CHAPTER 186: APART TO BE TOGETHER: PART 3 - CURSE

As the battle erupted, Telos seized his singular blade, unleashing a flurry of strikes that sliced the air with blinding speed.

Each blow painted streaks of motion, driving Asahi and Aletha backward.

With a surge of resolve, he tore a fragment from his own cyan heart and hurled it at the enemy.

Aletha’s perception was flooded by memories of The Attacker, recalling exactly how digging at the heart always brought calamity.

Yet, even as Telos unleashed a tempest of slashes, the figure stood resolute—a shadow carved from stone, unmoved and unbreakable in their path.

With each rapid swing, Telos darted his gaze, feeling his power surge and return to him like a rushing stream. Flickers of family memories danced in his mind, spurring him to race along the walls and strike the figure with renewed might.

"Morwenna."

As Asahi and Aletha fell back, chaos exploded around them. Telos’s voice cut through the turmoil, ragged with desperation.

"You two! Get your blades ready, now!" He demanded as his blade dropped to the ground.

"On it!" replied the wanderers as the sound of steel clashing against metal reverberated on the walls.

They ricocheted from wall to wall, dodging deadly strikes in a blur of motion.

Swords and beams danced in a deadly ballet, weaving around them. In a heartbeat, they launched a decisive, lethal strike at the creature.

A blinding eruption of white light burst from the device, yet the creature refused to yield.

This being didn’t just have arms; it had several visors. Its strength overpowered theirs. Asahi decided to dash straight forward with his blade, marking a scratch on its steel surface. Then Aletha came forward in a distant swing, striking from the top and running on the walls.

Their blades tangled in a furious dance as the mechanism roared, hurling itself wildly. The room tilted and slipped downward, cloud pillars and debris swirling in chaos as Asahi and Aletha plummeted. Telos darted desperately, weaving through the mayhem until suddenly,

(SHING)

As a magenta strike stained the air, time slowed down in a vignette as the streak painted the earth in essence.

The mechanism and device shattered in an instant.

As the mechanism shattered into a rain of gears, a veiled silhouette drifted down the hallway, her only possession a shimmering white dress. Telos’s breath caught, dread curling in his chest as he recognized her.

She was barefoot, with almost no marks on her body.

Her skin was flawless, her dark magenta eyes intense, and her long silver hair cascaded like a silken waterfall. Her beauty radiated a perilous allure, sharp enough to cut through the night, glimmering like a dew-kissed blossom. The abruptness of her attack made them recoil, mesmerized by the radiance shimmering at her feet.

In that instant, Asahi and Aletha’s blades slipped from their grasp, shock and awe freezing them as the truth of her identity struck home.

"Aiyana!"

But then, as her foot touched and scraped the ground, along with her shimmering white dress, the young woman started to speak.

"Our ownership of this world has been lost to time," She said as she choked Telos to death with magenta strings. "I won’t allow this incarnation to pass."

Asahi, having zero clue why this figure was hurting Telos, couldn’t help but drop his sword in awe. This girl, the woman they saw, was indeed Aiyana. But something felt off about her. Aletha tried to speak, but still fell into shock. Telos tried to speak but was forced unconscious by the aspects of Aiyana.

. . .

A sudden stillness fell. The confrontation’s echoes faded, ushering in a tense new moment between the three.

Now, with only Asahi, Aletha, and Aiyana left, a taut silence stretched between them, heavy with unspoken questions waiting to break free...

"Why won’t you come home?" Asahi asked as he clenched his fist. "We have been looking for you. Why are you resisting us?"

The figure remained silent at his words.

Aletha moved toward Aiyana, arms outstretched for an embrace, but Aiyana stepped away, her silent nod a barrier between them.

"No, the Prism has translocated. Everything underneath has been lost to time. The world of Gincad is lost, and only the remains of the war emerge. "

Aletha then asked, with a palpable sweat dripping on her face.

"Aiyana, please. Come with us. We can leave this world. We can start anew. We can start somewhere else, FAR from here."

After moments of silence and recollections, the young woman wearing a silver dress, Aiyana, replied to Aletha with a sneer.

"Even if we were to escape this world together, what good will it do for our abode? Our universe?" She said as her hand scraped the wall. "What about our parents, Acheros and Achlys? What about me?"

Asahi and Aletha stood rooted, shaken by her cryptic words. This was not the Aiyana they remembered; her spirit, once radiant, now flickered with shadows. As they watched, transfixed, Aiyana revealed more.

"It’s because of this curse," She said, "This horrible, destructive curse. It had been with our family since the very beginning. All those people, all those creatures." Aiyana, after snapping Telos back into life, looked over to the two and had an empowering conversation. "I won’t tolerate it."

"What?" Aletha shouted with shock. "Why are you acting like this? We’re your siblings!"

Aiyana, not impacted by their words, formed a barrier away from Asahi and Aletha.

Her shimmering white dress contrasted with the chill of her lifeless words. Her eyes, pale and nearly void of feeling, flickered as she glanced at the mark on her hand. With a surge of pink luminance, she tore a pillar of clouds apart, sending fragments spiraling into the distance.

"I know that you both are my siblings." She grieved. "Of which I love very, very much. I wish my brother and sister nothing but harmony. However, something must be said. They can not hide it any longer. Asahi, Aletha,"

As both their eyes drifted back and forth at the blurry, transforming figure, shocked by her actions, a reveal unlike any other was shared.

. . .

A heavy silence descended as revelations loomed.

"I destroyed our world," Aiyana said, her eyes cold and lifeless.

. . .

Time seemed to stand still as realization struck.

In that moment, Asahi and Aletha’s world turned to ice. For so long, two hopes had driven them: to reunite with Aiyana and to unmask the destroyer of their world. They had suspected The Establisher, following a trail of clues and doubts.

Both hopes shattered in a painful truth: the one they yearned for was also the destroyer—Aiyana.

Now, Asahi understood why the Nameless Cavern people said there was a dead look in her eyes. Her innocence ended with that traumatic event. Asahi and Aletha were left speechless, unable to grasp that she was the one they had sought to avenge.

Aiyana’s confession left Asahi and Aletha lost in uncertainty.

"Aiyana, please," Aletha pleaded. "Just unite with us, and let’s find a different world. There’s so much out there." "Can’t you see? We can’t live like this!"

Aiyana screamed, her voice twisting the shadows into a furious storm around her.

"It’s this curse—this world-destroying curse. It’s haunted us again and again."

With almost remorseful eyes, Aiyana shook her head and raised her voice.

"We can’t let the curse ruin everything. That’s why... we must stay apart, so we can be together," she said, tears streaming down her face.

As Aiyana faded into nothingness, Asahi and Aletha reached out, tears streaking their faces, but their hands closed on empty air. Her hollow voice lingered, echoing through the boundless void.

" Brother, Sister... There is much you don’t know about the truth of our family." She said with sniffles, "Yes, indeed, I have destroyed the old world. But that doesn’t mean you need to hurt in the new one. Until this curse gets lifted, before I find a way to get... my vengeance..."

Just before vanishing, Aiyana forced Aletha to the floor, streams of essence swirling around Asahi’s mark. All watched as her form dissolved into shimmering white particles that scattered across the floor.

Like Telos before her, Aletha was drawn into Asahi’s mark, leaving him utterly alone on the barren surface.

Now, with no understanding of Aiyana’s motives, Asahi dreadfully looked back at her and said.

"Why are you doing this?" He asked, trembling, "Don’t you love us?! What have you done to Aletha!?"

Only silence erupted from Asahi’s blank words.

Even more painful than Aiyana’s destruction of their world was her trapping Aletha within Asahi. The act felt merciless, erasing every joyful memory from Linuxinia and every hard-won victory after the battles with Aedline and Alaunus. Now, all of it seemed hollow and meaningless.

But then a recollection dawned in him.

. . .

Memories from the past surged abruptly to the surface.

The pink luminance, the luminance that had enveloped the old world, matched the very luminance trailed in the past. It was true; Aiyana did destroy their world.

In the past, Asahi, Aletha, and Aiyana were trying to escape their doomed world. But after losing the floating castle in the sky, they dropped Aiyana.

Now, just before they were about to escape, The Establisher came into being and did a number on them. They tried to save their parents, but they were caught in the luminance as well.

. . .

Memories faded, drawing Asahi back to the present.

At last, the scattered pieces of their past snapped into place.

The underground world, the surface, everything.

It was Aiyana who had unleashed all of this—the turmoil, the enemies, every shadow that haunted them traced back to her.

After the storm of painful memories, only one final conversation lingered—a last echo after the tragedy.

"Tell me, why are you doing this?" Asahi fell into tears. "Why are you doing this to your own family?"

And answering with cold, lifeless eyes, she revealed her arm covered in black, corrupting substance. Magenta lines of ruin climbed on her skin, revealing it to be like a pulsating heart.

"It’s because of this curse I have," She said with her final words. "It’s our enemy."

After speaking those words, Aiyana vanished into the shadows and returned to where she came. No words were spoken after the disappearance of his own sister. He had hoped that they would reunite, but in fact, it was far from the case.

At last, Telos and Aletha faded into Asahi’s body, leaving him stranded in a vast, echoing emptiness.

Asahi started to well up with tears in his eyes as he heard Aletha’s voice swarming inside his head.

Their voices quivered on the brink of despair, every word weighted with heartbreak.

All the happy moments, the hope of reunion, were torn up and scattered, lost to the void.

As the seconds crawled by, a biting chill pressed against Asahi’s face; an arctic wind swirling and raising goosebumps on his skin. He was no longer in the citadel, nor in Linuxinia with friends, but somewhere far more desolate.

A majestic ice peak towered before Asahi, its beauty both mesmerizing and menacing.

Though his body bore no wounds, Asahi’s heart lay in ruins, leaving him stranded in the wilds of Astait, swallowed by despair.

(ARC 3 COMING SOON)