The transmission returned to Vergil without any fanfare, as if the system itself had accepted that, at that point, he was the axis around which events gravitated.
He walked.
Just that.
Without haste, without urgency, without even the posture of someone in combat. There were no weapons in his hands, no open wings, no infernal chorus or proclamation of power. Vergil simply advanced through the forest as one traverses a corridor that is too long.
And yet, everything died.
Sometimes he chose.
Other times, not even that.
A creature moved wrongly—it disappeared.
An aura bothered him—it was extinguished.
Something tried to surround him—it ceased to exist.
Then, he continued walking.
The forest no longer reacted as before. The labyrinth still moved, still tried to reorganize paths, erect vegetable walls, create conceptual traps… but now there was hesitation. The magic that sustained that environment seemed to have developed something akin to fear.
