There was no sky there.
No ground either.
Fenra stepped on fragments of reality floating in a void made of echoes and temporal distortions. Fragments of broken times, pieces of futures that never happened and pasts that had collapsed. It was a domain between realities, born from the collapse of two temporal forces that should never have coexisted.
Here, time obeyed no rules.
And so, it bled.
In this space, temporal abilities, teleportation, or usual distortions were flawed, unpredictable—making every second a pure battlefield. Body, mind, and will would be the only reliable resources.
Fenra felt the heat of something ancient in the air. Something of her own.
She had always known.
From the moment she opened her eyes in this world, from when she discovered her mixed heritage, from when she felt that presence... She had always known.
A wrong force. A distortion. Something that simply should not exist, but was there. Always there. As if reality were bending, supporting something trying to break it from the inside out.
This thing now had a name. And a body.
Vernasha.
The woman standing before her did not seem grand. But every inch of her presence created cracks in what remained of that place's sanity. She smiled, like a child who had just fooled her parents.
— Of all the stages of the plan — Vernasha said, her voice too soft — the only one I could never predict perfectly... was you.
Fenra kept her breathing steady, eyes fixed. The silence between them was a war of wills.
— The cosmic balancing factor... — Vernasha continued. — Something the universe creates to counterbalance an anomaly like me. I never knew the form, nor the time it would appear. But now... here you are.
She spread her arms as if welcoming a revelation. Her smile was that of an entity satisfied with its own prophecy.
— Congratulations, Fenra. You are going to be part of something very big... soon.
Fenra raised an eyebrow, a brief laugh escaping her lips.
— If you're not stupid — she said — you've already understood that, to complete what you want... you'll have to go through me.
She walked slowly, firmly, as if her words were blades.
— And that makes me the only thing that truly prevents you from winning. The part of your plan you yourself admitted you couldn't predict. In other words...
She stopped, her smile now vanishing.
— ...I am the most likely one to kill you. And you know that.
Vernasha's smile wavered.
— Mei told me about you. — Fenra continued. — Spoke your name as if spitting venom. Told me how you hide behind others, behind strategy, behind cowardice.
Vernasha, however, laughed loudly, like a teenager hearing a fun secret.
— Ahhh, Miss Strongest talked about me? How cute! I didn't know I was so famous!
Fenra responded with a cold laugh, short as a blade leaving its sheath.
— Famous for being a coward. For never showing your face when it matters. But look at that... from what you said, I can assume: I am a variable you don't control. An error on your board.
She then clenched her fists.
— And you know our abilities cancel each other out. Here, now... you have nowhere to run. You'll be lucky if you've trained even half as much as I have in real combat.
Vernasha's smile was now empty. There was no more laughter—just a silent acknowledgment.
— You are right — she said, in an almost admiring tone. — This is the most dangerous part of the plan. But also... the most necessary.
The atmosphere changed. Fenra felt it. An emotional gravity took hold of the space, as if the void stopped breathing.
— So... — Fenra narrowed her eyes. — What is your real objective?
Vernasha stared at her.
— To bring the Abyss back to the surface? Just that?
The laughter ceased completely. Vernasha looked down for a moment and, raising her face, her eyes shone like golden, millennial suns.
A gaze that was not human.
— Since it's you... — she began — I think I can show a few of my cards.
A shiver ran down Fenra's spine, but she refused to look away. She was facing a living enigma. Something that breathed a truth older than time.
— Imagine yourself... wandering the cosmos. Not as a body. But as an energy. Pure. Free. Alongside other presences you love. And then... suddenly... that freedom is ripped away. And everything you knew... disappears.
Her voice became lower. More intimate.
— The Abyss is not just a destructive force. It is essence. It inhabits fear, hatred, resentment... but also extreme love, attachment. It is pure imbalance, and it is everywhere. Even in the purest.
A silence.
— Forcing a father to harbor the Abyss in his son's body... must have been horrible. That's why that boy's father killed himself.
The words fell like an anchor in Fenra's mind.
She blinked. Her heart beat faster.
Boy?
What boy?
Her mind spun. What Vernasha was saying was beyond anything she understood. Cosmos. Essence. Fragmentation. Broken humanity.
She asked, confused:
— What are you talking about?
Vernasha just smiled sadly, turning slightly to the side.
— Sorry... — she said, with a painful sweetness. — I know you wouldn't understand. And yet... I wanted to talk. Loneliness affects me too, you know?
She took a step forward.
— Sometimes... I just wish someone understood.
Fenra then took a deep breath. Her eyes did not tremble.
— If it's any consolation — she said — I understand one thing.
She raised her hand. And then closed it firmly.
— That the only way to end all this... is by tearing you in two.
The silence between them was like glass about to crack—tense, fragile, suffocating.
Fenra kept her eyes fixed on Vernasha, trying to extract any fragment of truth behind that ironic smile that seemed to cut more than any blade. The environment was hazy, as if reality itself hesitated to witness what was about to happen. The light from above was unstable, flickering in golden and gray tones, as if time there were being bent.
Vernasha reclined with perverse elegance, as if bored with everything around her, but this was just another layer—every gesture of hers was meticulously calculated.
— Splitting me in two might cure a little, yes, what a genius idea of yours... — she said with sarcasm, her voice like poisoned honey. She raised her face slightly, her smile widening like a predator's before wounded prey. — ...but can you really do that?.
That question was not just a provocation. It was an emotional trap, a trap of control. Fenra knew that.
The woman before her was a labyrinth—dark, twisted, with no visible exit.
And yet, for some reason, fascinating.
Fenra did not respond immediately. Her gray gaze narrowed, and within her mind the pieces began to move. Quickly. Like a whirlwind about to collapse.
She had been mistaken. Vernasha wasn't just a manipulator. She was the manipulator.
"She orchestrated the attack… orchestrated the Monarchs… she orchestrated everything. From the very beginning…" — Fenra thought, her body growing tense.
The feeling was like trying to face a mirror that shatters before you understand your own reflection. Every plan, every move of Fenra's... had perhaps already been foreseen. And not just foreseen—perhaps already shaped by Vernasha from the start.
In that instant, something broke inside her. A certainty that was once rock was now sand slipping through her fingers.
And then, an insidious thought formed:
"What if even Dante... is just another piece on her board?"
The level of danger Fenra had previously attributed only to the worst horrors she had faced... now extended to that woman with bright golden eyes who looked at her as if facing an old book she knew by heart.
— You know... — Vernasha said, as if talking to an old friend — Your gray eyes analyzing me are a delight. She approached slowly, like a lazy cat that is nonetheless lethal. — If you want, I can tell you everything I know.
Fenra remained motionless. She knew any sudden movement there could be fatal—not because Vernasha was physically stronger. But because fighting someone who writes the script while you act... is like fighting inside a dream that is not your own.
And then, Vernasha tilted her head slightly, as if savoring the suspense before the fall:
— Only if you take too long here... — she whispered, and the gold in her eyes shone like sharp blades in the darkness — ...I guarantee many people will die out there.
That hit Fenra like a punch.
Time. The choice. The guilt.
Vernasha knew exactly where to press. The doubt in Fenra. The sense of urgency. The fear of failing Mei. Failing Tekio. Failing all who still resisted outside.
She clenched her fists, but felt her fingers trembling.
Fenra saw now: Vernasha was not just a threat—she was the maestro of chaos. The one who pulls the invisible strings of destruction with an elegant symphony of horror and logic.
And perhaps... just perhaps... Fenra's end was already written right there, in that room, in that conversation.
But what was the end for someone like Fenra?
She took a deep breath. Looked into Vernasha's eyes. For a second, there was silence.
Two worlds colliding in absolute silence.
Two mirrors trying to reflect each other—but neither wanting to accept its own image.
"My body is getting used to it, I may not distort the environment but I think I can do more here than anywhere else..." Fenra thought.
"But if I'm right, that doesn't apply only to me..."
Vernasha stared at Fenra as if she could read every one of her thoughts.
A smile from one who had already won.
Vernasha was the very incarnation of perverse control wrapped in elegance. Her blonde hair fell like dense, dead flames to her waist, contrasting with pale skin that seemed made of living marble. Her golden eyes—alive, intense, too bright to be merely human—seemed to see not only the now, but all the possible futures in which you died by her hand.
Her attire was composed of a black fabric with details in ancient gold, as if every embroidery told part of a forgotten story. A cloak trailed behind her, floating without touching the ground, as if the reality around her subtly bent so as not to impede her. As if the mere sight of it awakened memories of a nightmare never dreamed.
Her presence was not loud. It was absolute. Where Fenra distorted space, Vernasha distorted reason.
Fenra then gritted her teeth.
"I have to test it... I have to... REACT"
Fenra was the first to move. With a firm, elegant spin, she pulled forth an ethereal spear, forged from the space that rippled around her like a living cloak. Her dual iris, separated, rotated slowly—an eye that saw beyond matter.
— You are not just a traitor… you are the very error taking form. — Fenra said, in a low tone, as her energy distorted the ground under her feet.
Vernasha, with her arms loose at her sides, took a step forward with absurd calm. Her dark dress dragged a trail of shadows that dissipated in the air. Her golden eyes shone with scorn and certainty.
— And you are adorable when you try to understand the board while sitting on it.
With a snap, both moved.
Fenra advanced with a sharp crack of energy, her spear piercing the air and creating a trail of spatial distortion. Vernasha raised a pale hand and formed a mirror made of a dark, steaming liquid. The weapon passed through the mirror—and was thrown back in a brutal ricochet, nearly hitting Fenra.
— Perfect reflection. Of intentions, of strengths, of weaknesses... — Vernasha murmured, rotating her wrist. The floor beneath them began to crack and reorganize like pieces of a moving puzzle.
Fenra jumped back, a trap trying to close around her feet. She created five spatial blades and threw them all at once—the blades split in the air, seeking blind spots.
But Vernasha... danced.
With movements that defied time, she spun in her own shadow, as if in a cruel ballet. Each blade bent as it approached, being redirected as if she were the center of a whirlpool of inverted logic.
— Killing me would be what, exactly? — Vernasha mocked, raising her hand. — Justice? Revenge? Relief? I am not meant to be an end, Fenra. I am the means.
Fenra launched herself again, now with stakes of energy crackling around her body like gray flames. A whirlwind of distortion surrounded her legs, allowing her to cross distances in the blink of an eye. She appeared behind Vernasha, striking with an expanded energy chain—an ethereal weapon that extended like a living serpent.
Vernasha turned just enough.
— You think you are unpredictable... — she whispered, catching the chain with her bare hand. The impact generated a wave that bent the air like hot glass.
Fenra's eyes widened. That should have destroyed any known matter. But Vernasha held the chain firmly.
— But I have lived inside your unpredictability. And I loved every curve of it.
With a pull, Vernasha yanked her, sending Fenra flying toward her—and delivered a kick to the stomach with the elegance of a cruel queen. Fenra flew backward, crashing through a set of floating geometric shapes that exploded on impact.
Coughing, Fenra fell onto a slanted plane of distorted energy.
— I know what you did... — she snarled, getting up. — You orchestrated everything. The fall of the Sif, the ambush, Mei's imprisonment... it was you. It was always you.
Vernasha smiled, tilting her head.
— And now you see... That I am the link everyone ignored. The blind spot of geniuses, the crack beneath the throne.
Fenra clenched her fists. She knew what was at stake. The space around them was sealed. No portals, no reinforcements, no escape. The presence holding this place together was Vernasha's. And the only way out...
— ...Is for one of us to die here.
Vernasha shrugged with cynical elegance.
— Oh, what a quick conclusion. Are you willing, then?
Fenra answered with silence. And with a blast of distorted space that collapsed toward Vernasha's chest.
The explosion was tremendous. The plane curved, the shadows recoiled. But there, from within the dust and distortion, a voice emerged:
— ...I am more alive than ever, Fenra.
Vernasha emerged from the impact with a bloodied arm, but smiling as if she had received a gift.
— Thank you for reminding me that feeling pain is... so human.
Both prepared for the next exchange. Both knew.
The next sequence was not a test. It was a sentence.
To be continued...