The clash had no pause.
Steel rang against steel, sparks flying as Kaelen's sunforged blade met the dark shimmer of Elian's staff. Shadows bled from the cracks of each impact, curling like smoke only to be burned away in a flare of light. Lyra stumbled back into the fray despite the blood running down her face, her dagger flashing in her trembling grip.
The ruined temple trembled with every strike. Dust poured from the ceiling in gritty veils. Mosaic stars—once glittering depictions of the heavens—splintered beneath their boots. The ground itself seemed to recoil at the violence.
Kaelen pressed forward, relentless. His breath came ragged, but his strikes were merciless, measured, driven by oath and fury. Every motion was a denial of the doubt clawing at his heart. He would not falter. He could not falter. Not before the void. Not before this heretic.
"You don't see it," he snarled, his sword crashing down in a brutal arc. "You are the corruption. Every breath you take poisons this world!"
Elian caught the blow on his staff, knees buckling as the force rattled through his bones. The void surged inside him at the contact, urging him to let it spill free, to drown Kaelen in shadow and end the struggle in one strike. His arms shook with restraint. His teeth ground against the words whispered in his skull.
Why fight? the void crooned. He will kill you. She will fall beside you. Let me claim the burden. I will carve him open. I will give you peace.
"No," Elian hissed through gritted teeth, his lips cracked, his voice raw. "Not you. Not ever."
Kaelen shoved him back, dust clouding between them. He stalked forward, blade alight, eyes burning with conviction. Yet beneath that fire—something else. Fear.
Lyra's dagger lashed out from the side, forcing Kaelen to pivot. The blade scraped across his armor, scoring it but not piercing. He slammed his gauntleted fist into her stomach and sent her staggering.
"Stay down," he barked, though his voice wavered.
Lyra coughed, blood flecking her lips, and forced herself upright again. "Not… a chance." Her grin was wild, defiant. She moved with the reckless strength of someone who had nothing left to lose. Her dagger flashed again, buying Elian a heartbeat of air.
The temple groaned. A low, grinding moan that made the hairs rise on their arms. A fissure split across the floor, cutting through the star mosaics. Faint voidlight glimmered below, sickly and wrong, as if something beneath the ruins had awakened.
The walls cracked in answer. A rain of dust descended, choking the air. From above, shards of stone rained down, clattering across the floor like broken teeth.
Kaelen drove forward regardless, his blade a burning arc in the haze. He fought not only Elian, but the creeping sense that this entire place wanted to devour them all.
"Kaelen!" Elian shouted through the roar of falling stone. "Listen to me! If you kill me now, you'll damn us all—"
The knight's sword silenced the words, a strike so fierce Elian barely brought his staff up in time. The impact rattled his arms to the shoulder, sparks and shadows bursting outward. He staggered, coughing on dust, blinded.
Lyra hurled herself between them, dagger raised. Kaelen's blade glanced off it and she was knocked sprawling, rolling across the cracked marble.
The ground lurched again.
A section of ceiling split with a sound like the world tearing open. A massive slab plummeted toward them. Elian dove aside, pulling Lyra with him. Kaelen leapt back, the stone crashing between them with earth-shaking force. Fragments exploded outward, cutting their skin in a storm of razor-edged debris.
The battle ground was no longer just against each other. The temple itself was their enemy now.
Yes, the void whispered, gleeful. Let it all collapse. Let it bury the knight. Let it crush the pirate. Let it grind every oath, every hope, into dust. Only you will remain. Only you and I.
Elian clutched his staff tighter, veins bulging in his temples as he forced the voice back down. "I'm not yours," he growled, though the words trembled.
Kaelen emerged from the dust, blood trickling down his brow, his armor cracked. His sword blazed like a brand against the growing dark. He limped, but his eyes were fixed, unrelenting.
"You're already his," Kaelen rasped, leveling the blade at Elian's chest. "You just don't have the courage to admit it."
Elian's heart pounded. His arms shook. Lyra's hand brushed his shoulder, grounding him, steadying him even as her own body trembled.
"Then kill me," Elian said, voice raw. "But know this—if you do, you'll be nothing but the Umbra's blade."
The words struck harder than his staff ever could. Kaelen faltered, his breath catching. His oath wavered in the storm of collapsing stone. His grip on the sword tightened, as though crushing the doubt within his palm.
The temple screamed.
The central dome split with a deafening crack. Fractures raced across it like lightning. Chunks the size of carriages plummeted. The floor gave way in sections, swallowing mosaics into a chasm of voidlit dark.
Lyra shoved Elian aside as a pillar toppled, shattering where he had stood. Kaelen ducked beneath another, the rubble smashing around him.
It was no longer a fight. It was a scramble for survival amid falling ruin.
Elian swung his staff not at Kaelen, but at a collapsing arch, knocking debris away as he dragged Lyra through choking dust. Kaelen hacked apart tumbling beams with sweeps of his sword, each strike ringing louder than the last.
But still they fought—blades flashing even as the roof gave way above them. Neither willing to yield. Neither willing to let go.
The dome thundered. With a final groan, it collapsed entirely.
Stone rained in an avalanche. Dust consumed all light. The roar drowned their cries.
Elian glimpsed Kaelen's eyes one last time—wild, desperate, human—before the storm swallowed them. Lyra's hand was torn from his. The world became dust and ruin.
And then—silence.