The sky fractured as Emma and her corrupted double separated. Golden light and necrotic darkness repelled each other like opposing magnets. The bone islands below shifted with a grinding roar, splintering apart like cosmic tombstones. Crystalline shards from tempests above rained down, slicing through air with keening wails.
Emma's Questmind interface pulsed, its golden tree structure brightening. Lyrion's voice returned, urgent now. "The rift Korrath opened is destabilizing reality. Time dilation and spatial fractures will intensify. Use your wings to stabilize your trajectory."
"What about the Titan I saw in the rift?" Emma asked mentally, dodging a crystalline shard that would have severed her spine.
"The Veiled in Shadow, stirring in its prison-realm," Lyrion replied. "Its presence warps time and space. We must close the rift before it fully emerges."
Emma's wings pulsed stronger, capacity climbing to 40 percent as she navigated the crystalline storm. Reality thinned around her. Time stretched and compressed in nauseating waves. Her golden eyes wept blood as visions assaulted her, glimpses of negation's dawn when chaos first seeded the omniverse. Star systems unraveled into void. Realities dissolved into nothingness. Titans walked with steps that shattered existence. The weight of cosmic history crushed against her consciousness.
"I see it," she gasped. "The beginning of chaos."
Sylvara hovered above the battlefield, tracking the witches' teleportation patterns. Golden dust-essence trailed from her fingertips. "Titans predate us all," she called. "before order, chaos was their will, and chaos will be their return. The Arbiter resides in the Nexus Veil, accessible through a Titan breach. Close this rift, and you may find a path."
Emmaruxis circled higher, un-light trailing from her wings. "Not the beginning," she called, voice resonating with Titan harmonics. "The truth beneath the lie."
Below, Chloe fought despite her eviscerated abdomen. A witch teleported too close, appearing partially inside her torso. Their overlapping bodies negated, tearing a ragged hole through her chest. Blood and viscera sprayed across the bone island, steam rising where it touched the ancient surface. Her scream tore through the battlefield, but her fist connected with the witch's head, pulverizing it with a four thousand ton impact. The skull exploded into fragments, black ichor mixing with her blood as she collapsed to one knee. "Still standing," she gasped, forcing herself upright.
Sylvara's voice cut through the chaos. "Chloe, your Phantaveil can evolve. Etherevoc amplifies it with ethereal projection. Focus your will to project illusions beyond physical reach."
Chloe channeled Phantaveil through Etherevoc. An illusory duplicate shimmered into existence ten feet away, drawing two witches toward it. The distraction gave her a moment to breathe as blood loss blurred her vision.
Aisha moved with mathematical precision, one-armed and half-blinded. Her remaining eye calculated teleportation patterns, predicting arrival points milliseconds before witches appeared. Her crystallized blood-blade found throats and hearts with surgical accuracy. "Pattern recognized," she muttered through blood-flecked lips.
A witch materialized behind her, exactly where she anticipated. Aisha's blade was already swinging, decapitating it before its feet touched the ground. The skull rolled across bone, black ichor painting her face as she pivoted to face the next threat.
Emma dove toward Emmaruxis, wings giving her a clumsy burst of speed. They collided again, the impact sending shockwaves across the realm. Emmaruxis's claws raked Emma's face, opening wounds that sealed almost immediately with golden light. Emma's fist connected with her reflection's sternum, delivering a seventeen thousand ton strike. The sternum splintered with a wet crunch, fragments piercing corrupted flesh as black ichor sprayed outward in a superheated mist.
"You see fragments," Emmaruxis hissed through a shattered jaw. "I see the whole."
Korrath appeared above them, shadow-cloaked and terrible. His hands summoned a massive claw of chaos magic, reality screaming as the rift tore wider. The gap expanded, revealing the Titan Veiled in Shadow. a limb of cosmic proportions draped in shadow-stuff, stirring beyond reality's edge.
"The Veiled watches," Korrath intoned, star-eyes consumed by darkness.
Lyrion's voice resonated in Emma's mind. "Korrath's chaos claw amplifies the rift. Direct strikes won't suffice. Use Aetherweave to counter chaos energy, then target the remaining witch twin to weaken his Fateweave further."
Lucas caught a teleporting witch mid-blink, his massive hands tearing it in half. The spine separated with a wet crack as vertebrae popped like brittle twigs. Black ichor drenched his gore-soaked form, mixing with his own blood from a dozen wounds. "They keep coming!" He positioned himself to shield the faltering Chloe.
Gray's voice crackled through fractured comms. "Emma, neural link failing under chaos negation, but I've isolated a pattern in the rift's energy with Techsynth. It's unstable. A concentrated strike could disrupt it." Static consumed his words.
Emma's capacity surged to 41 percent, golden wings blazing against the hemorrhaging sky. She broke through a crystalline tempest, reality shards slicing her flesh before accelerated healing sealed the wounds. Time warped around her, moments stretching into eternities as she witnessed her team below. bleeding, broken, fighting with desperation against enemies that defied physical laws.
Markus fought legless, with half his torso dissolved. A witch had teleported into him, chaos magic negating their overlapping bodies. Organs spilled across bone in a glistening mess of crimson and black ichor, but his fist still crushed the witch's skull with a three thousand ton strike. "Not yet," he gasped, consciousness fading as blood pooled beneath him.
"Markus, your Lumeheal can evolve," Sylvara called. "Soulspire enhances it with soul-based healing. Channel your essence to stabilize your form." Golden light flared around him as Soulspire activated, knitting his soul's energy into a makeshift barrier that slowed his bleeding.
"Why show me these visions?" Emma demanded of Sylvara.
"To understand the cost," Sylvara answered, golden dust swirling around her as she countered witch magic. "Order is bought with blood, always."
Emmaruxis attacked again, necrotic wings cutting through Emma's light. Their battle carved trenches through reality, exposing the fabric beneath creation. Each impact, 18000 tons, 19000 tons, threatened to shatter the fractured realm. "Choice is illusion," her reflection whispered, voice intimate despite cosmic violence. "I exist because you will exist. The thread of eternity loops."
"How do I counter her words?" Emma asked Lyrion, doubt creeping into her thoughts.
"She speaks of inevitability, but your choices define your path," Lyrion replied. "Focus on your crew, your humanity. Their trust anchors you against Titan lies."
Emma's wings blazed at 41 percent as she channeled Aetherweave to counter the chaos energy around the rift. A shimmering barrier of golden light formed, slowing its expansion. She then dove toward the remaining witch twin, Lyrion guiding her aim. "Target her core. A Fluxion strike will end her."
Emma unleashed a ten thousand ton Fluxion blast. Golden energy slammed into the twin, shattering her form into obsidian fragments. Black ichor vaporized in the heat as Korrath's Fateweave weakened further, witch coordination faltering across the battlefield.
Korrath's chaos claw tore the rift wider in retaliation. The Titan Veiled in Shadow stirred, its limb reaching toward freedom. "This is what defiance earns," Korrath called, shadow-essence boiling around him. "The Veil tears. The echo strengthens."
Emma rocketed toward the rift, golden light trailing behind her. Emmaruxis pursued, necrotic wings beating furiously. "You cannot mend what was never whole," she screamed.
But Emma wasn't trying to mend anything. She targeted Korrath. The renegade Veilweaver's eyes widened as she approached at relativistic speeds. Her fist connected with his chest, a twenty thousand ton impact that shattered his ribcage. Bones splintered with a sickening crack as his body crumpled inward. He tumbled through his own rift, shadow-essence trailing like a dying star.
The rift pulsed, darkness spilling outward like black blood from a cosmic wound. The Titan Veiled in Shadow's limb extended further, its star-filled gaze locking onto Emma with crushing intent.
Lucas bellowed from below, "Em!" His voice carried through the chaos, anchoring her against the Titan's gaze.
Time slowed as Emma hovered before the rift, golden wings blazing at 42 percent now. Each heartbeat thundered in her ears as the Titan's presence pressed against reality. The choice before her crystallized, retreat and lose this chance to find the Arbiter, or push forward through the Titan's domain.
Emma glanced down at her crew. Lucas stood protective over Chloe, both drenched in blood and ichor. Aisha calculated, adapted, and killed with mathematical precision despite her injuries. Markus clung to consciousness through Soulspire, his body more golden light than flesh now. Gray worked frantically in the vessel, fighting chaos negation to maintain their link.
Their trust was her anchor against the void.
"The Veil parts," Sylvara called, her star-magic flaring against encroaching shadow. "The path to the Nexus reveals itself. Will you face the Arbiter?"
"I'll find the Arbiter," Emma vowed, wings burning brighter at 43 percent.
She positioned herself before the rift, golden light against cosmic darkness. Emmaruxis circled, her necrotic wings leaving trails of un-light that devoured reality. "There is no return from this crossing," her corrupted reflection warned, voice layered with Titan harmonics. "The threshold changes all who pass."
"Then I'll change," Emma replied, her resolve hardening. "But on my terms."
The Titan's gaze weighed heavier, a pressure that threatened to unmake her very essence. Yet Emma held firm, anchored by her crew's presence below, by the choices that defined her. Capacity: 43 percent and rising, her wings solidifying further with each moment.
She prepared to cross the threshold, to face the Nexus Veil and whatever awaited beyond. The blood of her crew, the sacrifice of their bodies, it would not be in vain. The Arbiter waited, and with it, perhaps, the answer to the Titans' endless hunger.
The thread of eternity stretched before her, not a loop but a path of her own making.