Arc 1 Final: Crack (1/3)

  Simon raised his hand, and with a slow, almost reverent motion, something appeared in his grasp—not a sword, no, but a flaming tear in the very fabric of reality. The blade was shaped from vibrating, deep blue light, so pure and concentrated that the air around him began to shimmer. It hummed—a quiet, oppressive tone, as if the mana itself were screaming. Every movement, every twitch of the sword left behind a faint trail of energy in the air, as if it were slicing through time and space. It was the most dangerous, unstable artifact a mortal could forge—pure, untamed mana.

  And yet Simon… had tamed it.

  His grip was steady, his stance flawless. The sword didn’t flicker. No trembling, no jitter. No heat distortion around his arm, no tearing of his flesh, no visible strain. He controlled it with a calm as if it were forged from steel and not from raw, burning magic. Others would’ve been shredded, scorched, annihilated. But Simon—this quiet, wounded, solemn man—had not only claimed the weapon. He wielded it with a level of focus that seemed almost supernatural. Or perhaps... tragically divine.

  And then we moved. I, the demonic echo of a fallen paladin. He, the broken prophet wielding a sword of light and magic. No hesitation. No shouting. No battle cry. Only the sound of our steps, echoing off the bloodstained stone floor. Two friends. Two warriors. Two beliefs that were about to collide in this moment.

  –

  Gravor watched everything with quiet fascination. Deep within Luken, in that shadowy place between thought and feeling, he lingered—a figureless shadow, yet not without purpose. And he felt it. The flicker. The fracture. The shift in Luken’s mind. Simon had said something—something dangerously close to the truth, but only close. Images. Fragments. Visions out of context, half-seen, half-understood, lacking the foundation beneath them.

  And that was enough. Enough to sow doubt. Enough to plant mistrust between the paladin and his friendly demon. Gravor could taste it. A subtle bitterness. The fiber of disappointment. The beginning of estrangement. A fine hairline crack in trust—still invisible, but growing.

  Another being might have felt panic. Fear of being discovered. But Gravor… grinned. Deeply. With relish. The crack wasn’t dangerous. Not truly. Luken couldn’t cast him out. Not anymore. Not since the Spiritrealm, where the real bargain had been sealed. Not with words. Not with remorse. The bond had been forged—not in blood, but in mind. In deepest will.

  Whether Luken knew it or not no longer mattered.

  Only one thing did:

  The first step had been taken.

  The first of many.

  -

  I felt my entire body tense as Simon conjured the sword made of pure mana. There was no more inner conflict in his eyes, no regret, no trace of doubt—only determination. In that moment, something inside me changed. Every last flicker of hope for reconciliation, every quiet whisper that this might just be a test, burned away in the searing glow of his blade. If he said he had to kill me, then I could no longer afford to hold back.

  My movements became sharper, more brutal. I no longer aimed to wound—my claws struck with full force, targeting weak points, driving the weight of my demonic form into every hit. I was no longer a comrade. No longer an ally. In that moment, I was a predator—and he was the prey.

  Our first clash was like a storm of light and shadow. His blade screamed through the air, carving fiery arcs of raw energy, while my attacks gouged deep trenches into the ground when they missed. He dodged skillfully, but I could see the patterns. Three more moves, and I’d break his rhythm. I pushed forward.

  With a feral roar, I unleashed dozens of razor-sharp spikes from my back. They detached in a deadly hailstorm, rushing toward Simon, who reacted in an instant and summoned a shimmering, sapphire-blue barrier. The spikes struck with loud crashes—some shattered, others fizzled into crackling sparks—but I hadn’t meant to hit him. I’d taken his space. That was the plan.

  I hurled my sword, which now spun like a burning boomerang of Gravor's essence, straight at him. At the same time, I beat my wings, soared upward—only to slam full force into something invisible. Mid-flight, I hit the upper limit of Simon’s shield dome head-on. It was like smashing steel into my face. Pain lanced through my skull. Stars danced before my eyes. My nose throbbed—maybe broken. I reeled back in the air, just in time to avoid a pale blue fireball exploding where I’d just been hovering.

  Gasping, I wrested control of myself again. I pulled my wings tight to my body, tucked in, and let myself drop—like a meteor, with deadly intent. The impact shook the ground, sending dust and shards flying in all directions. Cracks spidered across the stone. My heart thundered, but I had no time to breathe.

  Already, a cascade of lightning came screaming down. Simon seized the moment I was exposed with ice-cold precision. I leapt to the side, ducked, rolled, leapt again—the last bolt came head-on. Without thinking, I threw up my sword. The lightning struck the blade with a blinding crack, splitting the air. A portion of the energy surged through my arm, but I felt no pain. Just vibration. Just pressure. And then—nothing.

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  What the…?

  "Your sword in this form is almost entirely wrapped in my essence," Gravor’s voice echoed calmly in my mind, almost proud. "Or at least, it's as tightly woven with it as possible, so that it—"

  "Not now!" I snarled inwardly, cutting him off, and hurled myself back at Simon with an animal scream. My wings carved through the air, claws extended, ready to shred through cloth, skin, and pride. I felt the warmth of the sword in my hand, felt Gravor’s power burning like a flame in my chest. No mercy. No hesitation. Only the fight.

  -

  The barrier was a wall of pure will—a pulsating construct of Simon’s mana that withered every one of my vines the instant they touched it. Maira tried everything—curses, disease, divine weakening—but nothing broke through. I could only watch helplessly as two forces clashed within, like thunderous titans grinding against one another. I felt the shockwaves ripple from the center of the arena again and again. When Luken struck, the ground trembled. When Simon answered, the air itself shimmered from the raw mana use. I clenched my teeth and hurled my thorned vines at the barrier once more. This time, I managed to tear a gap—barely the size of a hand, open for less than a second—before it sealed again. The dome was like a breathing cage, and each breath made me angrier. Luken was in there. He was fighting. And I was powerless.

  But we kept trying. Maira prayed—actually prayed—to a god called Oshuur, one she herself didn’t even like, just to get any reaction out of the wall. I poured every ounce of energy I had left into the roots, made them twist together into a drill, a spear, a fist. And sometimes—rarely—I caught a glimpse of the arena’s interior for a heartbeat. It was... terrifying. Black wings, crackling lightning, shimmering mana storming through the chamber. Luken wasn’t the paladin he used to be. And Simon wasn’t the clever, cynical mage anymore. They had become something else. Something ancient. Something powerful. And dangerously close to something monstrous.

  Then it happened. I felt it first, like a shift in the wind. Maira saw it at the same time—the dome shuddered. It shrank. Not much—maybe a meter in radius—but it was clear. Then again. And again. It was shrinking, slowly but inevitably. And with the shrinking came the first fractures. Hair-thin. Flickering. I saw Simon inside take a step back, his face strained, sweat beading on his brow. Then—he raised his hand. And his sword... dissolved. No spell. No flash. It simply disintegrated into dust, into light, into nothing.

  I knew instantly: This was our chance.

  The second Simon let go of his sword was all I needed. I launched myself like a berserker, hurtling toward him with everything I had left. My body burned, my wings tore the air apart, my cursed blade gleamed with demonic energy. I gripped it with both hands, spun mid-air, and hurled the weapon down with all my strength—toward his head, toward his life, toward his judgment. This wasn’t a warning blow. There was no mercy. It was the sentence for his betrayal.

  But Simon moved. Not swiftly—not with a spell—but with instinct, with sheer, desperate survival. He threw his staff up, held it horizontally above his head. My sword crashed down onto it.

  The impact was like an explosion through my arm. The essence of my blade screamed, sparks flew, the staff vibrated as if it were about to shatter. Simon staggered, his legs nearly buckling, but he held the block. With sheer will. I felt his magic flicker, the dome twitch, energy crackling between us like a storm of lightning. But he didn’t break. Not yet.

  I stared into his eyes as we pressed against each other. There was fear there. Pain. Hatred. But also... regret. Maybe. Maybe. But in that moment, I couldn’t tell anymore.

  I backed away as Simon’s sword reappeared from nothing—radiant, blinding, blazing like a damned star. His staff vanished, replaced by a smooth, flawless blade of pure mana that no longer flickered like before. No, this thing was absolutely stable. Artificially perfect. Unnaturally calm. A weapon not forged from a mage’s will, but from sheer madness. I felt even my cursed powers hesitate for a second, as if the sword were a predator trying to dominate everything around it.

  And then came the pressure.

  Without warning.

  The air around me turned so heavy it felt like the entire sky had collapsed onto my shoulders. I could barely breathe, let alone move. My heart pounded like it wanted to burst from my chest, every muscle in my body tightened as if I were about to explode. Then came a new sensation—a pull, but not on my limbs. No. Something tugged at my very core, my essence, my being. I felt myself stretching, as if something in the air was trying to tear me apart. And then—it was gone. Blown away like mist.

  I gasped for breath, staggered, my claws scraping the ground, and looked up.

  Simon stood there.

  And I wished I hadn’t seen him.

  His body was a silhouette of burning light. Veins of mana crackled beneath his skin, bluish rifts flickered under his eyes, and his eyes themselves… they were two suns, shining, burning, merciless. In one hand he held the sword—now resembling some divine relic—in the other, a shield formed of liquid light—pulsing, clear, every movement spawning new runes and patterns I couldn’t decipher.

  He wasn’t human anymore.

  He was a goddamned mana nexus.

  And I understood what was happening here.

  Reality was beginning to fracture.

  Not stone, not wood, not metal. But the layer beneath it all—the space, the structure, the very laws that even Gravor could barely bend. Lines on the walls flickered. Light bent incorrectly, as if mirrors had formed in midair. Sounds echoed back in waves, distorted, delayed. The dome wasn’t just an arena anymore. It had become a maelstrom of too much energy. One wrong spell—and it would collapse like paper, taking everything inside with it.

  “He’s insane,” I whispered. “He’ll destroy himself and everything here.”

  And from that moment, my mind shut off.

  I let go of Gravor. I let go of the rage. I even let go of thought.

  I spread my wings, my scales bristled, and I let power flow from my claws, from my back, from my heart. My cursed sword trembled in anticipation, and I grabbed it with both hands, feeling every heartbeat as if I were one with the weapon.

  Then I charged forward.

  Not in haste. Not in fury. But with purpose.

  My wings hurled me like a projectile. The ground cracked from the force of my launch. Sparks flew from my claws as I cut through the trembling air. Everything shimmered. Everything shook. But all I saw was that one point ahead—Simon.

  He raised his sword. I raised mine.

  And I knew: only one would walk away whole.