The air above Virelia burned and bent.
Kaelen and the lich stood facing each other across shattered ground, both breathing hard—if the lich could even be said to breathe. Mana leaked from cracked spell circles like bleeding veins. Kaelen's wings twitched, heavy now, his dragonic form dimmer, scales dulled by exhaustion.
They had reached the end.
No grand declarations. No theatrics.
Just two beings who had pushed themselves to the brink.
The lich raised its staff again—its magic slower now, less refined—but Kaelen didn't give it the space. He stepped forward, gravity snapping beneath his feet, and the distance vanished.
Steel met bone.
Axiomfall clashed with the lich's reinforced arm, sparks of distorted time scattering like shattered mirrors. The lich retaliated with a brutal backhand infused with spellwork—but Kaelen rolled with it, pivoting just enough to let the blow slide past his ribs instead of crushing them.
They collided again.
This time, Kaelen let go of the sword.
The lich's hollow eyes widened for a fraction of a second—too late.
Kaelen drove his fist forward.
Not with raw strength.
With time and gravity woven into the strike.
The punch landed square in the lich's chest, and the space around it collapsed inward, tearing apart layers of magic and bone simultaneously. The impact didn't explode—it erased.
The lich screeched as part of its torso vanished, unable to regenerate.
Kaelen didn't stop.
He stepped inside the lich's guard, close—too close for spells.
A knee to the ribs.
An elbow to the jaw.
A twisting palm strike to the sternum.
Each blow was coated in chronal severance and gravitational pressure, ripping pieces of the lich away from causality itself. Whatever Kaelen struck could never return, never be healed, never be summoned back.
"You—!" the lich snarled, trying to form a spell with shaking hands.
Kaelen caught the wrist.
Crushed it.
The bones shattered like chalk.
"You talk too much," Kaelen said quietly.
The lich lunged in desperation, claws tearing into Kaelen's shoulder, but Kaelen didn't flinch. He pulled the lich in and drove his forehead into its skull—a dragon's strength behind it.
The crack echoed like thunder.
The lich staggered.
Kaelen spun behind it, wrapped his arms around its chest, and drove gravity inward, compressing everything toward a single point.
"End."
With a final surge, Kaelen tore out the lich's core with his bare hands.
The crystal heart shattered.
The lich's body froze mid-motion.
Then it began to disintegrate—bone unraveling into ash, robes collapsing into nothing, its skull cracking and falling apart last.
Silence fell.
Kaelen released his dragon transformation.
The wings dissolved into light.
The horns faded.
The scales receded.
He dropped to one knee, breathing heavily, the world spinning.
Above him—
A helicopter hovered.
Cameras pointed down.
Live broadcast.
The world was watching.
Somewhere far away, in a quiet home, a woman stared at the screen with shaking hands.
"…That's our son," she whispered, tears falling freely.
Her husband swallowed hard. "He… he became a hero."
Kaelen looked up, noticed the camera, and laughed weakly.
"Man… figures," he muttered.
And then his strength gave out.
He fell forward—unconscious.
The world didn't see what happened next.
The lich's skull twitched on the ground, faint magic gathering—one last spell forming in desperation.
A shadow fell over it.
A pair of boots touched the ground silently.
A voice spoke—calm, unimpressed.
"Now, now," the voice said, "don't try something so stupid."
The lich's hollow eyes widened.
Standing over it was a man in a black suit and white mask.
Only the lich could see him.
Only the lich could feel him.
Fear—true, instinctive fear—flooded what remained of its mind.
"You—what are you—" it tried to speak.
John tilted his head slightly.
"He finally set the stage for his future by defeating you," John said casually. "Can't you accept your L, you pile of bones?"
The lich trembled.
John raised his foot.
And crushed its skull.
Gone.
Not a trace left behind.
John glanced at Kaelen, unconscious but alive, and smiled faintly.
"Good job, kid."
Then he vanished—like he was never there.
And across the world, the name Kaelen Veystrum began to spread.
The era had its hero.
And the world had finally seen him.