The void had teeth.
Every pull from the First Ring-Bearer's presence gnawed at reality itself, dragging platforms, fragments, even light into its orbit. Its shattered rings spun uneven, grinding against one another like broken gears—but each rotation birthed a wave of annihilation that threatened to strip Vemy bare.
His Prismarine wings stuttered, shedding feathers of glass and fire into the pull. Every shard that left him screamed, alive with his defiance, but even that song was breaking apart.
[Warning: Prismarine Stability Falling.]
[Core Resonance: Critical.]
Vemy spat blood into the void and steadied his spear. "So this is what the Warden was hiding. Not balance. Not order. Just another chain."
The First Ring-Bearer's voice echoed, jagged and layered, as if spoken through countless fractured throats.
"I am not chain.
I am the origin.
The one who bore the first cycle.
The ring that held infinity still."
A halo spun loose from its frame, unraveling into a storm of spirals that stretched across the abyss. Every line of light cut deeper than any blade, carving fissures into the void itself.
Akiar, clinging to a shard of broken reality, shielded his eyes as lightning sparked wild from his hands.
"Vemy! That thing's feeding on the Ring's break—it's using your defiance to stabilize itself!"
Vemy's teeth clenched. The Ring of Defiance had shattered to give him strength—but the shards weren't just his. They were bleeding into this… thing.
The First Ring-Bearer raised its hand, pulling a fragment of halo into a blade of raw voidlight. It pulsed, each thrum strong enough to shake Vemy's bones apart.
"Defiance is fuel. Your shard burns bright.
So I will consume it.
And you."
The abyss convulsed as the blade came down—too fast, too absolute.
But Vemy moved faster.
The shards orbiting him screamed in unison, flaring into streams of meteoric fire. His spear fractured into dozens of mirrored weapons, each one trailing Prismarine light as he hurled them forward.
[Prismarine Override: Fragment Arsenal Deployed.]
Glass and fire met void and eternity. The explosion twisted sound into silence, silence into thunder.
Through it all, Vemy roared, voice ragged but unyielding:
"You don't get to rewrite me.
You don't get to take what's mine!"
The clash ripped another fracture into the abyss, jagged and yawning, spilling light and shadow in equal measure.
And deep within that fracture—
something stirred.
Not the god. Not the shards. Something older. Something waiting.
The abyss trembled as if aware of it.
And then—silence.