Apex hit the earth like a felled titan.
Branches cracked. Soil split. The entire forest inhaled, waiting to see if its King would rise again.
I remained on the treetops, the Veil of Glass glinting in the dying sunlight, watching the man who had come so close to taking my life.
Even now, wounded and breathless, he glared up at me with an anger so ancient he fought through the pain just to keep me in his line of sight.
Good.
I needed him desperate.
I wanted him furious.
An animal backed into a corner was dangerous—
but predictable.
Blood poured from his chest, the mark of Sound-Death—my son's weapon.
Hunter's timing had been… off, but still effective.
The ravens scattered. The wolves went still, waiting for their King's command.
He always whistled, and somehow they understood. But I doubted he could manage that now, not with blood filling his lungs.
I grabbed a vine and descended from the treetops.
My boots hit the ground with a thud that silenced the forest.
Apex tried to rise, gripping the axes still wet with jungle blood. His breath trembled. His knees failed. Yet he still raised his head to look me in the eye.
The man had the spirit of a beast.
"Apex," I said, my voice low. "You know why I came. I didn't want this violence."
His eyes narrowed, as if my honesty disgusted him.
"I came for answers, and you tried to take my life," I continued.
"Apex… let's keep this simple. How did Rose die?"
He spit blood into the dirt.
"You think I'd tell you?"
His voice was hoarse, strangled by pain.
"It's none of your business. That's all you need to know."
I stood over him—not triumphant, not satisfied.
Just furious.
"You saved her twice before I ever met her," I said.
"Apex, Rose loved you enough to stand between you and death."
His jaw tightened at her name.
Perfect.
Her name still meant something to him.
"You think I crave bloodshed," I said quietly.
"You think I destroyed her kingdom for petty revenge. I want one thing—an answer."
His hand trembled around his axe.
"Why can't anyone tell me how she left this world?" I pressed.
"For ten years, I thought she was alive. For ten years, I thought she was safe. For ten years, your people got away with murder!"
His expression cracked—just a fracture, but enough.
"What a lie."
"If I lie, then tell me the truth," I said.
"Tell me you had nothing to do with it. Tell me you fought for her, that you were away when it happened. Give me anything that makes sense."
I inhaled deeply.
"Talk to me before this gets bloody."
Leaves rained down from above. Familiar footsteps shifted on the branches.
I knew that presence.
Heavy feet gliding.
A cocky breath.
A humming weapon.
Hunter.
My son was finally here… late, as always.
I crouched down, bringing myself eye-level with Apex.
"I was never your enemy," I told him. "Your hatred—your envy—blinded you to what Rose truly saw."
I removed my mask for the first time since entering Oma.
"Look closely, Apex."
Dead eyes.
Dried tears.
A heart rotting with unanswered grief.
Apex laughed—actually laughed—shocking me.
"Zefar, the funeral was ten years ago. Mourning late doesn't excuse genocide… you hypocrite."
His gaze was hostile—unmoved by my pain.
Confusion flashed across my face.
Then anger followed.
Enough.
I put the mask back on.
I tried to be human, honest—vulnerable.
And he mocked it.
My cold understanding returned.
This man wanted death.
He preferred a grave over answering a simple question.
What did they do to Rose?
Apex rose to his feet.
One dash and he could reach me.
Sound-Death hummed in the distance—Hunter ready to fire at the slightest hint of intent.
I sighed.
Here we go again.
Was violence the only answer men like us could give an already sick world?
Apex didn't attack first. He was waiting,scheming or thinking of escaping, I wasn't sure.
Had he ever used this many brain cells before?
He just stared at me—blood leaking from the corner of his mouth, breath ragged, one knee half-buckled—yet he somehow mustered the strength to whisper words sharper than any blade that ever tasted my flesh.
"You know I don't hate you," he rasped. "I never did."
His voice was low, almost gentle.
Deadly.
"In fact, when Rose told me your life story…"
A pause. A breath.
"…all I felt was pity."
The forest stopped breathing.
Even the predators around us—the wolves, the snakes coiled at the roots, the owl perched above—froze as if they too understood that what came next would be far worse than claws or venom.
"Yes, Zefar," he said softly.
"I pity you."
Something cold slid under my ribs.
"You're a boy born with no love," Apex continued, staggering upright as though grief itself was pulling his spine straight.
"A man who never found it. A father who can't give it."
He lifted his chin—defiant, fearless in the face of a man who had ended kingdoms.
"Look at yourself!
You call your sons Slayers."
My jaw tightened beneath the mask.
"Don't you see?" Apex murmured.
"You are the new Father of Murder."
My heart stilled.
"Just like your father," he said.
"You built an army of killers."
My fingers curled around the hilt at my hip.
"Instead of admitting you were always insane," he pressed, "you make big speeches. Philosophies. Justifications."
His eyes narrowed—not in hatred, but in something far crueler.
"Zefar… the only one you lie to is yourself."
"Rose might have respected you," he said.
"Babel might adore you."
He leaned in, so close I could feel his heartbeat struggling against cracked ribs.
"But you?" Apex whispered.
"You hate yourself. And that's the saddest life there is."
He looked almost compassionate for a moment—almost.
"You're barely alive, Zefar."
The next breath he took trembled with lethal resolve.
"So, let me end your misery."
Silence.
Absolute, deafening silence!
Hunter stopped holding the trigger.
The wolves backed off.
Even the wind stayed behind the trees.
Because for the first time in a long, long time…
…I had nothing to say.
A thousand years ago?
Those words would've broken me.
Would've turned me feral.
Would've made me tear the forest apart with grief, rage, denial.
But not now.
A millennium of self-loathing dulls eventually.
You can only drown in guilt for so long before your lungs adapt to the water.
By year one hundred, I hated myself.
By year two hundred, I feared myself.
By year nine hundred, I was numb.
And by a thousand?
I had something else.
A purpose.
An army.
An Empire.
A land that gave me a reason to keep living in this miserable world.
So Apex's words slid into me like knives—sharp, cruel, perfectly aimed…
…but useless.
I simply exhaled, letting his words drift
through my mind again.
Boy born with no love.
Man who never found it.
Modern Father of Murder.
He knew exactly where to cut because he was right. I had lived through those truths.
Drowned in them.
Accepted them.
Survived them.
Apex thought he was breaking something still fragile.
He was hammering at stone.
He mistook my silence for despair.
His pupils narrowed.
His breath steadied.
His fingers tightened around his axes.
He lunged.
Lightning in human form.
He wasn't fighting me—he was hunting a weakness he'd convinced himself still existed.
His swings tore grooves through the air.
The ground cracked under his feet.
Wind snapped at our clothes as he struck again, again, again—
And I moved.
Sidestepped.
Tilted my head.
Shifted my weight.
Apex's blades kissed nothing but emptiness.
He growled in frustration, digging deeper, pushing his battered body beyond even the jungle's limits.
Hunter fired from somewhere in the canopy—Sound-Death roared—
But Apex twisted, spun, vanished from the projectile's path.
Trees splintered behind him.
Even I was impressed.
But he still couldn't touch me.
He came at me with a downward strike meant to cleave skull and spine.
I slid past it.
He whipped around with a second blade meant for my ribs.
I stepped inside it.
He tried to catch me off balance with a feint to my knee—
I flowed around it.
He was speed.
He was fury.
He was an entire kingdom's worth of violence trained into bone and muscle.
But I?
I just didn't care.
Blessed by Heaven.
Backed by Haven.
Favored by Adam and Dawn.
How could I ask for more than an unkillable soul?
I was Victor Zefar, the world's first Incarnate.
It no longer mattered if Apex was the fastest warrior alive.
He still wouldn't touch me.
His breaths grew ragged.
His swings sloppy at the edges.
His footing less sure with every blur of motion.
But I remained calm.
Grounded.
Centered.
Unmoving except for the tiny, effortless shifts that let him miss me by inches.
It wasn't a duel anymore.
It was a demonstration.
Apex stumbled at last—only half a second, only half a step—but for a warrior like him, it was a lifetime.
And in that moment he saw it.
Truly saw it.
His eyes didn't show fear.
They showed resignation.
Defeat.
Understanding.
He didn't lower his axes—but the weight of them dragged at his shoulders.
His stance stayed wide—but exhaustion hollowed his spine.
His breath still flared—but the fire in him dimmed, flickering under the wind of reality.
Apex finally understood.
He could not kill me.
Not today.
Not ever.
Not even if he had ten lifetimes, ten armies, ten axes sharper than pain.
His body trembled.
His knees almost buckled.
His gaze flicked away, just once, as though the truth was too heavy to meet head on.
When he looked back at me, something was gone.
Not hatred.
Not anger.
Hope.
The hope that he could win.
And seeing that…
Seeing a king stripped of his last belief…
I felt no victory.
Only utter numbness.
He breathed out—one long, broken exhale—and lowered his head.
Not in surrender.
In acceptance.
That was where the battle ended.
Right there.
In the moment Apex realized he was swinging not at a mere mortal…
…but at a man turned legend.