Ash rained from a sky that no longer existed. The broken dome above Maerith had vanished, leaving only a swirling void of half-formed stars and dying timelines.
And before them stood the boy.
The younger Azael.
His feet left no prints in the dust.
His eyes were too calm. Too empty.
"Join me," he said again, voice soft and full of promise. "Or I'll take your place."
Azael stepped forward, heart hammering. "You're not real."
The boy smiled. "I'm more real than you."
Selene unsheathed her dagger. "Don't listen to him. It's a trick—"
"No," Lyka whispered. "Look at his shadow."
They did.
The boy had none.
Only a writhing blur at his feet, shaped like chains.
And then Azael understood.
"…You're the version of me that was never born."
The boy's grin widened. "Correct. The first prophecy never allowed my existence. The Watchers erased me—before I ever took a breath."
He lifted his hand. A dozen other phantoms stepped from the smoke—other children. All versions of Azael that had never survived the rewritten timelines.
"And yet," the boy said, "we remember."
Selene reached for Azael's arm—but he stepped away.
"What do you want?"
The boy's eyes flicked to the Spire of Threads.
"To be written back in. To exist. And for that…"
His gaze turned cruel.
"…you must cease to."
Before anyone could move, the ground split—and the Spire pulsed, throwing blinding light into the sky.
A single figure stood at its apex.
Clad in shadowsteel. Wings of molten thread spread behind him. And in his hand—
—a blade that hummed with prophecy and pain.
"Father?" Azael breathed.
It was him.
The man from the visions.
The shadow wielder who'd died protecting Liliane.
The enemy prince.
But… he was alive.
Lyka choked. "That's not possible. He died. We saw it."
Selene's grip tightened on her weapon. "No. He was hidden. Someone rewrote history."
The man raised the blade—and pointed it at Azael.
"Son of two dooms," he said coldly. "You were never meant to live. And now… I must correct the mistake."
The younger Azael stepped beside him.
Together.
Father and unborn son.
And the real Azael whispered, as the truth collapsed around him:
"They were never protecting me from my power…
They were protecting the world from what I was supposed to become."
Stay tuned...