The battlefield had fallen into a momentary stillness—but not peace. It was the kind of silence that came only when something far worse was about to unfold.
Below the fractured sky of Tartarus, the domains still clashed, their borders grinding against one another like tectonic plates forced into collision. Fire bled into ice. Storm winds tore across molten plains. Reality itself seemed to strain under the weight of the three rulers who had nearly destroyed one another.
Tikadello and Albatros stood opposite each other now, towering over the broken form of Gaisen.
Gaisen lay motionless.
His wings—once vast and sovereign—were torn, half-frozen and half-burned. The currents of wind that once obeyed him had fallen silent, scattered into nothing more than faint whispers drifting across the shattered stone.
For a moment, neither Tikadello nor Albatros moved.
Then—
They turned on each other.
The Clash of Opposites
Tikadello moved first.
A surge of absolute cold erupted outward, freezing the very air into crystalline shards. The ground beneath Albatros instantly solidified, locking into a jagged prison of ice.
But Albatros did not hesitate.
With a guttural roar, heat exploded from his body—an inferno so intense it warped the space around him. The ice didn't just melt—it vaporized, turning into a screaming cloud of steam that blasted outward like a detonating star.
They collided.
Not with claws.
Not with brute force.
But with their domains.
Ice met fire in a violent collision of existence itself.
Blizzards roared against volcanic eruptions. Frozen spears pierced through waves of molten rock, only to shatter as heat swallowed them whole. The ground beneath them split open again and again, unable to withstand the opposing forces tearing through it.
Tikadello raised one massive limb and brought it down—
A continent of ice formed mid-air and crashed toward Albatros.
Albatros answered with a sunburst of flame, punching straight through it. The impact scattered frozen debris across the horizon, each shard glowing red-hot before disintegrating.
The two were no longer fighting—
They were rewriting the battlefield with every move.
A Presence Above
Then—
The sky cracked.
Not metaphorically.
Not symbolically.
It fractured.
A jagged line tore across the crimson heavens, spreading like broken glass. From within that wound, darkness seeped—not the absence of light, but something heavier. Something older.
Something that did not belong to this version of Tartarus.
Both Tikadello and Albatros stopped.
For the first time since the battle began—
They hesitated.
High above them, beyond the chaos of their domains…
A silhouette stood.
Still.
Watching.
The Return of the Reaper
Altopereh had returned.
But this was not the same form that had barely survived before.
Dark, shifting hues crawled across its frame—like living shadows clinging to its damaged structure. Its once clean, defined silhouette was now fractured, asymmetrical… evolving.
It was no longer just a machine.
It looked like something trying to remember what it used to be.
Inside the cockpit, Youri sat motionless.
The battlefield reflected across his eyes.
Gaisen fallen.
Tikadello standing.
Albatros burning.
And above it all—
Him.
"You see them," Altopereh's voice echoed inside his mind, low and distorted, like something speaking through layers of reality. "These… are the rulers now?"
A slow, almost mocking laugh followed.
"To think… this is what replaced us."
Youri exhaled quietly.
"You call them weak," he said, his voice steady, "but one of them nearly ended you."
His gaze fixed on Tikadello.
"If it wasn't for Gaisen… you wouldn't even have a core to return to."
For a moment—
Silence.
Then Altopereh laughed again.
But this time—
There was something colder behind it.
Truth vs Arrogance
"Oh, you poor fool…"
The orbiton's head tilted slightly, as if looking down on the entire battlefield with amusement.
"You keep asking the wrong question."
Its arm—damaged, yet still functional—jerked slightly before stabilizing. Dark energy flickered along its length, condensing into a warped plasma blade.
"Not what happened…"
A pause.
The blade ignited fully—unstable, crackling with something far beyond standard energy.
"…but what is happening now."
Youri's grip tightened.
Below them, Tikadello and Albatros shifted their stance.
They felt it.
Even they—domain rulers—recognized the shift.
This was no longer a three-way struggle.
Something else had entered the equation.
In an instant—
Altopereh moved.
Not like before.
Not with speed alone.
But with intent.
It didn't descend.
It cut through space.
The air screamed as the orbiton tore downward toward the battlefield, its unstable blade leaving a trail of distorted reality in its wake.
Below—
Tikadello roared.
Albatros unleashed a wave of fire.
Both turned their full attention upward.
For the first time—
They weren't fighting each other.
They were preparing…
To face him.
The Battlefield Evolves
The moment Altopereh entered their range—
Everything erupted again.
Ice surged upward in towering pillars.
Flames spiraled into a vortex of destruction.
Wind—faint but not gone—stirred weakly around Gaisen's fallen form, as if the domain itself refused to fully die.