the air, endless, suffocating. It could erase me with a mere thought.
But I didn't falter. I held my ground through sheer will.
Cracks webbed across his skin like a shattered mirror. He was dying already. Allowing me this moment was his final mercy.
"I wish not only to kill you, brother," I said, voice trembling, "but the angels, the saved… I wish to kill even God."
Nicholas looked up at me, his gaze full of sorrow and strange affection. His hand rose, cupping my face despite the blood running down his neck.
"My beloved elder sister," he whispered, smiling faintly, "it feels as though our roles have reversed. You're the one who seeks salvation now."
Tears welled up, burning. I had devoured an entire world and crushed Makilah within it, yet I was still unprepared. Still incomplete.
I laughed bitterly through the tears. "No! Don't say things like that!" I screamed. "Don't pity me! Curse me! Strike me! Forget me if you must, but don't give me words of mercy!"
His strength faltered, his breath slowing. "Forget… yes," he murmured. "I was always good at forgetting what hurt too much to remember."
He chuckled weakly as my sword pressed deeper. "This is my end, Nicole. Take care of Mirabel. She'll grieve."
I froze. Couldn't he feel them? His children, his wife, the ones he'd sworn to protect?
No… of course not. He hadn't been there when Mirabel sealed herself and the others inside that barrier around Anstalionah.
I had gone only to reclaim this sword from the treasury, and found them wandering the halls like ghosts.
A hysterical laugh tore from my throat, mixing with tears. "Damn it, Nicholas! Can't you see it?"
My sword slipped from my hand, clattering against the ground. I fell backward, weeping harder than I ever had before.
"I'm so… jealous of you."
He blinked, his fading eyes soft. "What did you say? I couldn't hear."
I slammed my fist into the earth, my voice raw with grief. "I'm jealous of you, brother!"