Silence followed Kael's final step into the realm beyond realms.
The void around him no longer pulsed with uncertainty—it shimmered, alive with threads of potential yet untouched. Each thread a timeline, a possibility, a life that might or might not be. But they were waiting. Waiting for him to touch them. Waiting for him to choose.
But Kael did not reach out. Not yet.
His body—if it could still be called that—trembled with the weight of what he now carried. Knowledge not meant for mortals or gods swirled within him like a storm bound by sheer will. Every heartbeat echoed with creation. Every breath unraveled a paradox.
And still, he stood still.
The being of infinite faces was gone. Her presence lingered like perfume on the breeze—unseen but undeniable. Her words echoed, "You are the answer." And the deeper truth: that the answer itself must choose what question would be asked next.
Was it freedom?
Was it rebirth?
Or was it… destruction?
Kael's thoughts turned to the world he had left behind. To the cities drowned in silence. To the people who had lived, died, and waited for salvation that never came. He thought of the gods who bled ambition, who feared the truth he now embodied. He thought of the friends who had stood beside him—and those who had fallen.
Their faces flashed in his mind like ghosts in a shattered mirror.
"I wasn't ready," he whispered to the void. "I never was."
But no voice answered this time. No cosmic revelation. Only the soft hum of possibility, like a question that refused to ask itself.
Kael looked down. The "ground" beneath his feet rippled like the surface of water, revealing glimpses of realities beneath it—worlds without pain, futures where the cycle of power had been broken, places where he had never been born.
He could choose any one of them.
And yet, one vision called to him above all.
A child—a girl—standing alone in a field of dying starlight. Her eyes were blue like a calm sky, and yet they held an emptiness that mirrored the void itself. She was no one. And yet… she was everything.
"Who…?" Kael murmured, stepping forward.
As he moved, the vision grew clearer. The girl was speaking to someone—her voice soft, hopeful. And then Kael saw it.
She was speaking to him.
Not the god-slayer. Not the eternal question. Just Kael.
She smiled. And in that smile, something shattered.
It was his doubt.
His hesitation.
His fear.
Kael closed his eyes.
He finally understood what choice truly meant.
It wasn't about power.
It wasn't about destiny.
It was about the will to move forward despite knowing the weight of what might follow. It was about standing in the face of infinite paths and daring to carve one that had never existed before.
With a single breath, Kael raised his hand and reached into the threads of fate.
And he chose.