Darkness swallowed him.

  Not the simple kind—the absence of light, the comfort of shadows.

  This was deeper.

  Colder.

  A place between time and reality.

  Kieran was falling.

  But there was no ground to hit.

  No air to breathe.

  Only echoes—of voices that weren’t his, yet belonged to him.

  And at the center of it all, standing in the void—Varic.

  The First Reincarnator.

  The man who had once worn his face.

  The void shifted, twisting into something impossible.

  Kieran was no longer falling.

  He was standing on a battlefield.

  But not one he recognized.

  The sky was split, filled with endless chasms of light and shadow.

  The ground was littered with corpses.

  Not soldiers.

  Not knights.

  But things that shouldn’t exist.

  Creatures made of writhing tendrils, endless eyes, and shifting limbs.

  And in the distance, a towering figure loomed over the dead.

  Varic.

  Standing amidst the ruins of a war that had never been recorded.

  A war that had been erased.

  "Do you see it now?" Varic asked, his voice echoing through time itself.

  "This is what the Keepers were afraid of."

  "Not you. Not me. But the war they buried."

  Kieran clenched his fists.

  "What are you talking about?"

  Varic’s eyes burned like twin dying stars.

  "The Abyss was never an enemy, Kieran."

  "It was a consequence."

  Kieran felt it before he understood it.

  The battlefield wasn’t just a memory.

  It was alive.

  Every corpse on the ground—every shadow in the distance—was watching him.

  And then—

  They spoke.

  A thousand voices.

  Some whispered.

  Some screamed.

  And all of them carried the same message.

  "We were never meant to die."

  Kieran stepped back, his breath catching.

  Because now, he understood.

  The Keepers hadn’t just erased a war.

  They had erased an entire people.

  Varic watched him carefully.

  "I stood where you stand now, once."

  "I thought I could change fate."

  His expression darkened.

  "I failed."

  "And now the cycle continues."

  Kieran gritted his teeth.

  "No. I am not you."

  Varic smirked.

  "You say that now."

  "But every reincarnator before you said the same."

  He gestured toward the battlefield.

  "Tell me, Kieran—how do you think this war started?"

  Kieran hesitated.

  Because suddenly, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

  But Varic answered anyway.

  "We started it."

  "We— the ones who came back. The ones who couldn’t let go."

  "We tried to rewrite the world."

  "And in doing so, we shattered it."

  Kieran shook his head.

  "No. You’re lying."

  Varic stepped closer.

  "Am I?"

  "Then tell me—why do you exist?"

  "Why do reincarnators keep returning?"

  Kieran froze.

  Varic’s voice was soft now.

  "You are not alive, Kieran."

  "You are an echo."

  "A memory playing itself over and over, desperately trying to fix a mistake that can never be undone."

  Kieran staggered.

  Because for the first time—

  He felt it.

  The truth.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  The weight of all the lives that had come before him.

  He was never meant to be here.

  And yet, he was.

  "Now you see."

  Varic held out his hand.

  "Join me. Let us end this cycle together."

  "Let us become something more than echoes."

  Kieran breathed heavily.

  His mind was screaming.

  But he forced himself to think.

  To see the truth hidden beneath Varic’s words.

  Yes.

  The war had been started by reincarnators.

  Yes.

  They had broken the world.

  But what Varic wanted?

  It wasn’t freedom.

  It was control.

  And Kieran would not become another Varic.

  His grip tightened on his dagger.

  "I refuse."

  Varic’s expression darkened.

  "Then you are doomed to repeat our sins."

  "And this time—"

  "You won’t survive."

  The battlefield exploded into motion.

  And the real fight began.

  Varic moved first.

  Faster than anything human.

  His chains lashed out, twisting through the air like living things.

  Kieran dodged left, rolling beneath the first strike.

  But Varic was already there.

  A backhand sent Kieran flying, crashing into the remains of a broken siege engine.

  The impact shook his bones.

  But he gritted his teeth and pushed forward.

  This was not just a fight.

  This was a battle between two versions of the same fate.

  And Kieran refused to lose again.

  Varic’s voice boomed across the battlefield.

  "You do not understand, Kieran."

  "I am not your enemy."

  "I am your future!"

  Kieran spat blood.

  "Then I reject my future."

  He dashed forward, blade flashing.

  Varic raised a hand—a wave of abyssal power slammed into Kieran, knocking him back.

  Kieran hit the ground hard.

  But he wasn’t done.

  He never was.

  The shadows around Varic shifted.

  No.

  Not shadows.

  Something deeper.

  Something alive.

  The battlefield began to warp, time itself fracturing under the weight of their battle.

  Kieran saw glimpses of other lifetimes.

  Other versions of himself.

  Some where he had joined Varic.

  Some where he had died before making it this far.

  And in all of them—the world still burned.

  "It doesn’t matter what I choose," Kieran whispered.

  "The cycle always repeats."

  Varic’s grin widened.

  "Exactly."

  "Now do you understand?"

  "There is only one way to win."

  Kieran tightened his grip on his dagger.

  "Then I’ll find a new way."

  And with that—

  He lunged.

  The battlefield twisted.

  Stone crumbled into dust, then reformed into castles, ruins, burning cities—scenes from wars that had never existed.

  Kieran moved through them in a blur, dodging Varic’s attacks as the world broke around them.

  This wasn’t just a fight.

  It was a battle across time itself.

  And if Kieran lost here—

  He wouldn’t just die.

  He’d be erased.

  Varic’s chains lashed out, each one glowing with abyssal energy.

  Kieran twisted his body, narrowly dodging a strike that would have ripped him apart.

  But the world kept shifting beneath him.

  One second, he was in the ruins of an ancient city.

  The next, he was standing on the walls of a kingdom under siege.

  The sky above cracked like glass, revealing a void of infinite possibilities.

  And through it all, Varic kept coming.

  "You think you’re different?" he sneered, his voice echoing through the collapsing timelines.

  "You are just another shadow of what I once was."

  Kieran gritted his teeth.

  "Then let’s see if shadows can kill gods."

  He lunged.

  Their blades met in a flash of silver and abyss.

  The impact rippled through time, causing fractures in the world around them.

  Varic struck with inhuman speed, but Kieran kept up.

  Steel clashed against raw power.

  A strike to the heart—parried.

  A dagger to the throat—dodged.

  They moved through a thousand battles, each strike reverberating across lifetimes.

  And then—

  Varic’s fist crashed into Kieran’s ribs, sending him flying through the ruins of a forgotten empire.

  Pain exploded through his body.

  Kieran hit the ground hard, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

  But before he could move, Varic’s boot pressed down on his chest.

  "This is where it ends," Varic said, voice cold.

  "You will break, just like I did."

  Kieran’s vision blurred.

  Not from pain.

  But from something deeper.

  Because in that moment, he realized—

  Varic was afraid.

  Kieran smirked through the blood.

  "You’re wrong."

  Varic’s brows furrowed.

  Kieran grabbed Varic’s chain, yanking him down.

  And as the first Reincarnator stumbled, Kieran whispered into his ear.

  "You failed because you thought there were only two choices."

  "But I refuse both."

  He drove his dagger into Varic’s side.

  Not to kill him.

  Not to win.

  But to do something Varic never could.

  To end the cycle.

  Varic staggered back, gripping his wound.

  For the first time—he looked mortal.

  His chains fractured, the abyssal power around him flickering.

  The world around them shook violently.

  The battlefield cracked.

  The past began to collapse.

  Varic stared at Kieran, realization dawning in his eyes.

  "You… you are undoing it."

  Kieran exhaled, his body shaking.

  "No more reincarnators."

  "No more gods."

  "No more Keepers."

  "This war ends today."

  And with one final strike—

  He severed the last chain.

  The entire world imploded.

  Kieran felt himself falling, his soul ripping free from the fractured timeline.

  Everything blurred—

  The past.

  The future.

  Everything that could have been.

  And then—

  It was gone.

  The war that had lasted beyond lifetimes… ended.

  And Kieran?

  He woke up.

  Kieran’s eyes snapped open.

  He was lying on cold stone, back in the ruins of the Bastion of Ash.

  Selene and Veyren stood over him, expressions torn between relief and confusion.

  "Kieran?" Selene whispered.

  Kieran slowly sat up.

  The chamber was silent.

  The obsidian seal?

  Gone.

  Varic?

  Vanished.

  Kieran touched his own chest, half-expecting to feel something missing.

  And in a way, there was.

  The echoes of past lives—gone.

  For the first time in any of his reincarnations…

  He was just Kieran.

  Not a remnant.

  Not an echo.

  Just himself.

  And that?

  That meant he had truly won.

  Veyren exhaled.

  "Whatever just happened… it’s over, isn’t it?"

  Kieran stared at the rising sun through the broken ceiling.

  For the first time in centuries, he felt free.

  No more past selves pulling at his mind.

  No more inevitable war waiting in the shadows.

  It was over.

  "Yeah." Kieran breathed.

  "It’s over."

  Selene studied him.

  "Then what now?"

  Kieran stood, stretching his sore limbs.

  He looked at the horizon.

  For the first time in lifetimes, the future was uncertain.

  No prophecies.

  No destined battles.

  No cycles.

  Just a world waiting to be shaped.

  "Now?" Kieran smirked.

  "Now, we get to decide what comes next."

  And as the sun rose over the ruins of the old world, Kieran and his friends stepped into a future that no longer belonged to fate—

  But to themselves.