The void trembled.
Not from pain. Not from fear.
From rage.
High above the ruined battlefield, where the sky still tore at its seams, the shadows boiled. The last remnants of the abominations vanished into dust, erased by Lucifer's mere presence, and what followed wasn't silence—it was pressure. A crushing, suffocating pressure that wrapped around the edges of the universe like a clenched fist.
They were watching.
The Outer Gods.
Not with eyes. Not with faces. Just presence. Ancient. Vast. Endless.
Their whispers filled the void.
"Again…"
"He interferes…"
"The Fallen One breaks what was promised…"
"Too many cycles. Too many losses."
Lucifer stood at the center of the scorched battlefield, coat fluttering lazily in the still-rippling air. He tilted his head upward, crimson eyes narrowing as he felt them. The watching ones. The ones who had tried again and again to infect this universe like a disease.
