Erend felt it. Khepra-Ankh was coming.
The presence pulsed through the connection like a distant star growing brighter, but Erend knew the truth with brutal clarity.
It was not fast enough. Not yet.
And Zerathul was too close to reclaiming everything.
A moment later, Zerathul laughed.
It was not a sound of relief or triumph alone. It was a certainty that he was winning.
The rings along his body shuddered violently, their fractured light dimming as if crushed by an unseen weight. The resistance that had slowed his movements weakened all at once, and something ancient and vast stirred behind his eyes.
Time power answered him again.
"I feel it…" Zerathul growled, his voice thick with satisfaction as the tentacles around his face writhed wildly. "The chains are breaking."
He straightened in the air, his posture no longer strained, no longer divided.
Then he laughed again louder, echoing across the sky.
