The bridge, suspended in nothingness, was broken at its center—as if it symbolized a rift between two times… or two hearts. The wind did not blow; it pulled. A strange gravity, like a call from the depths of ancient forgetting, tugged more at the soul than the body.
Xiao stood at the edge of the bridge, staring into Heim's eyes.
Not as he remembered him. His face wasn't angry, nor cold—it was expressionless, as if his past had been erased and replaced with a darkened blank page.
Heim spoke softly:
> "Hello, Xiao. How long has it been since we chose different paths?"
Xiao didn't respond right away. He looked past Heim… and there, behind him, was the *Core of the God* —the essence of light the fallen gods once spoke of.
Xiao took a step forward. The creak of the bridge beneath his feet sounded like a scream from the past.
He said quietly:
> "I thought you were dead… or that I killed you that day."
Heim smiled—but it held no warmth.
> "Maybe you did. Or maybe I died inside the moment you chose to sacrifice me."
Xiao clenched his fists. His blood was boiling—not from rage, but from the *weight of choice*. He had believed he sacrificed for a noble goal… but was it truly so? Or was he simply too weak to face the truth?
Heim drew a new sword—not his old one, but a *shard from the Core itself*.
> "Come, Xiao… This isn't a battle of strength. It's a *trial of fate*."
---
*The Battle of Shadow and Light:*
Energy erupted between them. Xiao's sword blazed with the fire of memories, while Heim's blade absorbed the shadows from the void itself.
First strike— *the bridge cracked*.
Second strike— *the air tore apart*.
Third strike— *the screams merged*, no one could tell whose they were.
Heim fought with a new style—familiar yet distorted, as if it had been stitched together from shards of broken techniques. Every movement carried *a longing… and a bitterness*.
Xiao began to breathe heavily.
But then, he saw Astaire's face… then Ragnar's… then the faces of those he had saved.
They weren't just memories. They were *reasons*.
He shouted:
> "I didn't choose this path to rebuild the past…
> I chose it to *atone for it*!"
And he unleashed a new technique— *"Coreflare."*
---
Light and fire exploded across the bridge, transforming the place into a celestial battlefield. Even the edges of the dimension *began to split*.
In the end, Heim's sword fell.
He hadn't been defeated— *he had surrendered*.
Looking into the void, he whispered:
> "Maybe… you didn't kill me, Xiao.
> Maybe I let you go… because I feared watching you reach fate before me."
Xiao stepped forward and placed a hand on his friend's shoulder. *Victory wasn't what mattered—only acknowledgment.*
---
In a moment of stillness, the bridge vanished.
A *stone throne* appeared at the heart of the void, surrounded by *seven seals*, each pulsing with a different light.
The woman's voice returned:
> "You have completed the trial, Xiao…
> But your choice now is not between light and shadow—
> It is to *become the god… or slay the god*."
His new cloak, woven from the *ashes of rebirth*, fluttered around him.
The chapter had not closed—
*the door to destiny had just opened.*