The Expansion Core loomed before them—a sphere larger than a planet, suspended at the edge of realspace and the Time Abyss. It pulsed with energy so vast that gravity bent sideways around it. This was Biggenator's fortress. His throne. The birthplace of the Expansion that had consumed countless worlds, rewritten countless fates.
Kaien floated toward it with the others in tow. No ships, no barriers. The fused sparks within him now stabilized his form even in the outer folds of warped spacetime.
Mirra spoke through the telelink, voice quiet. "We don't even know what's waiting inside."
Kaien didn't answer. He already knew.
It wasn't an army.
It was him.
The Core's surface opened for them like a blooming flower of light and metal. Inside, the architecture didn't follow geometry—it spiraled upward in logic-defying angles, where rooms led to memories and halls stretched across dreams. It was part machine, part memory, part will.
A voice echoed through every molecule.
"Welcome, Kaien.My successor.My mistake."
Biggenator.
His voice was calm. Grand. Larger than emotion.
Kaien landed inside the heart of the Core.
The others held back.
He walked alone through the great corridor, flanked by memory statues—fragments of what Biggenator had consumed. He saw Elion, locked in crystal. Lyra's old form. Even a version of himself—twisted, broken, kneeling.
At the end of the path stood Biggenator.
He was no longer human. If he ever had been. He wore a form forged from expansion itself—constantly shifting, adapting, growing. His skin shimmered with galaxies. His eyes were black holes ringed in fire.
And yet his face was familiar.
Kaien stopped a dozen steps away.
"This ends now," he said.
Biggenator laughed.
"Does it? Tell me, wielder of all three sparks—what will you end? Expansion? Time? Yourself?"
Kaien ignited the sparks.
Light burst from him in spirals—gold, white, and silver-blue. Time stilled. The Core trembled. But Biggenator didn't flinch.
"Impressive," the villain said. "But still blind. You think I want to destroy time?"
He stepped forward, slow.
"I want to free it."
Kaien narrowed his eyes. "From what?"
"From fate. From the Loop. From the Eternal Return."
Biggenator gestured, and the Core walls split open, revealing an endless swirl of timelines, constantly repeating. Worlds reborn. Wars replayed. Death and love recycled across dimensions.
"This is your legacy," Biggenator said. "This is what Elion protected. A prison."
Kaien's sparks pulsed uncertainly.
"You lie," he said.
Biggenator leaned close. "Then why does every timeline end with war? Why did Elion seal the sparks—if not to preserve the cycle?"
Kaien wavered.
Then remembered Mirra's words. Gorran's sacrifice. Lyra's return from corruption. The hope he'd seen in their eyes.
"No," he whispered. "This world can change."
Biggenator grinned.
"Then show me."
They clashed.
The explosion of force rocked the Core. Outside, fragments of the Expansion curled and withered, sucked into the gravity well of their power.
Kaien met Biggenator's fist with his own, and the resulting shockwave tore a hole in the walls of time. Through it, Mirra and the others watched a million versions of Kaien fighting and losing. Being broken. Consumed.
But this Kaien—their Kaien—was different.
Because he carried the final spark.
The spark of memory.
Every blow Biggenator struck, Kaien remembered. He used past failures as momentum. He turned past defeats into new strategies. And still, Biggenator grew.
"Fool!" the villain roared. "You expand nothing! You limit yourself with memory!"
Kaien bled, stumbling back.
"Maybe," he said, spitting red onto the Core floor. "But I'm not alone."
The sparks in him resonated with distant calls—Mirra's pulse shield, Lyra's battle cry, even Gorran's roar from behind enemy lines. They were with him, across time.
And from the dust of a forgotten chamber, something stirred.
A final voice.
"Kaien…"
Elion.
He appeared as light—a holographic echo, but more alive than ever.
Kaien collapsed to one knee, exhausted. Biggenator prepared the final strike.
But Elion's voice reached into the center of Kaien's soul.
"You're not meant to win alone. You're meant to choose."
Kaien looked up, tears streaming.
"What do I choose?"
"To become what I could never be."
Kaien stood.
The three sparks floated from his chest.
He looked at Biggenator—and forgave him.
The villain froze. "What are you doing?"
"I'm not ending you," Kaien said. "I'm ending this cycle."
He opened his arms.
The sparks fused together, not as weapons, but as a single seed.
A core of creation.
Kaien let go of himself.
He let go of Elion.
Of vengeance.
Of memory.
He became the Catalyst.
The Expansion Core imploded.
But not in destruction.
In restoration.
A wave of temporal equilibrium flooded the multiverse. Realities were no longer chained to inevitable war. Timelines no longer looped to pain. Memory and gravity realigned.
The Expansion was undone.
Biggenator, caught in the center of the collapse, reached toward Kaien—not to strike, but in awe.
And in the final moment, Kaien whispered:
"Be small again."
Biggenator vanished.
The moon shuddered.
The palace trembled.
Mirra, Lyra, and Gorran ran to the Core—but it was gone.
In its place, a single boy stood barefoot in the starlight.
Eyes gold with memory.
Hands glowing with renewal.
Kaien was gone.
But his legacy remained.
---
Years passed.
The Expansion never returned.
The multiverse healed.
And from the ruins of the old world, a new order arose—not one of control, but of balance.
At its center was a woman in a long coat, holding a time-weaver staff and a pendant shaped like a spiral flame.
Her name was Lyra.
She stood on a rebuilt moon, looking out across the restored worlds, as a child ran up beside her.
The boy's eyes sparkled.
"Tell me again," he said. "About Kaien."
Lyra smiled.
"No," she said softly. "This time, you'll tell me."
She handed him the spark.
And a new spiral began.