The impact cracked the sky.

For a heartbeat, all three figures vanished inside a blinding cyclone of light and shadow.

And somewhere deep in that storm, Ceyla's voice echoed, fierce and bright:

"We're not losing here not while Khael's watching!"

Kero said "Is that so..." he then activate his Shinrei.

Then the Eye of Kero ruptured.

A blast of shadow and wind erupted from the center of the crater shrieking like the end of a world.

Black feathers and violet light scattered through the ruins as the soundless explosion tore the air apart.

When the smoke finally cleared, Ceyla Nox lay half-buried beneath a broken pillar, her armor cracked, sparks flickering across her skin. Juno Arkai knelt nearby, one arm limp, blood running down his jaw.

The storm they'd unleashed had been beautiful but it wasn't enough.

Kero stood in the distance, barely scratched, his sword resting on his shoulder, breath steady.

Half of his mask revealing a calm, half-smile that didn't belong to any sane man.

"So bright," he murmured. "So fragile."

Across the battlefield, Khael Corzedar's head snapped toward the explosion.

The faint pulse of Draconic Dominion that had been sleeping beneath his skin flared, burning a deeper blue. His pupils slit, his breath caught — and for the first time, the calm broke from his expression.

"Ceyla—!"

He vanished from his place in a single blink, the ground beneath his feet turning to dust.

The air cracked open as Khael landed beside her, his scaled hand instantly catching the falling debris before it could crush her.

His aura surged a thunderous wave that rippled across the battlefield, making even Bakuza pause mid-swing.

Ceyla blinked through the smoke, her lips curling in a faint smirk despite the blood on them.

"I'm fine, idiot…" she murmured, voice trembling between exhaustion and pride.

Khael froze for a heartbeat, staring down at her, his expression soft, but his eyes still blazing with that barely contained fury.

"You call that fine?" he said quietly, his tone sharper than the wind.

Ceyla chuckled weakly, trying to rise. "It takes more than that to kill me, Dragon Knight."

Her heart pounded fast, hard, like it was trying to claw its way out of her chest.

And Khael, oblivious as ever, simply sighed and rested a hand on her shoulder, Shinrei energy stabilizing her veins.

"Next time, don't try to solo a masked psychopath."

"Next time, don't look so worried," she shot back.

Their eyes met a flash of something wordless passing between them, deeper than the chaos surrounding them.

A few meters away, Juno stood up slowly, watching the two of them with a faint, tired smile.

He exhaled, blood dripping from his knuckles.

"Figures… even in the middle of hell, you two find a moment."

He brushed a hand through his messy hair, turning his gaze away.

(She'll never see me that way… and he'll never notice until it's too late.)

A quiet, bitter laugh escaped his throat.

(That's fine. As long as she's smiling like that… I'll keep fighting.)

Further off, Rael Eluron wiped the blood from his mouth, his golden aura still flickering but unstable. Kaen Suro stood beside him, one arm wrapped in bandages of flame.

Kaen glanced at Khael and sighed.

"Looks like our Dragon Knight's occupied right now."

Rael smirked faintly despite the blood on his chin.

"Tch. Love in the middle of war. How romantic."

Then, from across the fractured horizon, Bakuza's laughter rolled in — deep, thunderous, echoing off every ruined wall.

His molten grin spread as he lowered his massive blade, eyes locking onto Khael's glowing form.

"No fun with just the two of you," he rumbled, smoke spilling from his mouth.

"I'll wait for the Dragon Knight. Let him have his tender moment. When he's done—"

He spread his arms wide, Shadefire dripping from his fingertips.

"—we'll finish what the gods started."

The world trembled again.

Rael's blade hummed. Kaen's flames rose higher.

And at the heart of it all, Khael's Draconic Dominion pulsed brighter, his wings half-unfurled, eyes locked on Bakuza with growing rage.

Ceyla whispered under her breath, "You're glowing again…"

Khael's gaze didn't leave the titan ahead.

"Good. Because this time… I'm not holding back."

Then Lira moved like water toward them silent, certain. Her hands glowed with the soft, steady light of Wave, and the air around Ceyla and Juno cooled as her Shinrei braided into their broken rhythms.

"Take care of them for me, Lira." Khael's voice was low but firm; the Draconic Dominion around him thrummed like a caged storm.

Lira bowed once. "I will." She set both palms on Ceyla's chest; a pale tide of Shinrei flowed outward, knitting torn muscle and steadying erratic pulses. Juno's wounds steamed and closed as she chanted, the cadence of her voice a metronome that put frantic heartbeats back into measure.

Ceyla forced herself upright, wiping burnt grit from her lip. She met Khael's gaze and tried for scorn, but it came out ragged. "I'm fine, idiot." Her heart hammered in her throat — that frantic, alive sound but beneath the bravado there was something else: the tremor of relief when a friend reaches for you.

"(Again this uselessness…) "she thought, heat flaring in her chest. "(Why do I care so much when he looks like this?)"

Juno let out a short, wet laugh and brushed ash from his sleeve. He watched the exchange with tired amusement and an old ache folded quiet beneath his ribs, the unreturned shape of a thing he'd long accepted. "(It hurts. Of course It hurts. You idiot, you fool, keep fighting)" he thought, and the sigh that left him was half resignation, half devotion.

Khael watched them both just long enough to catalog their status. He didn't smile not in a way Ceyla would notice but something soft uncoiled in his chest. "You've both grown strong," he said, voice even. "Now leave the rest to me."

He faced Kaen and Rael across the smoke-streaked field; their two figures were a raw, aching mirror of this moment rage, blood, and resolve braided with duty.

"Take care of Bakuza for me," Khael said. "Hold him. Don't let that thing recompose."

Kaen's flame flared, a white-hot flare that made the air hiss. He spat blood, wiped it away, and grinned through cracked lips. "Don't worry about Bakuza, I can take care of him."

Rael's jaw was a hard line, his blade humming in its sheath like a caged note. He nodded once, the motion small but absolute. "We'll hold him. Kill the reaper."

Bakuza laughed on the far ridge, the sound brittle and hungry. "Hoh…" He spread his arms, reveling in the ruin as if it were a feast. "Brave words. Brave little people."

Khael didn't answer. He moved.

He stepped out from the broken line of their formation and the air tightened around him like a fist. The runic veins across his skin pulsed darker, older signs burning under the new teal light. He exhaled once, and the silence that followed was a physical thing: the battlefield drew a long, involuntary breath.

Then Khael poured Shinrei into the space between him and Kero.

The current he released was not a blade or a storm but a pressure — a weight of ordered wind pressed down until motion itself balked. Runes in the air flared and sank like drowned stars. Kero's shadow-blade stuttered in its arc as the wind inside his lungs thickened, then grew thin.

Kero choked not from pain but from suffocation of the spirit. His mouth opened; no sound came. The wind he controlled recoiled, becoming a cage that closed around him. For the first time in the duel, Kero's calm fractured into ragged breaths. The black veins at his temple throbbed.

"What—" he managed, a scrap of a question he could not finish.

Khael's voice was close and cold. "You held silence for too long." He pressed the shinrei weight harder, gentle and inexorable as tide. The world compressed at Kero's ribs; his shoulders hunched, his sword sagged, and his steps faltered as if the air refused to carry him.

Kero's eyes darted, frantic now. He clawed for the wind he'd once bent into blades and found only a waiting void. The mask, cracked at the edge, trembled. For a pulse he looked human raw, panic-struck, an exposed thing.

Kaen watched with a predator's focus, fire licking his knuckles. "Heh," Kaen breathed, dark amusement and cruelty coiled together. "Don't worry about Bakuza. He'll get more than he bargained for."

Bakuza's grin narrowed but did not leave his face. Heat cupped his voice. "Hoh…" he said again, this one quieter, a promise rather than a laugh. "Good. Keep him busy, dragon."

Khael's grip on the control never loosened. The world within his push was precise; he was not trying to crush Kero outright, he was starving the sword of its breath, holding the blade until the hand that wielded it could not move freely. Every second bought Kaen and Rael more time to trap the titan's motion, more seconds for Lira to stabilize the wounded and for Shigeo's web to reroute the voidborn vectors away from the strike zone.

Ceyla, coughing, pushed herself up on unsteady arms and met Khael's eyes. "You better not go stupid on me," she rasped, heart still pounding.

Khael's reply was a single nod. "I won't. Just keep breathing."

Juno managed a half-smile at that and flexed his bandaged hands until the knuckles cracked. "Don't die on us," he muttered, less to Khael than to himself.

Kero's breathing came ragged now, the suffocating shinrei like iron. He tried to draw in wind and instead swallowed grit. For a beat, his sword slipped from his fingers; the mark of his control faltered. The shadow around him thinned, wavering.

Bakuza watched the tableau from his ruin-throne with amused hunger. "Make it last," he taunted, voice carrying like a bell. "Make it beautiful."

Khael's jaw tightened. The teal in his eyes deepened, and something like an animal thrill threaded through his indrawn breath. He held the pressure until every tendon in Kero's neck quivered then, with the precise cruelty of a surgeon, he eased it.

Kero gasped as if pulled back to shore. He coughed, one hand scrabbling for his sword, the other pressed to his throat where Khael's influence had been. He spat dark saliva and managed a wet, dangerous smile.

"You—" he rasped. "You're not merely human."

"No," Khael said quietly, almost to himself. "I'm what I must be."

Kero's eyes glittered with something like reverence and hate at once. He straightened, steadied, and the wind around him snapped into a blade again. But the pause had cost him muscle memory stuttered, rhythm broken. The next time he moved, Juno's fist met his ribs; Ceyla's lightning branded the air where his shoulder had been. Lira's healing hands flared to keep their lines from collapsing.

Kaen, flame coiling like a living thing, threw a glance at Khael and barked, "On me! Now!"

Rael answered with a shout that was half prayer, half war-cry; his Lumen Blade ignited anew, the Verdant Mirror at his back flaring as Seraphis fed light into Kenji's battered wind arcs and the group's converging path.

Bakuza peeled his gaze from Kero to the trio closing on him. The grin returned, wider and wilder, a creature hungrier for the hunt than the kill. "Good," he breathed. "Bring it to me."

To be continue