The clash was an earthquake of flame and hunger. Faron's crimson beasts slammed into Gluttony's bloated frame, fire howling as it devoured the black tide. The air warped, torn between two forces one born of endless hunger, the other of burning defiance.

Gluttony's thousand mouths screamed as one, black ichor boiling under the storm of fire. His massive arm shook, shielding his core, flesh sizzling against the inferno.

"IMPOSSIBLE… WHO ARE YOU!!!! "

Faron staggered forward, bones splintering inside him, his every step breaking something deeper. His arms shredded, flames spilling from torn muscle like veins turned molten. His ribs were fractured glass. But his eyes his eyes blazed brighter than the beasts themselves.

"I'M JUST A MAN—" he roared, blood spraying his lips, "—A VEINWALKER WHO PROMISED YOUNG ONES THEY'D LIVE TO SEE TOMORROW!"

The crimson wolf sank its fangs into Gluttony's arm. The lion raked its claws across his chest, tearing voidflesh apart in showers of burning gore.

The battlefield froze. Rookies, teachers, even Voidborn paused to watch. The impossible was happening one Veinwalker was forcing a Sin back.

Faron's Shinrei spiraled violently, the opened 4th Gate shredding what was left of his body. Blood poured freely. His lungs wheezed like broken bellows.

(I can't… last longer. If I stop here… they'll all die. Then so be it.)

His cracked lips curled into a grim smile.

(If despair belongs to the Sins—then let my fire be the one that denies it.)

He spread his arms wide. His blades screamed, the beasts fracturing into countless sparks.

"VEIN GATE… ECLIPSE!!!!"

The 5th Gate split open.

And with it Faron Deymir split apart.

His body convulsed, flesh unraveling into ribbons of fire, veins bursting into rivers of molten crimson. His scream was no longer human, it was the roar of something ancient, something primal.

The shattered fragments of his Echo Blades spiraled upward, pulled into the inferno blazing from his soul. And then, with a sound like the cracking of heaven itself, the flames converged.

A colossal beast took form half wolf, half lion, all fire. Its mane blazed like a living sun, its fangs dripping molten light, its eyes twin furnaces of crimson Shinrei.

The Spirit of Fire.

Gluttony's thousand eyes widened in unison. For the first time, the Sin staggered a step back, ichor dripping from his wounds.

"No… this power….this shouldn't exist anymore!"

Faron's voice boomed from within the beast, layered with flame, with agony, with defiance.

"IT EXISTS… BECAUSE I STILL BELIEVE IN THEM!!"

The beast lunged, a tidal wave of fire swallowing the battlefield. Voidborn shrieked, their bodies vaporized before they could even crumble. The earth melted into rivers of glass. The air ignited, a storm of heat and crimson light.

Gluttony raised both arms, his cavernous maws screeching as they devoured flame after flame. But it wasn't enough. The beast's claws ripped through his bloated form, tearing chunks of voidflesh that sizzled into nothingness.

The Rookies shielded their eyes, tears streaming down their cheeks not from the heat, but from the sight of their teacher burning his life away.

Yuto screamed, voice cracking:

"Sir!!! YOU'LL DIE!"

But Faron's laughter, raw and broken, echoed louder than the Sin's screams.

"BETTER ME—THAN THEM!"

The beast reared back, its mane blazing like dawn. Its jaws opened, fire swirling into a core brighter than the sun itself. The final attack.

Faron's last breath.

"ECLIPSE ARTS: DEVOURER'S END!!!"

The beast's roar became a cataclysm, a tidal wave of fire that obliterated everything before it. Gluttony's screams shattered the sky, his bloated frame buckling under the onslaught. Mouths closed one after another, silenced by fire. His form warped, blistering, splitting apart as he stumbled backward.

For a heartbeat just one, the Sin of Gluttony was forced to kneel.

The battlefield glowed like a second sun had been born.

And at its center, Faron's body finally gave way, collapsing into ash that scattered on the heated wind.

But his voice lingered, soft, carried through the flames:

"Live… all of you… live, damn it…"

The crimson beast dissolved into sparks. The battlefield fell into stunned silence.

And as the flames dimmed, every student and teacher stood with tears in their eyes, fists clenched, Shinrei burning hotter than ever.

For they had witnessed it.

One man just a Crimson Veinwalker had forced a Sin to bleed.

As Gluttony staggered in the haze, black ichor pouring from the torn crater in his chest. Dozens of mouths still screamed from his body, but their tone was different now—shrill, pained, desperate.

"A CRIMSON VEINWALKER—SHOULD NEVER HAVE HURT ME THIS MUCH!" His voice broke into a thousand echoes, fury dripping into each syllable. "I AM GLUTTONY—I DEVOUR ALL!"

But the battlefield no longer trembled at his roar.

It trembled with theirs.

Teachers and the survivors of Teams 10 and 11 stood shoulder to shoulder, Shinrei surging higher than it had ever burned. Their grief had become fury, their fear hardened into steel.

"FOR FARON!!!"

The scream came from all directions at once.

Yuto's flames blazed hotter than ever, coating his entire body. "ECHO ART: BLAZING HORIZON!!!"

Aryn slammed his fists into the ground, stone pillars erupting to pin Gluttony's legs. "STONE CAGE!!"

Fina's vines lashed upward, blooming into radiant blossoms that surged with healing light, feeding power into every ally within reach. "LIVE THROUGH HIM!!"

Kara charged in with lightning cracking off her limbs, laugh turned to a war cry. "ECHO ART: THUNDER PIERCER!!!"

Izan's wind howled like a typhoon, shredding Gluttony's tendrils and driving the Sin back step by step. "YOU'RE NOT THE ONLY STORM HERE!!"

Milo raised his hands, the boy who always pretended to be weak, his Shinrei blooming in golden-white petals. "FLORAL ASCENT—BLOOM IN HIS MEMORY!!!"

And then, all together

Teachers broken but unyielding, rookies crying and screaming, every survivor pouring the last of themselves into one final strike.

Their voices became one.

"ECHO ARTS—UNITED!!"

The battlefield erupted in fire, stone, storm, thunder, bloom, and wind—colliding into a single cascade of Shinrei that roared with the memory of Faron Deymir.

Gluttony's mouths shrieked. His frame cracked, black ichor evaporating in the storm. His arms snapped under the combined force. His chest split open, the wound Faron had carved now burning with new fire.

The Sin thrashed, chains of void lashing wildly—

but every lash was cut, every scream drowned.

"IMPOSSIBLE—YOU'RE JUST CHILDREN—"

Yuto's blade pierced his core. Kara's thunder roared through it. Aryn's stone crushed it closed. Izan's wind tore it apart. Fina and Milo's bloom sealed it in a storm of radiant blossoms.

And all their voices together howled the last words Gluttony ever heard:

"THIS IS FOR FARON!!!"

The Sin of Gluttony screamed once more then shattered into black ash, dissolving into the void from which he was born.

Silence followed, broken only by the crackle of dying flames.

The rookies stood there, chests heaving, tears streaming, their Shinrei dimming. They were not victorious heroes they were survivors, carved raw by grief.

But they had done what none believed possible.

One man just a Crimson Veinwalker had forced a Sin to bleed.

And the rookies had finished what he began.

To be continue