The silence stretched forever.
Arin knelt beside Asura's broken form.
The void drifted around them —
ashes of stars, ruins of forgotten dreams,
the corpses of a dead reality.
Her body screamed at her to stop.
Her heart whispered a thousand reasons to end this.
He destroyed the world.
He killed millions.
He became the monster the world had feared.
And yet…
And yet.
He had once been a boy.
A boy who bled.
A boy who cried.
A boy who begged for mercy and received none.
She saw that boy now —
buried deep under the cracks,
under the scars,
under the ruins.
He was breathing.
Barely.
She could end it now.
A single blow.
A single choice.
The System — broken and glitching — flickered faint echoes in the void:
[Subject: Asura]
[Status: Critical Failure.]
[Recommended Action: Termination.]
She ignored it.
Her trembling hand hovered over his chest.
Her sword — now just a jagged shard — burned faintly in her grip.
"You chose this path,"
"You burned it all,"
"You left nothing behind…"
She closed her eyes.
Memories flashed:
Children laughing in ruins.
Mothers weeping as cities burned.
Survivors clutching broken weapons against endless night.
But also:
A boy sitting alone under a grey sky.
A boy abandoned by the world he tried to love.
A boy who never had a chance.
Tears slipped down her cracked cheeks.
"We all made this world.
We all broke it.
Not just you.
Not just me.
All of us."
The sword shook in her hand.
She could end him.
She could free the world of its final shadow.
She could make sure no one ever remembered this nightmare.
Or…
Or she could forgive.
Not forget.
Never forget.
But forgive.
Because if there was ever to be a new world…
it couldn't be built on vengeance.
It couldn't be built on hate.
It could only be built on scars.
And scars were the proof that healing could happen.
Arin dropped the sword.
It clattered against the void and dissolved into dust.
She reached out with her bare, broken hand —
and touched Asura's heart.
A spark flickered between them.
Faint.
Wounded.
Alive.
"If there's anything left of you…
Find it.
Rebuild it.
Or let the silence take you."
She stood slowly.
Her legs trembling.
Her soul heavier than it had ever been.
She turned away from him.
Not because she hated him.
Not because she pitied him.
Because she chose to believe —
however foolishly —
that something better could still rise from ruin.
As she drifted into the endless black,
the void around her began to shift.
A glimmer of light.
A heartbeat of something new.
A whisper of something not broken.
Not yet.
Behind her, Asura's body stirred.
Not much.
Just a twitch.
A flicker.
A breath.
The old world was dead.
The kings were gone.
The gods were silent.
But something still lived.
And in the endless, broken sky,
a new world waited to be born.