The feeling did not fade.
It waited.
The first explosion tore through City Hall like a thunderclap made of stone.
For a heartbeat, the festival froze—music cut mid-note, laughter strangled into silence. Then the sound reached us, a concussive roar that rolled through the streets and rattled teeth in their sockets. A tower of smoke erupted above the square, black and boiling, scattering banners like torn feathers.
"What—" Katherine began.
Another detonation answered her, this one closer. Down by the piers.
The ground lurched beneath our feet.
Screams followed—first scattered, confused, then everywhere at once. Stalls overturned as merchants fled. Performers dropped instruments and ran. Somewhere a bell rang wildly, not in warning, but in panic, its rope pulled by hands already shaking.
"At first I thought—" Roland said, voice tight. "An attack."
So did everyone else.
Guards surged through the streets, shouting orders that tangled over one another. Steel flashed. Shields rose. And then—more explosions. Not measured. Not strategic. Too many. Too fast. Fire burst from rooftops, from alleyways, from open air itself, as though the sky had learned to burn.
The guards broke.
I saw it happen. Helmets discarded. Formations dissolving. Men trained to hold lines now running shoulder to shoulder with civilians, faces pale with the same realization dawning in all of us.
This was no siege.
People rushed the fountains, forming desperate lines, passing buckets hand to hand. Others hauled water from the canals, slipping on the stones, dropping what little hope they carried. It did nothing. Flames leapt higher, fed by something unseen, something wrong.
Then the tremors began.
The earth groaned—a deep, grinding sound, like a giant waking beneath the city. Cobblestones split apart, jagged cracks racing through streets as buildings sagged and sank, their foundations swallowed whole. Towers leaned. Walls collapsed. The city screamed.
Out at sea, the tide surged violently, waves crashing against the piers as the wind rose into a hollow, howling screech that cut through bone and thought alike.
"Arthur!" Katherine shouted—but her voice was nearly lost.
I saw Professor Goodwill ahead of us, coughing through the smoke as he ran toward a woman pinned beneath shattered beams. Without thinking, Roland broke from us and rushed to help.
"Roland, wait—!"
They strained together, lifting debris inch by inch. Goodwill turned, his face streaked with ash.
"Run!" he shouted. "Get away from here—now!"
Roland hesitated but remained steadfast, his character would not allow those in need to be left alone in his presence.
The explosion came without sound.
Just light.
Fire burst from the ground around them, a ring of flame roaring upward as a burning pillar from a nearby stall collapsed. I saw Professor Goodwill vanish beneath it, crushed instantly, his cry swallowed by the inferno.
"NO—!"
Roland screamed—and went down.
A shard of wood had torn through his leg. Blood darkened his trousers as he clawed at the stones, trying to rise.
I dropped my sword and ran to him, hauling him upright as the heat pressed in from all sides.
"Arthur," he gasped, gripping my sleeve. "Go. Take Katherine. Run to the Citadel—the King's Guard—"
"I'm not leaving you!"
He smiled. Softly. Even then.
"I'll be right behind you," he said. "Just need to rest this leg a moment. I'm a loyal shadow, remember?"
I wanted to believe him. My chest tightened.
I took Katherine's hand and ran.
Bodies lay scattered through the streets—still, broken, burned—as though some colossal beast had descended to raze Ardor from the world. Smoke tore at my eyes, searing my lungs with every breath. I turned once, toward the cottages.
My parents.
There was nothing. No debris. No fire.
Just absence.
"Katherine," I coughed. "We're almost—"
She stopped.
I turned.
Her face was white with terror, eyes locked on something behind me.
I followed her gaze.
The Citadel was gone.
Its roof had collapsed inward, flames devouring the stone itself, guards nowhere to be seen. The last refuge—burning.
My knees gave out. Whether from smoke or despair, I didn't know.
What would Grandfather do, I thought dimly. What would he say at a sight like this?
Katherine collapsed beside me.
Only then did I understand.
This was not war.
Not nature.
This was judgment.
As though the heavens themselves had opened, hurling flaming ruin upon us without reason or mercy.
I crawled to her, clasping her hands—once cold, now burning with unnatural warmth.
"I'm sorry," I sobbed. "Forgive me. I promise—I'll take you there someday. Beyond the seas. Beyond the horizon. It'll be our adventure."
My voice vanished into the roar.
And as Arthur spoke his final words, Ardor burned.
The view pulled back—beyond the city, beyond the kingdom. The southern continent lay in ruin, scorched black beneath towering columns of smoke that stretched for miles. Kingdoms fell in silence. Seas boiled. Skies bled red.
The world of men ended.
For what purpose, what sin, none could say.
Only the gods knew.
The flames glowed the color of a crimson rose. Even the gulls could not escape the embrace of its petals.
And then—
A figure appeared, standing atop the heavens themselves.
Cloaked in deep blue.
Around his neck hung a pendant, cold and radiant.
It bore the number III.