The moment Everett marked them, everything began to dissolve.
Gloria's breath caught mid-inhale. Guruji's eyes widened, the whites flashing with alarm. The Castle of Bones, the throne, the skulls—it all unraveled into smoke.
Or rather, mist.
Thick, endless black mist.
---
They landed without falling.
No floor. No sky. No sense of "up" or "down." Only black mist—shifting, coiling, alive. The trees were black mist. The grass was black mist. Even the wind was made of it, brushing against their skin like the breath of some forgotten god.
Everett stood before them, no longer seated. His eyes were calmer now—still dark, still dangerous, but laced with sorrow.
"This," he said softly, "is the Realm of Destruction Intent."
He spread his arms. "Everything here—the wind, the beasts, the ground you stand on—is born from the pure intention to destroy. You've felt it before. A taste. A flicker. But never like this."
Guruji stepped forward. His eyes narrowed in defiance.
He began to chant in Sanskrit.
"Peace, peace, peace."
Holy symbols spun around him like fireflies made of scripture. But as soon as they touched the mist—they vanished. Dissolved. Like sparks flung into the ocean.
Gloria's hand clenched her blade.
They both understood.
This Everett was too far above them.
His presence alone bent the realm. If he chose to watch them—not even attack, just look—with full intent, they could faint from the weight of his pressure. It was like standing near a collapsed star and pretending to breathe.
Then it happened.
They felt a stirring in their souls.
A mark.
It writhed inside their will like a whisper engraved in fire.
Satus.
They both spoke the name in their thoughts. And as if it had been waiting, the mark activated. Not outwardly. Inwardly.
The realm began to shift.
---
The mist thinned—then split.
One half remained dark, dense, and hungry. But the other began to freeze.
A blue-white frost rippled from Gloria and Guruji's feet. Trees of ice formed, blooming upward like ancient frost-lotus. Snow fell—but backward. Up into the sky. The black mist recoiled from it, hissing.
Two realms, now side by side.
Destruction. Frost.
Everett looked around, surprised. Then—he smiled. The kind of smile only a doomed oracle would understand.
"Satus help, huh?" he murmured. "That's good."
Behind him, the mist began to move.
Shapes emerged. Beasts.
Elephants with hollow tusks. Phoenixes with feathers made of smoke. Dragons with no eyes and too many jaws. Even ants the size of houses—made entirely of malice.
They weren't summoned.
They were born.
Born from Everett's presence alone.
And yet—
Gloria and Guruji stepped forward.
From their own bodies, shards emerged—shining blue, covered in frost-etched runes.
They pressed them.
And behind them, the frost realm roared to life.
Armies of creatures responded—ice wolves, crystalline deer, armored eagles, silver-furred apes wielding icicle clubs. The Frost Realm did not bow. It answered.
---
The two realms faced each other.
Then Everett stepped forward.
Slowly.
Each step cracked the air itself. The world blinked around him. Space sagged under his footfalls like stretched fabric about to tear.
Gloria and Guruji readied themselves, but Everett—
vanished.
A blink later, he was behind Guruji.
A black katana, drawn from nothingness, slammed downward. Sanskrit letters flared up like golden shields.
SSSSSZZZZZTT—!
They sizzled, melted, burned.
The sacred letters evaporated as if someone had poured acid on them.
Gloria spun, blade in hand, and swung. Her sword hummed with intention:
By oath of stars and blood once sworn,
Let ancient wrath in light be born.
From forge of gods, my blade now wakes,
To cleave the curse no shadow breaks.
Descend, O flame, through fate and sky—
And let the Tree of Ages die."
Sword of Final Fury.
But Everett vanished again.
Now behind her.
A second katana arced down—just as a massive mammoth charged from the Frost Realm.
The Ash storm Mammoth, tusks glowing with volcanic energy, slammed into Everett like a freight train of fury.
But Everett didn't even raise his weapon.
Instead, behind him, another mammoth emerged—formed of the black mist itself. Its eyes were voids, its breath a death-wind.
It opened its mouth—
—and exhaled.
A gale of darkness, filled with slicing blades of mist, erupted from its trunk.
The Ashstorm Mammoth screamed as its body was shredded. Blood misted. One of its legs buckled. It didn't fall—but it staggered.
Gloria's heart sank.
They were losing.
---
She let out a roar and activated her mystic sword techniques in quick succession.
"Final Slash! Eternity Divide! Blade Spiral of the Last Dawn!"
Her blade sang, slicing with frostlight. The ground cracked beneath her.
Guruji, despite his injury, lifted his staff high. The chants resumed—this time slower. Deeper.
"Namō buddha. "
Golden Buddha statues rose behind him—peaceful, radiant, eternal.
But Everett only watched.
Calm.
His eyes held a truth neither of them wanted to hear:
> He wasn't even trying.
Not really.
And yet, Gloria and Guruji pushed forward. Because behind every blow, every chant, every frost-born beast…
Was one shared hope:
To bring Everett back.
The real one.
The one who still laughed. Who still cared.
Not this god of destruction… this Ashen King made of broken promises.