The depths of the Estuary became an abyss of distorted time.
Cronos descended at speeds that defied all logic, his transcendent form of twisted time shining like a beacon in the primordial darkness. The Sacred Demon writhed beneath his grip, its tentacles desperately trying to break free, but the Transcendent of Time did not release his prey. He had seen the nexuses, he had understood the plan, and nothing in this universe or any other would stop him.
The aspect of time that Cronos possessed protected him from the distortions that affected other beings. While Daeron had aged decades in seconds, Cronos moved through the temporal loops with a fluidity that only someone who had embraced the concept of time could possess. Each second he spent in those depths was a year, a decade, a century, but for him, it was simply another instant in his eternal dance with chronology.
And then he saw it.
Thousands of runes glowed on the riverbed, forming a complex pattern that stretched as far as the eye could see. They were the foundations of Ariel's sorcery, the nexuses that kept the Great River bound in an eternal cycle. Each rune pulsed with ancient energy, and the time around them was so dense that he could feel it as a physical weight upon his being.
It was at that moment that Cronos remembered.
This was the same place where he had achieved supremacy. Countless years ago, on a previous journey through the Estuary, he had reached these depths and had understood the true nature of time. It was not a line, it was not a cycle, it was a living force that could be shaped, tamed, and yes, even killed.
The memory propelled him forward.
With a roar that resonated across all frequencies of existence, Cronos slammed the Sacred Demon against the runes. The impact was catastrophic. The shapeless mass of grayish flesh crashed against the nexuses, and the runes began to crack, forming a chain reaction that spread like a wave of destruction across the riverbed.
The Sacred Demon shrieked, a sound that was neither a roar nor a groan, but the distorted agony of a thousand tortured souls. Its body, which had been immune to so many attacks, began to tear apart. The will that had kept it unshakeable for eons crumbled along with the runes that gave it existence. Deep wounds opened in its flesh, and a black substance gushed from them, dissolving into the water.
The guardian was gravely wounded. Shattered. But not dead.
With a desperate movement, the Sacred Demon freed itself from Cronos's grip and began to ascend toward the surface, fleeing from the depths where its very existence was being dismantled. Its tentacles moved with frenzy, and its will, though weakened, still pulsed with the need to survive.
Cronos did not pursue it.
He could not.
Because at that moment, time struck him with all its fury.
The destroyed runes had released the concept of time they had kept prisoner, and now that energy hurled itself at the only living being remaining in the depths. Cronos felt his body age and rejuvenate in chaotic cycles. His skin wrinkled, his bones weakened, and then, in an instant, he was young again, only to age once more. Each second was an eternity of torment, each beat of his heart was a century of existence compressed into an instant.
But Cronos did not give up.
He extended his soul, embracing the temporal chaos that enveloped him. Time was not his enemy—it was his domain. And if he wanted to survive this, he needed to do what he had always known he must do.
He needed to kill time.
This would be his act of defiance, the trial that would take him beyond the limits of transcendence. To become a Supreme, he needed to prove that he was worthy of that power, that he could master the concept he had embraced his entire life.
Cronos closed his eyes and plunged into the temporal maelstrom.
His soul extended like a net, catching the fragments of time that bombarded him. He shaped them, tamed them, forced them to submit to his will. He felt the decades of experience accumulate within his being, the centuries of knowledge flow through his mind. And in the midst of that chaos, he found the truth he had been seeking.
Time was not a force that could be controlled. It was an illusion, a construct of perception. And Cronos, the Transcendent who had traveled through the loops of the Great River, was the only one who could see through that illusion.
With a cry that echoed through the void, Cronos assimilated time.
He did not control it. He did not dominate it. He assimilated it, integrating it into his own essence. The concept of time became part of him, and he became part of the concept. His body stopped aging and rejuvenating; instead, it stabilized in an eternal state, an existence that transcended the limits of chronology.
Cronos opened his eyes, and within them shone the power of a Supreme.
---
On the surface, Uriel and Daeron saw the guardian emerge.
The Sacred Demon broke the water's surface with an explosion of black energy, its body shattered and bleeding. The mass of grayish flesh that had once been imposing was now a shadow of what it had been. Its tentacles hung limp, and its will, once so heavy it could crush souls, was now weak, barely a whisper of what it had been.
Uriel felt the change before he saw it. The pressure he had been enduring since the battle's start suddenly lifted, and the guardian's overwhelming presence reduced to something almost insignificant.
"What happened to it?" Uriel asked, his voice filled with awe.
Daeron observed the guardian with a mixture of satisfaction and caution. "Cronos reached the nexuses. He destroyed the runes that maintained the cycle. The guardian is dying."
The Sacred Demon attempted to attack, but its movement was clumsy, uncoordinated. Its tentacles rose weakly, and its will barely managed to extend a few meters before fading away. The creature that had been an immortal guardian was now an empty shell, an echo of what it had once been.
Uriel watched the scene with a mixture of satisfaction and concern. The guardian was defeated, but where was Cronos?
And then, from the depths, he felt something.
A presence that had not been there before. A will that rose like a rising sun, filling the Estuary with its power. It was not the overwhelming will of the guardian, but something more subtle, more profound. Something he recognized as familiar, yet transformed.
Cronos had ascended.
The water began to churn, and from the depths emerged a figure. It was Cronos, but it was not the same Cronos who had submerged. His body radiated an energy that distorted the space around him, and in his eyes shone the eternal light of tamed time. The Transcendent of Time had ceased to be a Transcendent.
Cronos, the first Supreme being born in Ariel's Tomb, had been born.