Stonefall was still alive.
Lanterns burned along the walls. Patrols moved through the damaged streets. Workers hauled stone and timber through the night, determined to keep their city standing.
From a distance, it almost looked peaceful.
But Eren knew better.
Because the futures had changed again.
They had narrowed.
The Two Remaining Paths
Eren stood on the highest tower of Stonefall.
Below him the city stretched in fractured streets and damaged towers, patched together by stubborn human will.
In his mind—
Two futures remained.
Only two.
The first was the one he had already seen.
A shadow spreading across the city.
The Devourer inside him losing control.
Stonefall consumed from within.
Erased.
The second future was worse.
Not destruction.
Not consumption.
Erasure.
The sky above Stonefall tore open like wet paper.
Light poured through the wound in reality.
Then something descended.
A shape so wrong that even the Devourer inside him recoiled.
And when that thing arrived—
The city didn't burn.
It didn't collapse.
It simply vanished.
Buildings.
People.
History.
Memory.
Removed from existence like a mistake corrected.
Neural Pattern Stability: 18%
Foreign Residue: 29%
The Devourer pulsed uneasily.
For the first time since Eren had bonded with it—
It was afraid.
The System Notices
A thin line of text appeared across Eren's vision.
Not the usual interface.
This one flickered.
Glitching.
As if the System itself was struggling to speak.
ANOMALY DETECTED
DEVOURER SIGNATURE LOCATED
CONTAINMENT PROTOCOL INITIATED
Eren's stomach dropped.
"Containment…?"
The message continued.
ENTITY CLASS: PREDATORY COSMIC
PURGE AUTHORIZATION: GRANTED
The air around him felt suddenly colder.
Not temperature.
Reality.
Like the world had taken a step backward.
Ruby Arrives
Boots clanged against the tower stairs.
Ruby stepped onto the roof.
"You vanished again," she said. "That usually means bad news."
Eren didn't turn.
"Define bad."
She crossed her arms.
"City-destroying bad."
"Try world-erasing."
Ruby went very still.
"…Explain."
He pointed upward.
She followed his gaze.
The sky looked normal.
Dark.
Stars scattered across the night.
But Eren could see something else.
A faint distortion.
Like heat rippling through air.
Only this ripple moved with purpose.
Slowly descending.
Far Above
The thing hunting him did not travel through space.
It moved through possibility.
Each step it took erased alternate timelines.
Collapsing probability until only one path remained.
A clean path.
A hunting path.
Its purpose was simple.
When the System encountered something it could not regulate—
Something that consumed worlds and timelines—
It released a single answer.
An ancient predator.
Something designed to erase Devourers from reality.
And it had just locked onto Eren.
The Devourer Reacts
Inside him, the Devourer writhed violently.
The fragment of the cosmic entity twisted in panic.
But the Devourer itself—
The true parasite bound to Eren—
Was doing something else.
It was hiding.
Compressing its presence.
Reducing its signal.
Like an animal trying not to attract a larger predator.
Eren felt the shift immediately.
Foreign Residue: 31%
The fragment was being forced deeper.
The digestion accelerated.
But that only made the contamination worse.
Ruby Sees It
The distortion in the sky grew stronger.
Now even Ruby could see it.
A ripple moving slowly across the stars.
"…That's not normal," she said.
"No."
"Is that the thing hunting you?"
"Yes."
"How big is it?"
Eren thought about the futures he had seen.
About cities vanishing.
About the sky tearing open.
"…Big enough."
Ruby cursed under her breath.
"Alright. New plan."
"What plan?"
"We stop it."
Eren actually laughed.
A tired, broken sound.
"You're going to fight a cosmic extermination protocol."
She shrugged.
"I've fought worse."
"Name one."
She thought about it.
"…Okay fair point."
The Assassin Speaks
Behind them, guards dragged the captured assassin up the tower.
The man was bruised but conscious.
He took one look at the distortion in the sky.
And went pale.
"…Oh no."
Ruby grabbed his collar.
"You recognize that?"
The assassin swallowed.
"Yes."
"What is it?"
He hesitated.
Then whispered a word that made the guards flinch.
"A Nullifier."
Eren turned.
"You've seen one before?"
"No one sees them," the assassin said hoarsely.
"Because when they arrive… nothing survives to remember."
The First Sign
The distortion above Stonefall suddenly sharpened.
Stars vanished behind it.
Not blocked.
Removed.
Reality inside the ripple was simply… gone.
A massive circular void slowly formed in the sky.
And from its center—
Something began descending.
Not wings.
Not limbs.
Not even a body.
Just an enormous shifting structure of pale geometric plates rotating around an empty core.
Where it passed—
Clouds vanished.
Wind vanished.
Sound vanished.
The world itself seemed to shrink away from it.
The Nullifier had arrived.
The Devourer's Fear
Inside Eren's mindscape—
The Devourer screamed.
Not with sound.
With instinct.
Run.
Hide.
Disappear.
But there was nowhere to go.
Because the Nullifier was already scanning.
And it had found the signal.
A faint thread of Devourer essence inside a human host.
Enough to justify purging the entire region.
Ruby's Realization
Ruby watched the thing descending from the sky.
"…Eren."
"Yes."
"If that thing is here for you…"
"Yes."
"And it's going to erase the whole city to get you…"
"Yes."
She sighed.
"Then we have a problem."
Eren nodded.
"A big one."
But Ruby smiled slightly.
The kind of reckless smile that had gotten her through every impossible fight so far.
"Well."
She drew her sword.
"Guess we're killing a god tonight."
The Final Warning
The System glitched again.
A final message burned across Eren's vision.
REGION PURGE COMMENCING
ERASURE COUNTDOWN INITIATED
10:00
Ten minutes.
Ten minutes before the Nullifier erased Stonefall from existence.
Not destroyed.
Not ruined.
Deleted.
Neural Pattern Stability: 15%
Foreign Residue: 35%
Seal Integrity: 23%
And the Devourer inside Eren was beginning to realize something terrifying.
If the Nullifier killed Eren—
It would kill the fragment too.
Which meant the Devourer had only one option left.
Stop hiding.
And fight.