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There was still no wind to carry away the awful stench of charred flesh, the zone seemed abandoned by time and nature themselves as if all hope to recover the land was beyond their mean. After all, all that was left were the ruined debris of Lagida burying the discarded body of its citizens.

Haliaetus reprimanded his inner desire to look around one more time, his pupil saturated with mana still focused on the only person still standing here, the only one still sane –or insane enough- to question his altruistic intervention against the carnivorous deities. He sacrificed everything he had to save this world, so why everyone still blamed him for an alleged misconduct?

“Me? A threat to this world?”

Unthinkable. Unbelievable. Unconceivable. He was a Watcher, born to oversee this world’s wellbeing. He was a Protector, vowed to fight against all dooms. Both his body and his soul existed for the only purpose of looking after everything that breathed and lived on this planet. Nothing more, nothing else.

However, not everyone shared his enthusiasm to play as the grand defender.

On the other side, Chaalith weighed her demonic sword with one slash, then drew a secondary weapon from her belt. A short second blade, a fine choice to sharpen her offensive arsenal against the only person left still stuck to its past, the only one who couldn’t believe otherwise that the world has changed for the better already. Nobody needed those ancient heroes anymore; the gods were gone.

“Your irrational decision-making and unpredictable tantrums caused grief beyond belief. You lost Qalendra, and instead of crying for her death you chose to vent your anger in the most chaotic way, irremediably and effectively throwing away every values you still pretend to defend.”

“Don’t you DARE evoke her name!”

“… Look at you. Still clinging to what was lost, when you’re supposed to support what was left. Eendis was right about you: you’re a hero. A hero from a past era. Your epopee was over thousands of years ago.”

“My work… My role… My duty is NEVER over!”

A radiant light shone from the gauntlets, a sign the unmatched miracle was about to make reality collapse again. The earth shook in terror at its sight, trembling in wait for another catastrophe to leave another unhealable scar.

Quickly responding to his initiative, Chaalith dashed in his direction with her swords ready to fend against the Fallen. In an attempt to ward her off, Haliaetus raised many pillars to slow her pace. It couldn’t work against her infused might, as a single swipe sufficed to blast away the obstacles in her path.

Miffed by this show of strength, he threw his knowledge about soul’s tinkering on the foolish cianala to disarm her completely. It worked on Aseraath, the trick of snatching away the bestowed benedictions. Yet, he couldn’t reach beyond the impenetrable layer of the intriguing artefact she was wearing.

An old armour from the old times when her people were still manipulated like soldiers on a chessboard, its sturdiness was on par with its original creators’ true prowess which irked him even more.

“You claim to fight for this new world, but even you can’t let go of the tools from before!”

Her determination mocked, Chaalith snorted at him before dropping her cursed blade upon the Fallen. Despite his innate attraction to the role of a defender, Haliaetus didn’t possess the same amount of martial experience as Chaalith. He’s never been on a battlefield, he’s never clashed this directly against someone, every of his actions were accomplished through the activation of his miracle. He managed to block the strike with his gauntlet, effectively nullifying the attack thanks to the many benedictions his body and chains wore, however, his lack of habitude to stand in a close combat was quickly outlined.

So what if he blocked the first strike? The second weapon approached him at an alarming speed, and before he could react to the incoming collision the first blade was already retracted and ready for another round. The third hit, then the fourth and the fifth were already followed by a sixth before Haliaetus had the time to step back from the first. Then, once his brain finally caught up with the last iteration, he found himself suddenly blown away by a powerful roundhouse kick.

His body bounced against the solid ground once, but that was no excuse for a respite as Chaalith already reduced the distance between them and executed another array of slashes, finishing the dazzling combo with a coup de grace piercing his stomach.

Her aim was true while she dealt a tremendous amount of damage to the Fallen, yet the blade was refused and vigorously repelled.

Backing off with one long jump, Chaalith promptly analysed the situation and could only conclude that this previous defence was merely an autonomous mechanism from his unconsciousness.

Barely able to react, Haliaetus tried to stand up from his position. It wasn’t any longer about his angriness from not being understood, or his hatred for finding any and every one giving their all to hinder him, but something closer to a burning emotion, like a monster trying to demolish its cage in order to devour the prey presented before him.

The rage storming in his mind was being reciprocated in his direct environment, giving birth to a slow, unnatural wind which gradually grew in scale and size.

“You dare… You dare *coughs*… You insolent…!!!!”

The tempest was already howling loudly before he could finish his insults, however, the air wasn’t feeling full of static electricity like any natural thunderstorm. Instead, a very heavy smell of mana started to fill her nose, an indescribable feeling full of dangers.

The few hit she managed to land with her demonic sword should have eroded a great deal of mana residing inside his body, yet he was still capable of wordlessly manifest a simple side-effect such as this maelstrom from his silently boiling fury alone. Exactly what you would expect from the hero who saved this world from the gods, it required this level of strength to repel a group of omnipotent beings away.

Above their heads, the dark clouds were charged with a phenomenal amount of wild mana, orbiting menacingly around a bodiless core, a blue sun which held no respect for the strong and no mercy for anything else.

Chaalith comprehended Haliaetus’s intentions. He was making another bomb, this time intentionally, with the only purpose to blast her away using his overwhelming power.

“So this is what the Protector do best? Is this how you saved the world in the past, by annihilating everything in your wake until nothing remotely menacing was left?”

“… It worked so far.”

Readying herself once more, Chaalith ran at full speed. The only way she could emerge victorious was to sap Haliaetus’s mana reserve until he couldn’t conjure anymore miracles. To get to that point, she needed to hit him with the demonic sword as many times as possible, but how many times was enough to undermine his near-infinite magical supply?

… Only one way to find out.

On Haliaetus’s side, although his resources were limitless, his options weren’t favouring his odds. Putting obstacles in her way seemed useless, so what else could he try to gain some time until he could successfully rearrange her soul and strip her from her immortality?

… Maybe there was a solution.

Shooting a war cry at her opponent, Chaalith pinned him down with another flurry of slashes. Each time her demonic sword collided with him, Haliaetus felt a fraction of his power fading away. And each time he tried to counter-attack in one way or another, her short sword interrupted his concentration. Rendered useless again, the Fallen was once more threw away by a kick.

However, something was different.

She found her leg now had a sort of latency in its movement, as if the muscles became sluggish or her body was hitting some sort of limit. But it couldn’t be possible with the sustenance of her boons which helped her keep her stamina. Chaalith stared at Haliaetus, he did something.

… He chuckled. He was chuckling at the abomination of a spell he was casting with his own hands.

His gauntlets were still shining, proof of his constant attempt to gather even more power that he was currently displaying. They were shining, but dimly. They were shining, but wrongly. They were shattered, the small detached fragments desperately magnetized, wriggling around the chain, trying to reform the whole.

“A curious attunement, but childishly easy to replicate. A magical enchantment made with the idea to eradicate magic? Only this impostor could come up with this kind of a mess.

It could have worked. It should have worked.

But I am Haliaetus the Watcher, the Protector! The gods created me and I rebelled against them. That is how history went.

However, while they created me, they also gratified me with the gift to understand mana better than any other!

I am the one who rearranged your souls so you all could utilize the mana in the air! I am the one who fabricated this whole industry, this entire system!

You all OWE me this world! And I will make SURE this debt is repaid with all the sincerity I deserve.”

“… You must have lost your sense of reasoning if you convinced yourself that is the right path to follow.”

“And yet I am right! You’re living because I granted you those benedictions. You can use magic thanks to the work I have put behind your back. I have given you all true world peace by driving the gods away.

Is there any reason I wouldn’t deserve respect? Or admiration? Adulation?”

“And repeat what the gods were doing? Plunging this world into servitude for your own convenience?”

Haliaetus stood silent at her questions. Pointing the fault in his actions, she was feeding the shame lurking in his mind, hoping he could still be persuaded to think again.

“I don’t need the world to accommodate me. I need the world to understand its predicament, to see the wrongs I am righting under its nose.”

… But it was no use.

Breathing in one short sip of air, Chaalith kicked a nearby boulder at Haliaeetus. The solid rock was simply removed from the arena by a thought, but the single instant of focus on the improvised projectile gave her all the time she needed to stand before him a third time. However, instead of unleashing another chains of attack, she intended to inflict him a heavy blow.

The demonic bone was blocked, no, grabbed by his left gauntlet, and the short sword was on its way to disrupt Haliaetus’s focus. But things went differently this time. Something melted in his hand.

“Magic, blast!”

Chanting a short sentence, Chaalith summoned a shockwave to forcefully create some distance between her and the Fallen. After landing a dozen of meters away, she noticed the demonic sword felt different. A black oose containing tiny fragments of a silver-coloured metal tainted the blade she was holding. Confused by the alien substance but quickly putting it aside, she refocused on her battle with Haliaetus, only to notice another stranger view.

The Fallen was suddenly howling with a profound suffering at the sky, grabbing his now-handless arm like a tormented, tortured prisoner of justice.

The pain of losing Qalendra was purely emotional and thus psychological, yet even he would never have been able to fully understand what physical pain really meant until now. A scratch was forgettable, a hit was forgivable, but here his forearm has foregone its solid aspect. What was left was a pitiful stump, and a Protector screaming his lungs out, his knees on the ground.

Unwillingly letting go of all his emotions and restraints, his distressed mind could only feel and hear pain and pain again. That was when one wish crossed his mind.

For everything to disappear.