CHAPTER 246: CHAPTER 246: EXECUTIONER

The ocean bent in reverence, its surface bowing under the weight of something ancient, something that existed before order learned to name itself. The air grew heavy, thick with ether so dense it warped sound. Even the light seemed to hesitate, unsure whether it was still welcome in a world that suddenly remembered who ruled its end.

Victor stepped forward.

The illusion of man broke like fragile glass. His mortal form peeled away layer by layer until the god beneath stood unveiled. Crimson ether bled from his body, reshaping itself into robes of living light, fluid and infinite, every fold shifting as though woven from flame. Beneath, he was skeletal and radiant all at once, the bones formed of burning energy, the voids between them filled with shadow.

And upon his skull rested seven crowns, ghostly halos, faintly luminous, forged from the remnants of the deities he had executed across the eons. They burned now in silent chorus, each one pulsing with a fragment of the laws they had once upheld.

Elias had read of this form in forbidden texts, the manifestation of the god of destruction, the Final Arbiter of Fate. Few mortals had ever seen it and remained whole and he seemed to be one of the lucky ones... that is, if Victor didn’t lose his mind because he lied.

Jonathan froze mid-step, his corrupted ether spasming like a wounded thing. The arrogance that had once sustained him flickered, replaced by something raw and primal: fear.

"You..." His voice faltered. "You have no right to..."

"I have every right," Victor said. His voice wasn’t sound anymore, but law. It cut through matter, time, and divinity itself. "You interfered with what was written. You reached for what does not belong to you."

Jonathan’s form convulsed. The black ether around him writhed, reacting to the weight of the verdict. "She’s my blood! My legacy..."

"She was never yours," Victor said. "You touched the loom of fate with unclean hands. You sought to steal the thread of life from one not yet born." His voice darkened, the air trembling. "That is the oldest sin. And I am its consequence."

He raised his hand. The seven skull crowns above his head ignited in unison, their light bleeding together into a single, unbearable red.

Jonathan’s ether screamed. He fell to one knee, claws of shadow digging into the ground as he tried to resist the pull. "You can’t... kill me," he gasped, voice breaking into static. "I am part of..."

"You were part of it," Victor interrupted. "Until you defied the pattern."

The sea roared as the sentence fell. Crimson ether surged from Victor’s body, lashing across the horizon in tendrils of flame. Each one carried a fragment of divine decree, judgment woven from the same power that unmade worlds. The chains of light coiled around Jonathan, binding him in place.

Elias stepped back, feeling the air turn viscous with divine weight. His lungs burned, every breath a struggle. The containment field he’d set faltered, unable to withstand the force pressing down on existence itself.

"Victor..." he tried, but his voice couldn’t reach through the storm.

Victor’s gaze never wavered from the kneeling figure before him. "Jonathan Clarke, a being without name in the ether realm," he said, every syllable a nail in the coffin of reality. "You have trespassed into the domain of fate. You sought to possess what was never yours. You unmade the boundary between creation and corruption."

He lowered his hand.

"I, Victor of the God of Destruction, and The Creator’s Executor, do hereby return you to nothing."

The world stopped.

For a single, breathless instant, all sound, all motion, and all color ceased. Then the chains erupted.

Jonathan’s scream tore through the void, dissolving into light as his body broke apart and was erased to nothing. The black ether that sustained him unraveled atom by atom, consumed by the red tide until nothing remained but dust and echo. The waves themselves recoiled, folding inward as if in prayer.

When silence returned, Victor stood alone amidst the ruins of what had been. The skull crowns above his head dimmed one by one until only faint embers remained.

The sea was quiet. The sky, blood-red with the afterglow of divine judgment.

Elias stood motionless for a long time, heart pounding against his ribs. He had seen gods fight before, but never this, the absolute execution of fate’s will, cold and impersonal, terrible in its swiftness.

When he finally found his voice, it came out hoarse. "You didn’t kill him."

Victor turned slowly, his skeletal form dissolving back into flesh, though his eyes still glowed with the light of ruin. "No. I removed him. There’s a difference."

Elias swallowed, forcing the tremor from his voice. "He was my father."

Victor’s expression softened slightly, though it didn’t reach his eyes. "And a corruption of the thread. You know the law. Interfering with fate severs the divine weave. I am not a judge by choice, Elias. I am a judge by nature."

The wind shifted, carrying the faint scent of salt and ash. The containment field fell with a whisper.

Victor stepped closer, resting his hand over Elias’s wrist; the marked bracelet Victor gave him the other night pulsed once in answer. "You have a lot to explain, my dear fiancée."

Elias blinked, the weight of the title hitting him almost as sharply as the silence that followed. The wind tugged faintly at his hair, the salt sting of the sea sharp in the air between them.

"Fiancée?" Elias echoed, his voice dry. "Is this how you open an interrogation now?"

Victor didn’t smile. His hand remained firm over Elias’s wrist, thumb tracing the faint pulse beneath the silver band that still shimmered with red light. "I could start with traitor instead, if you prefer."

Elias exhaled through his nose, a sharp, humorless sound. "You’re angry."

Victor leaned closer, his presence still heavy enough to make the air hum. "You used yourself as bait," he said quietly, his tone low but unrelenting. "You let a corrupted god draw a weapon on you, on our child, because you wanted to prove a point. Tell me, Elias, how should I feel?"

"I told you I had a plan," Elias replied, keeping his voice steady even as Victor’s eyes glowed faintly. "You’re alive. I’m alive. The city’s intact. The plan worked."

"The plan," Victor repeated, the words edged with steel. "You played with fate."

Elias met his gaze, unflinching. "And you executed it."