The stadium roared.
Cheering. Laughing. Drums of celebration echoing through Levincia Arena like nothing had ever gone wrong in the world.
Jhonathan sat on the bench at the edge of it all.
Helmet lowered.
Hands still.
Then slowly—
he removed it.
His face was calm.
But his eyes weren't.
Tears fell without permission.
Not dramatic. Not loud.
Just… constant.
Like something inside him had finally cracked after refusing to break for too long.
He looked up at the sky.
At the same star they used to look at for luck.
A small point of light that once meant tomorrow will be okay.
"I missed them…"
His voice was quiet.
Almost like he didn't want the world to hear it.
He had lived too long.
Fought too many wars.
Won against things no one should survive.
But none of it had ever felt like this.
Because this wasn't pain from injury.
This was pain from absence.
A hand struck his face.
Yvan.
The impact wasn't just physical—it was humiliating, deliberate.
Yvan leaned in, stepping on his helmet, grinding it into the ground.
"An idiot like you," he spat, "must know your place."
For a moment—
everything went still.
Jhonathan's head slowly tilted upward.
His stare changed.
Not anger yet.
Something colder.
Something waking up.
The air around him trembled.
Even the cheering began to fade.
A duel was declared.
Not formally.
Not fairly.
Just inevitability.
Yvan moved first.
But Jhonathan's authority answered faster.
His "God's Blow" cut through fate itself—
not the body.
Not the arena.
But the path of what was supposed to happen.
Jhonathan stood.
Slowly.
Brunhilde manifested in his hand like it had been waiting for this moment for too long.
Shockwaves rippled outward.
Knights staggered.
Walls cracked.
Even the stadium lights flickered.
Yvan hesitated for the first time.
Then—
everything broke.
Ruby's body was thrown onto the field.
Lifeless.
Discarded like she was never part of the story at all.
Silence hit harder than any attack.
Jhonathan stopped breathing for a moment.
"…no."
That was all he said.
Then something inside him shattered properly.
Brunhilde ignited.
Not as a weapon.
But as grief given shape.
The shockwave that followed erased the front rows of knights instantly.
Not out of precision.
But out of collapse.
Enemies swarmed him.
Hundreds.
Thousands.
Millions, even.
But none of it mattered anymore.
Jhonathan moved through them like a storm that had forgotten why it was falling.
Flames burned across the arena.
Stone melted.
Steel screamed.
The battlefield stopped looking like a place of combat…
and started looking like the aftermath of something that had lost everything that made it human.
And still—
he didn't stop.
Because he couldn't.
But deep inside that rampage…
there was no freedom.
No victory.
Only a truth he couldn't escape.
No matter how many he killed…
no matter how far he went…
it would never bring her back.
And the undying body he carried…
was no longer a blessing.
It was just time.
Endless, unforgiving time.
With nothing left to protect.