Smoke curled into the blood-red sky. Blue flames still danced on ruined stone, crackling as if alive.
Zane lay in the center of the destruction—unmoving, broken, bleeding. The silver-robed assassin from the Anomaly Organization stood over him, his white hair fluttering as if the wind itself obeyed his presence.
"You're not even worth the effort," the man scoffed. "I wonder... what would happen if your little girlfriend simply vanished?"
He vanished in a blink.
Screams erupted in the distance.
The people near Sera's estate cried out in horror as the white-haired figure reappeared in their midst, blue fire flaring around him.
And in the plaza, something shifted.
Zane's fingers twitched. His head lifted.
But it wasn't natural.
He rose not like a man, but like something summoned—resurrected. His body hung unnaturally, like a puppet with invisible strings. His eyes opened.
The blue flames around him flickered... then hissed.
A deep, guttural voice echoed through the air—everywhere and nowhere at once.
The sky split open, a crimson crack stretching across the horizon like a wound in the world.
The shadows of guards, buildings, trees—ripped free, writhing toward Zane, as though paying tribute to their true master.
Relics from across the continents—shards long buried, cursed blades, dormant cores—screamed across the sky, leaving trails of black fire as they converged on him. They rotated at terrifying speed, a storm of forgotten power spinning tighter and faster until—
A shockwave pulsed out as the relics fused into a single weapon:
A blade so dark it made black look pale. Its surface moved like a liquid, whispering secrets in a forgotten tongue.
It landed in Zane's hand with a deafening clang, splitting the earth beneath him.
Solid. Ancient. Crawling with eyes that blinked in and out of existence. It drifted down and rested upon his head, sending a pulse that shattered every light in the plaza.
From the shadows of the sky, they came.
Creatures of the Void.
Horrors with skin like smoke, wings made of broken dimensions, and eyes that pulsed like dying stars. They did not roar.
Zane stepped forward, now clad in armor formed by the shadows of the living. His own body wrapped in a shell of sin and silence. Eyes opened all across the black metal.
The white-haired figure at the estate paused.
> "Wh-what... what are you?"
A call went out. More Anomaly elites appeared, surrounding Zane. Their presence twisted the wind. Lightning. Poison. Light. Five different specialties.
One of them screamed and charged.
His sword struck Zane's armor.
And the moment it touched—
Eyes opened across the armor, fixating on the attacker.
He screamed once. Then—ash.
The other four hesitated.
A flicker—then a slash.
The second elite fell in pieces before she even knew she'd been attacked. Her eyes never closed—still wide with confusion.
Two more attempted a combined spell, chanting in perfect sync.
Chains of void erupted from the earth, wrapping around their arms, their necks, their very souls. They didn't just die.
Only one remained, trembling, begging—his voice cracked—
> "W-we didn't mean—"
That was all it took.
His head vanished, his body remaining upright for a second too long before collapsing like a marionette cut from its strings.
Shadows pulsed around him. The crown whispered. The blade twitched in his grip, eager.
He tilted his head and said, in a voice that was layered—his and something else beneath it:
> "Hmm. You hold my essence... It's time to take it back."
Luca cried out, clutching his chest.
Black lightning erupted from within him, racing toward the blade like a beast unchained. It wrapped around the weapon like serpents awakening from slumber.
The moment it touched the Voidblade, it sang.
Zane's form flickered—dozens of afterimages slicing through the battlefield in an instant.
Each movement was flawless.
Each death was quiet.
Each enemy reduced to nothing.
Then... from the body of one of the elites, a small, glowing artifact rolled free.
Zane picked it up, staring at it for a long moment.
Then he looked up at the sky.
> "I know you can hear me," he whispered.
> "I never attacked you. Never harmed your kind.
You feared what I might become.
His grip tightened. The artifact shattered in his palm.
> "Now... I'll give you something to be afraid of."
He lifted the blade to the sky. The clouds warped.
> "Tell your king..."
The shadows screamed in unison.
And far, far away, in the heart of the Anomaly Organization's citadel...
The Void King's name was whispered again for the first time in centuries.