[Mirabel Anstalionah.]
I could conclude from the simple fact that I could not breathe that I was going to die.
Yet even as that truth sank into me, a part of me refused to believe it. My lungs rejected the air, my chest burned, and the light that once answered me recoiled as if repelled by my existence.
My lips parted. "The Cradle of The End."
The Roaming Giant responded immediately, its cleave tearing across the horizon in a swing vast enough to split the world in two.
Before the blow reached them, Steeva gripped my hand, and Purtunah stepped forward with her sword raised high.
The world trembled as Purtunah's blade collided with the storm.
Bone cracked beneath her skin. Splinters of light burst from her arms. Blood streaked her lips as she braced herself, yet her eyes burned with fury and devotion.
She bore my power, suffered under it, resisted it, only to protect me.
I tried to move, but my own body disobeyed. My essence tangled in invisible threads, tightening, constricting, denying. When I reached inward, seeking my True Self, not even an echo answered.
She was killing the concepts that defined me, burning through the foundations of my identity, severing the pillars of my nature.
It was the end of my defiance.
I had turned my own divinity against itself, and with every moment, pieces of Mirabel Anstalionah were dying.
Worse, I could not resist. Not truly.
Their spiritual pressure crushed me. Steeva's sorrow, Purtunah's resolve, together, they pressed on my being with a force so absolute that even a giant could not rebel.
"Mirabel!" Purtunah shouted. "How much longer do you have?!"
Steeva's grip tightened, then she released me. Water spiraled in her palm, condensing into a blade like moonlit glass, Nicholas's element.
She thrust it into my right leg.
Pain erupted in a white, blistering flash. I collapsed to my knees, and the kingdom trembled as if sharing my agony.
For a heartbeat, I felt Destrarossa's distant gaze upon me. Mourning.
Ouroboros and Lancerial watched from their golden prison. Malachi's fading sorrow brushed my silhouette. Kivana whispered a prayer through the veil.
I attempted to rise, but I was forced backward as conjured swords formed around me, blades of water piercing my flesh, pinning me to the ground.
The stars dimmed overhead. Blood seeped across the soil, carried by the wind.
Purtunah stood above me, her expression unreadable.
"It was difficult," she said softly.
"Getting enough of my mana into your system, disguising it with pain, masking it through every strike."
I coughed, voice weakening. "Death manipulation shouldn't work on me. Not like this."
Steeva's eyes shimmered. "Mother's magic has changed," she whispered.
"It's stronger now, after Panthor's fall." Her voice cracked. "He was my light. And our shackle."
The field trembled as our powers collided again.
My flames roared, streaking across the night, staining the heavens crimson.
Fire met water. Gravity warped. Starlight burst from my hands in violent arcs, tearing through existence.
Steeva answered with storms.
Her waters rose as devouring mists, her strikes flowing with inhuman sorrow. She wept while she fought, the sea itself mourning through her.
Purtunah descended into darkness. Shadows wrapped her body, unfurling wings of blackened mist. Her blade sang with the power of endings, cutting through flame and starlight.
Her presence erased sound. Erased color. Erased time.
I countered with starlight and gravity, my voice binding reality itself.
"O star of wrath, burn the veil. Gravity of the Red Sun, fall!"
The Heavens obeyed.
Fire tore through the sky. The earth shattered. Mountains turned to glass. The battlefield became the forge of gods.
For a heartbeat, I stood above them both, my aura blazing red and gold, my eyes reflecting creation itself.
But the flames faltered.
The power that once made me invincible now devoured me from within, consuming the very concepts that held my form together.
Purtunah stepped through the dying light. "You've gone far enough, Mirabel."
Her voice carried sorrow, not triumph. The blade of darkness pulsed in her grasp, feeding on the remnants of my defiance.
"Falter, Red Giant of Wrath," she whispered. "Let your rage seep into the wounds of your lover."
Her sword pierced my heart.
The world fell silent.
My body lifted as if weightless, carried by unseen winds. My blood shimmered with starlight as my consciousness drifted upward.
My pain dissolved. And all I felt was release.
I passed through the Heavenly Gates, yet even then I knew this was not Heaven.
It was something between places, a realm molded for a particular design that I partook in, though the nature of that design remained mine alone to keep.
Only the good ones appeared, the perfect ones, which meant every single memory.
His smile. His voice. The warmth of his presence.
They merged with visions of my children, my kingdom, and the moment of my death.
I felt no pain, no grief, only an unfamiliar calm, a quiet relief that replaced all sense of longing.
It was peace stripped bare, pure and unburdened.
After what might have been moments or centuries, I came upon a light that seemed alive, its brilliance too deliberate to be nature's alone.
From it stepped an angel.
At first, I thought I had stumbled upon a painting, a divine masterwork suspended in the stillness of this place that pretended to mimic Heaven.
The figure stood tall and radiant, his wings unfurled like vast banners woven from dawn and starlight.
Each feather shimmered as though brushed by the hand of creation, glowing with layered hues of gold and white.
His armor gleamed with celestial polish, each plate reflecting the boundless sky behind him.
A crimson mantle flowed from his shoulders, rippling with a grace that defied stillness, as if unseen winds bowed to his presence.
Long golden hair framed his face, cascading down his back like rivers of light.
It caught the illumination of this imitation sky and scattered it across the fields in soft halos.
His features were perfect in a way no mortal could ever be, not human, but sacred.
His eyes, clear and blue, held both infinite patience and the unshakable weight of command.
In his right hand, he held a sword pointed downward, its edge gleaming with quiet restraint, a symbol of justice mastered rather than unleashed.
His left hand rested lightly at his side, as though he carried the strength of countless battles yet required none of it here.
His stance was steady, one foot upon the luminous ground, a silent declaration of harmony over chaos.
The air around him seemed to hum, alive with a purpose older than any world I had known.
Behind him, the heavens blazed with light, yet he did not burn within it.
Instead, he was its measure, its serene and perfect center.
In this flawless realm where even I was remade into something pure, he seemed untouched by sin itself, as though perfection had been born in him.
"Thus her story came to an end," he finally said, his voice like the echo of eternity.
In my hands appeared a book bearing my name. I opened it and, in an instant, read every word.
Every breath, every act, every sin and virtue of my life unfolded before me, and when the last line vanished, the book dissolved into light.
I looked up at him.
"You are special," he said. "You stand among Him. Yet I must admit, your current self is… pitiful."
Only then did I notice I was clothed in nothing but mist.
His gaze, unwavering and unclouded, remained fixed on mine, neither judging nor desiring.
Garments, similar to his yet softer in form, came into being around me, as though the realm itself sought to clothe my shame.
I looked down at my palms.
"Heaven is wonderful," I whispered. "Time feels gentle, space unmoving, my eyes are clear… as is my mind."
He chuckled, the sound like distant bells.
"This is only the beginning, the staircase to true perfection. Mirabel, tell me, what is your name?"
"Yoru-Barvasatha," I answered, as if compelled by the truth of it.
He smiled, faint yet radiant.
"A wonderful name. The name of the beginning, even as you reach your end."
"God is good," I said, and my laughter followed, a laugh without despair, free at last from sorrow.
He nodded, then reached out toward me.
"In this staircase, I came to you because I could feel it, your wrath. You are stricken with sin."
He laughed softly.
"Yes, your sin transcends the world you once called home."
"Who is like God?" I asked. "Tell me, can I abandon it? Even as I am now?"
He looked momentarily surprised, then smiled once more.
"Your story is over. Because you are just, Hell will never bind you. And because you are wrathful, Heaven may never keep you."
I lowered my gaze and brushed my fingers through the celestial grass.
"So I am lost," I whispered. "Merely because I loved."
He stepped closer, as if to embrace me, but some invisible truth held us apart.
Still, he took no offense, only lowered his arms, his sword gliding effortlessly until its tip touched the ground with soundless grace.
"You are resilient," he said softly. "So He will bless you with peaceful memories and winnable trials as you walk."
Tears welled in my eyes, not of sorrow, but joy.
"God is merciful."
He inclined his head.
"So wander, and embrace His glory. You are a lost little flame of genesis, and once you are found, you will live again within His kingdom."