The sky remained silent.
But the earth and everything surrounding it still remembered.
Ash curled in the breeze across the ravaged clearing behind the academy. The trees were split in two, and the soil had turned black and glassy from intense, unnatural heat. The damage was already beginning to disappear—swallowed by reality trying to mend itself.
But the scars inside them wouldn't fade so easily.
Anubis leaned back against a scorched boulder, clutching her side. Her hand was stained red-violet, the blood thick and heavy with energy that refused to clot. Beside her, Ramiel sat slumped, breathing hard, one hand pressed against his shoulder to keep it from collapsing entirely.
Neither spoke for a while.
There were no words left in their throats.
Only pain.
And what made it worse… was what they could feel in their souls.
A thread was still inside them.
The tendrils from Noctis hadn't just wounded their bodies—they'd marked them.
Anubis shivered, though the air was still.
Ramiel finally broke the silence. "It's... still in me."
She nodded without looking at him. "I know."
He turned to her, eyes grim. "You feel it too?"
"It left something behind. Not a curse. Not poison. Something more subtle." She exhaled shakily. "A brand."
Ramiel growled. "Yama wouldn't have done this unless he—"
"—meant to escalate," she finished. "He's not testing my strength. He's tracking it."
Ramiel cursed under his breath, wincing as the motion sent pain down his spine.
"He should've been killed years ago," Anubis muttered. "I knew he was too quiet lately. Sending you was the first move."
"I didn't come to betray you," Ramiel said, his voice tense.
"And yet he knew you'd be close enough to watch me bleed," she replied, tone sharper than she meant.
He looked away.
A pause.
"…But you fought beside me," she added, quietly this time.
He looked at her again.
"I did."
And for the first time, she didn't look at him like a shadow.
She looked at him like someone who might one day choose his own shape.
---
Zeus sat upon the marble throne at the edge of the sky, his eyes closed, fingers interlocked before his lips. Around him, the storm curled in quiet spirals, lightning weaving gently across the heavens.
Then it came—the scent of corrupted fire, the crack in the wind, the signature of the Black Womb.
He opened his eyes.
"Noctis."
He stood up slowly.
Below him, a mirrored reflection formed in a sheet of air—revealing the ruined grove, the bleeding bodies of Anubis and Ramiel.
His chest tightened.
"She fought it alone," he muttered. "And he..."
His eyes narrowed.
Ramiel.
"What's he doing there?"
He summoned the celestial mark hovering above his palm—the one he'd placed on Anubis's soul after the Forge.
It flickered.
Something was interfering.
"She's been touched," Zeus whispered. "Branded."
His voice grew cold. "Yama wants to awaken what lies beneath her scars. He's not trying to kill her—he's trying to unseal her."
He turned and walked toward the celestial gate behind his throne.
"Then he's already declared war."
-------
*Back on Earth*
Anubis staggered to her feet, wind forming around her like a second skin. Ramiel followed, slower, holding his injured arm.
"We need to leave this place," she said. "Before the mortals start asking questions."
"Where do we go?" Ramiel asked.
She glanced at him.
"To heal quietly. We can't be seen like this or we'll have to answer questions," she said, her voice distant. "Not like I'm worried about it though."
Ramiel gave a dry, humorless chuckle. "Right. Because we blend in so well."
She didn't smile.
Instead, she turned away from the cratered grove, cloak of wind wrapping tighter around her form. The runes etched into her skin had dimmed, but the aura around her still pulsed with quiet danger—like a wildfire trying to behave.
"Come on," she said. "There's a sanctuary outside the mortal veil. It hasn't been used in years."
Ramiel followed, limping slightly, blood still soaking the inside of his shirt. "One of yours?"
"Mine?" she shook her head. "No. It belonged to a witch. I just happened to find it earlier."
They slipped through a narrow, forgotten alley between reality and the in-between—a place where wind didn't move and shadows had no owners. The veil pulled apart like silk, and they stepped through, vanishing from the mortal plane.
---
*Elsewhere—Yama's Sanctum*
Yama stood before a floating ring of obsidian flames, his expression unreadable as Noctis's sensory imprint played out in ghost-like fragments before him.
The battle. The wounds. The mark.
Anubis's power.
But also—Ramiel's choice.
He watched as his son stood beside her. Defended her. Bled with her.
"You defied my command," he said quietly, eyes narrowing.
Noctis did not respond. It wasn't designed to argue. Only to obey.
Yama turned his back to the vision and walked to the throne of horn and glass. He sat slowly, eyes glowing green with heatless rage.
"She was supposed to be shaken," he muttered. "Now she's only further bonded... to him."
A cloaked figure stepped forward from the edge of the chamber.
"What will you do, my Lord?"
Yama's smile returned—too thin, too sharp.
"Nothing... yet. Let them think they've survived. Let her think she understands the brand."
He leaned forward, fingers steepled.
"When the time comes, it won't be Noctis that breaks her."
His voice darkened.
"It will be herself."
--------
*The Sanctuary*
The sanctuary was deep in the folds between planes, hidden behind a crumbling temple swallowed by thorny roots and pale mist. Inside, only four walls remained—runed, cracked, and humming with dormant magic. A broken crescent moon hovered in the sky above.
Ramiel collapsed onto a stone bench. "I don't think I've bled this much since I fought the Wraith Princes of the Abyss."
Anubis raised a brow. "You were never meant to survive that. So either you were lucky, or you cheated."
"I was angry," he muttered. "That's almost the same thing."
Anubis approached the inner circle of the sanctuary, laying both palms flat on the cold stone. The runes on her arms lit up as her power seeped into the altar.
From the center, a pool of violet light formed.
"Sit there," she said, pointing to the edge.
Ramiel approached, cautious.
"What is it?"
"Pain siphon," she said. "Ancient magic. It extracts active trauma and lets the body rest."
"And what does it cost?"
Anubis didn't answer.
But she sat down beside him.
As the light enveloped them, the pain in their bones eased. Not gone—but hushed.
For a moment, they simply sat.
Breathing.
Alive.
"Do you think he'll send something worse next time?" Ramiel asked.
Anubis's eyes were half-lidded. "No."
Ramiel looked surprised. "You don't?"
"No," she repeated. "I think he's already sent the worst thing."
Ramiel turned toward her, confused.
She met his gaze.
"You."