Kelsey sat at the foot of a cave, head supported by her hands, as she watched the two beings in the sky. She had seen the fight against the massive hornet, so she knew that the two up there were likely of equal strength. So, as they talked, she felt the faintest flicker of hope, a hope that perhaps her mistakes had not ended the story of her race.

Not that she'd live to see the outcome. She was dying, she knew. But she didn’t fight it. She didn’t know what awaited her after it, but she hoped there would be nothing. Mere nonexistence, a void of darkness and peace. Not that she deserved it. Which was why she hoped beyond hope that there existed no afterlife, no hell, no judgment – and she hated herself for that selfish wish. For a person like her to die and meet rest instead of punishment was unjust, and utterly unfair to the billions she had wronged. But, then again, when had the world ever been fair?

Pain suddenly clawed at her stomach then, as her eyelids became heavier and heavier. Black lines spread on her skin as whatever strange poison the centipede was killing her with worked its way through her veins. She had mere moments left of life, and she felt at a loss. She didn’t cling to her life, didn’t rage against the powers of fate that had led her to this moment. She felt nothing but anxious. Afraid. Lost.

She wanted to see the sunset. The ocean. The smile of her mother. She was just a girl, just starting her life. She had little ambition, content to watch others and enjoy her life. She’d never wanted to hurt anyone.

Yet now a planet of graves lay at her feet, and their vengeful eyes stared at her with seething hatred, waiting just beyond the veil of death.

And she was afraid. She wasn’t a warrior, a fighter. She didn’t like pain. She could not handle the retribution she deserved.

The man in the sky began to glow then, a resplendent, eye-catching blue. She looked up, and a mouthful of blood spurted past her lips, colouring the gray rocks under her. This was her end, she could feel it. She was slipping towards death, to whatever justice or injustice it held, and she had no power over it.

“Kelsey,” a voice suddenly whispered in her ear. A voice that sounded a lot like…“Guild Leader?” Kelsey asked, looking up. Her voice was husky, rough. Pained. Blackened veins had spread across her entire body, reaching inward from the edges of her face. The whites of her eyes had been corrupted, giving her the look of a demon.

“Kelsey, please,” the voice said again. “I know it hurts, but you have to stay alive. You must! For the sake of humanity, you must stay alive.”

Kelsey smiled a pained, confused smile. “It’s so nice to hear your voice again,” she said, her every word laboured and painful. “Even if I’m just hallucinating.”

“No, Kelsey, you aren’t hallucinating. Please, Kelsey. You must stay alive,” the voice pleaded desperately.

Kelsey nodded to the voice she thought was in her head. “Okay, Guild Leader." She paused again for a moment, breathing softly. "I’m sorry, by the way. For what I did.” Her voice cracked with emotion as she spoke, the words she thought she’d never be able to say tumbling out of her. “I was just…I was just doing what I thought was best. I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I was just scared.” She was crying now, a black, viscous liquid leaking out of her eyes, rising from her throat and filling up her mouth. She stopped talking, wracking sobs taking over her body. Each one hurt like nothing else had ever hurt her before, but she stubbornly clung to life, refusing to let her eyelids fall, refusing to let the darkness take her.

The sky exploded then, sending out powerful shockwaves that flattened the Earth yet again. It hit her like a truck, the force knocking her back onto the ground. She banged her head against the rock and her vision swam, but still, she held on. Her skin had turned almost entirely black, her body now beginning to wither. Her hair dried and fell out, teeth dropped out of her mouth, and her body shrivelled up like it was aging a hundred times faster. Everything in her body hurt, inside and outside, but still, she held on. She fought through the pain with a resolve she’d never done anything in the world with.

She may have betrayed her Guild Leader, murdered him with her very own hands, but she would not fail him again. Not this time.

-

The Insect Monarch stood with his hands spread to the heavens, floating high up in the sky. Powerful winds wracked the entire globe, picking up tsunamis and hurricanes. Earthquakes of magnitudes never before seen on Earth hit all around the planet as it creaked and groaned under the weight of a Monarch gathering enough Flux to ascend to the realm of the Emperors.

The man laughed with unbridled glee as power, unlike anything he had ever felt before, entered his veins. It was a state of pure bliss, an utter wholeness he'd been chasing his entire life.

And then, all of a sudden, just when he stood at the doorstep of the next realm, at the maw of the strength that he so badly craved, everything stopped. The winds died down, the earth regained its stability. Confusion warped the Monarch’s face as he lowered his hands, wondering what had happened. Wondering how the Arte could have possibly failed. How his calculations could have possibly been mistaken.

And then he sensed it. A heartbeat. On the planet.

Fury took over the confusion, colouring his face livid. He immediately locked onto the heartbeat and cast the fastest Arte he could, sending a purple lightning bolt over to the spot.

The bolt travelled faster than natural lightning itself, but it was still too late. Before it could reach the mountains, a dishevelled man with burnt robes appeared in its path, deflecting the thing with a mere slap.

The bolt changed directions, knocked down to the ground kilometers away from its target. Arterius stood in its path, his hair tousled and his robes charred at the edges, his chest heaving as he breathed hard. A look of utter rage boiled beneath the surface of his face, like a volcano seconds from eruption.

“NO!” the Monarch screamed in unbridled fury, insanity warping his face as he realized that he had lost his easiest chance to fulfill his goal. “NO!! I WAS SO CLOSE. HOW DARE YOU!!” Spittle flew out of his mouth as he raged like a man who had lost everything. “I WILL KILL YOU ALL! YOU THINK YOU'VE WON? NEVER! I WILL-”

“Shut up,” Arterius’ voice cut in, his voice quiet yet carrying a terrifying lethality. “Shut up, you disgusting excuse for a man." He was breathing hard, like he was doing everything within his power to contain his rage. "I don’t like getting angry. I don’t enjoy the feeling of hatred or rage. I am a calm person.” Arterius looked at the Monarch then, his eyes glinting with a light so dangerous that even the Monarch, for the first time in millennia, felt the ethereal chill of fear. “But you…” Arterius continued. “You crossed a line, you insect.”

As he spoke, he stretched his hand out sideways, and the Flux of the entire world reacted. Pure white smoke swirled around his outstretched arm, and a small golden circle only a foot wide appeared at his fingertips. Despite its tiny size, however, anyone could tell by looking at it that the few characters present within the circle held power far surpassing any other Arte that had been cast that day.

The power exuded by Arterius at the moment rooted the Monarch to his spot, the pressure so great that he could do nothing but watch.

The moment the rune completed, the handle of a sword poked out of the middle, seemingly materializing out of thin air.

“To vanquish all evil, to slay all demons, to end all chaos,” Arterius muttered as his outstretched hand clasped onto the handle and tugged. “Grant me your strength, Blade of Gwenneth.”

At his command, the entire sword came out of the golden circle like it was being pulled out of an invisible sheath. The sword was majestic, radiating a holiness that repulsed darkness. Its blade was a foot wide and more than a meter long, double-edged and glistening white. The cross guard and pommel were made of shining gold, and the handle itself was made of a marble-like white stone.

Despite the strength radiated by the sword, however, the Monarch was undeterred. The second the summoning was over, and the immense pressure was lifted off of his shoulders, the Monarch summoned his own sword and dashed forward, a crazed glint in his eyes.

While the Monarch’s sword wasn’t as flashy as the Blade of Gwenneth, it was not to be underestimated. Having soaked in the blood of many, many powerful mages, it carried a bloodthirst of its own that wouldn’t lose out to even the most prolific of assassins.

Its darkness was a perfect counter to the Blade of Gwenneth’s holiness, so when the two blades clashed, it was a perfect battle of their wielder’s strengths. The shockwave generated by the clash would have been enough to level a city and was more than enough to kill Kelsey, who had been lying at death’s door for longer than anyone ever had in her state.

However, before the shockwave could reach her, a dishevelled Aya arrived before her. With a single hand, she erected a shimmering golden wall around them that perfectly blocked off the wind.

“Oh, you poor, poor thing,” Aya said as she got down beside Kelsey, whose body was now entirely black and wilted like it had aged a hundred years. Gently, she placed her hands on the woman’s arm and closed her eyes, her entire focus on healing the woman. For the first time in many centuries, Aya was unsure if she had the ability required to heal her patient. Any normal person would have died long before their body could be damaged to the state that Kelsey’s had been. The fact that she had held on to life for so long against a poison developed by the Monarch himself was a feat even Aya had never seen before.

Still, she was the Mother Saintess after all, and her title wasn’t for nothing. Within seconds, she had blocked every sensory neuron on Kelsey’s body, letting her brain float into a state of utter bliss, devoid of the hellish pain it had suffered for so long.

There wasn’t much she could do in terms of saving her life though, even with her capabilities. Every organ and vessel within Kelsey’s body had been contaminated by the poison, and a poison developed by the Monarch was no easy opponent, even for one of the most proficient healers in the universe.

But Aya was not going to let the woman who had very likely saved all their lives die so pitifully at the hands of the Monarch. Even with her body in an almost irreparable state, there was still a way. Something that perhaps no other mage could pull off, but Aya had faith in herself. This was why she had become a healer, after all. To save the people scorned by fate; to allow the wretched tools of destiny another chance at life.

With a plan in mind, Aya furrowed her brows and got to work.

-

While Aya worked desperately to save Kelsey, a fierce battle took place high up in the air above them.

The Monarch attacked Arterius with wild abandon, his hate-fueled insanity powering his flurry of swings. Both men were accomplished swordsmen in their own right, and both fought with legendary weapons. The Monarch’s thinner blade held the advantage in mobility and speed, and his style played to his strengths. He jabbed and swung with precision, his every attack aimed at putting Arterius in a disadvantageous position. Still, with his wider blade more suited to defence and strength, Arterius beautifully parried the Monarch’s attempts. Golden white and blue streaks met each other repeatedly, their every clash rocking the very Earth beneath them, decimating the surrounding mountains.

Eventually, Arterius finally managed to land a full-powered swing on the Monarch, sending the mage flying like a blue comet across the sky before crashing into the belly of a mountain, sending up an explosion of dust.

Arterius breathed hard as he finally got a break, sweat pouring off his forehead. It had been many years since he’d last fought as hard as he did today. After all, at his level, it wasn’t easy to find sparring partners.

Unfortunately for him, his break wouldn’t last long. Before a minute had even passed, Arterius suddenly felt a powerful force sucking him upwards.

Feeling his body moving without his control, Arterius immediately looked upwards to find a red rune, a circle a few meters across with the same strange characters filling it up.

Realizing the danger it presented, Arterius fought as hard as he could to break out of the hold of the powerful Arte, but try as he might, Arterius could not regain control of his body as he sped upwards faster and faster. Then, the second he reached the rune, the Monarch’s foot broke through the blood-red characters and stomped down onto Arterius’ stomach. Arterius’ body bent like a U around the Monarch’s foot as his immense momentum pushed the rest of his body upwards still. Spittle flew out of his mouth as the breath rushed out of him. Once his momentum had finally been cancelled out, Arterius was pushed down back to Earth, reaching speeds no human had reached before on Earth.

He crashed into Earth with a massive explosion, sending up an enormous cloud of dirt. The crater around him spanned a few hundred meters wide, spiderwebbed cracks spreading throughout.

When Arterius’ swimming vision finally returned to normal, his eyes locked with the Monarch’s, who floated a few hundred meters above with a murderous glint in his eyes. A cruel smile spread across the Monarch's face as he stared at him, the cold smile of a man who didn’t blink at the genocide of billions.

“You die today, dog of Astros,” he vowed, his voice dripping with vengeful hatred.