It was dark and silent. There are a few stars that didn’t make it so lonely. No, not that it matters? She thought. The world’s damage to the core, and there can only be death.
What did it mean? What was all this suffering for? Nothing, just nothing at all! They looked to me as if I was a devil! She screamed inside this void. The stars looked back at her. They offered nothing other than their silent stare.
Another world burned. She had seen worlds destroyed but this time she had driven the blade to the heart of the world. This bauble belonged to her solely and nothing else.
I just want them back. What’s so wrong about that? I just want them back with me.
She was painfully aware of what her powers were. But she was far from true creation, and she was never the Mother of Creation. All she had was the strength to destroy worlds. What was the point of hands that could only destroy?
What did the Burnt Woman want from the very start? Where did it all come from? She could recall the image of the Knight that trusted her back. The Knight that granted him power.
Knight of Salvatore. He named himself that, but he never returned. That sowed hatred to that Knight. Still, she understood only later that he was killed by Kaiser in that timeline. That alone made her toy with the man who did not know what he was wronged for. He was clueless as ever not even when he had been killed too much.
She fell hard. That was all she could say. Or was it all the emotions of the incarnations working her way into her heart? No, she wouldn’t be so desperate to have a family.
Did she know in that instance how little time she had? Still, floating in a space where she was all alone? Was this all she had in this? What was the point of fighting so hard until now?
That was something she did not understand at all. Did she even want to be this powerful? What was the point of power when everything around her did not exist?
She was not asking for forgiveness. She was not looking for anyone to tell her that she was not wrong. She knew what did and wanted to do it. Truthfully, what the Burnt Woman wanted was the comfort of a home.
The image of her mother smiling in a burning stake. The smile of that knight who dedicated his life to protecting her. The unwillingness of a man who lost to this world, fighting with all he had. And finally, the birth of her children in that frosty cave.
The feeling of their soft skin, and their lovely giggles. The way they sleep into her arms lovingly. That warmth and softness all lost into the gentle night. All because of the power she had. The power that she was born with. The power that she claimed for herself and tore the world with.
It was not a lie that she wanted to save the world. That she had gone through many timelines to save a world that hated her and treated her like a cursed woman.
But what did it matter to a world that does not exist?
This is my prison.
She said to herself as the power within her rumbled. She did not know why she felt voices in that place. The bauble that was her prison was pierced. Beyond that bauble she saw a world different from hers, but still the same. She wanted to reach that world where people were alive, but she chooses not to. No, she pulled her hand in fear of what her hands could do. This sinful hands of hers that destroyed worlds for the sake of her own.
And so the Burnt Woman broke. The woman who would face gods and monsters broke at the emptiness of the void. She sat on a rock that floated still amid this black. She held her head and sat on the corner of this rock with body shaking sobs coming out of her.
It was silent. There was no air and yet she still lives. Not even this vacuum could kill her now. When she sat on this rock a field was formed around her. The wind finally came and the feeling of it came back to her skin. She raised her head, tears still wetting her cheeks, and eyed the world that she would not go.
The bauble sustained her being, continuously strengthening her power. With no living being alive around her, she absorbed what this bauble could give her. The more power she got there was still no chance she would reach the true creation.
However, the illusions she produced did not soothe her. There was no life in them, no beating in their hearts. The screams of a million souls screaming at her at the cost of producing the illusion she wanted. They were like fireflies that gathered like a swarm to escape the world that she had burned. Every single soul escaping to the next world where they might be returned. A soul stood in front of her, accompanied she assumed was his family. The soul had the image of that young man who she met on that tower, and he nodded his head in farewell. He bore no hate and continued to move forward.
She held that hole until all of them escaped from this world. When the hole of the bauble snapped back into place there was only a soul-crushing silence that remained. The stars twinkled brightly as the silence called. But in this world, there was a singular existence that stood
In this bauble, there was only one beating heart.
In this bauble, there was only one soul.
In her rock, there was only one cry that resounded.
In this world, there was a sad voice that echoed all alone.
None would hear her.
For in this bauble of a world there was only one that ruled a world of nothing. A world devoid of life where silence ruled.
In this world, there was a lonely god.
In the end, she got what she deserved. Absolute power really does corrupt absolutely. At the very least, she let go of Einar's family's souls and her fragment managed to get her partially happy ending.