Vale stood a short distance away, watching Chrome kneel on the fractured floor. Smoke curled faintly from the machine’s joints, and the glow in his eyes flickered as if struggling to stabilize. An uneasy knot formed in Vale’s chest.

  “Are you alright?” Vale called out cautiously.

  Chrome turned his head, the motion smooth but visibly strained. He smiled, soft and reassuring, he cradled the small core more securely in his arms. “I am,” he replied. “I just need time to recover.”

  That was all it took.

  The realization spread through the chamber like a wave. One by one, the students’ expressions shifted, shock melting into disbelief, disbelief into relief. Then the cheers came. Some shouted in triumph, others collapsed where they stood, laughing or crying openly as the weight of imminent death finally lifted from their shoulders. The danger was gone. The nightmare had ended.

  Vale didn’t join the celebration.

  His eyes remained fixed on the object in Chrome’s hands.

  The core was small, barely larger than a baseball, yet it radiated an immense density of atum. Vale could feel it humming faintly against his senses, resonating on a frequency disturbingly familiar. It was close to Miss Yuki’s signature… but not the same. The plane was identical, but the source was not.

  Hesitantly, Vale spoke. “What is that?”

  Chrome looked down at the core, his fingers brushing over its surface with deliberate gentleness, as if afraid even the slightest pressure might harm it.

  “A child,” Chrome answered quietly.

  Vale studied him for a long moment longer, searching his expression for something, guilt, sorrow or maybe certainty, but found only calm resolve. Eventually, he turned away. Whatever answers existed, they could wait. Right now, Ember needed him more than anything.

  Vale crossed the chamber, scooping up his crows as he passed. They were shaken but alive, their wings stiff with lingering cold. He set them down gently beside Ember, who lay sprawled across the floor, massive body dusted with frost. Eskar sat nearby, barely conscious, his breathing ragged and uneven. His skin looked dry, unnaturally so, his body pushed far beyond its limits. Nova knelt beside him, administering water and stabilizers with practiced urgency.

  Vale offered them a brief, tired smile before kneeling at Ember’s side.

  The wyvern’s right wing was completely encased in ice, veins of frost spreading across his scales. Ember lifted his head weakly, molten eyes blinking as Vale rested a careful hand against the frozen membrane.

  “It’s alright,” Vale murmured, voice low and steady. He let his senses flow outward, tracing the damage. “It’ll melt soon. It won’t leave much lasting harm.”

  Ember huffed softly, tilting his head before leaning forward and licking Vale’s face with unmistakable affection.

  “Hey!” Vale laughed, stumbling back as sticky saliva smeared across his cheek. He wiped his face with his sleeve, groaning as Ember chuffed in satisfaction.

  As Vale straightened, he noticed Nym approaching.

  She stopped beside him, her gaze fixed on Chrome across the chamber. Hesitant, but clearly troubled, she spoke. “Do you know him?”

  Vale followed her gaze and nodded. “Yeah,” he said simply. “He’s a friend.”

  Nym’s eyes widened slightly. “A friend…?” She turned back to Vale, her voice tightening. “The one who killed all of Callum’s relatives is your friend?”

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  The words hit Vale like a physical blow.

  “What?” he asked, his voice cracking despite himself.

  Nym stepped closer, her expression sharp, conflicted. “You’ve never heard of the Pendragon dynasty?”

  Vale took an unsteady step back, his heel catching against Ember’s wing as dread pooled in his chest.

  “The family that was annihilated by a single being,” Nym continued. “Wiped out completely.”

  Ember hissed suddenly, rising just enough to bare his fangs at her. Nym paused, glaring back at the wyvern, then exhaled and continued more quietly.

  Vale barely heard her.

  His eyes drifted back to Chrome. The machine still knelt where he had fallen, holding the core as if it were sacred. His posture wasn’t triumphant. It wasn’t proud. It was… protective.

  That wasn’t the image of a butcher.

  'No,' Vale thought. 'That can’t be right.'

  Chrome was gentle. Careful. He had risked himself to save them, had nearly destroyed his own body doing so. That wasn’t the act of something that slaughtered an entire dynasty for sport.

  By the time Nym reached him again, Vale had already made his decision.

  “Are you really friends with something like that?” she demanded, anger and disbelief burning in her eyes.

  Vale inhaled slowly, then met her gaze, cold, steady.

  “I don’t know if he did it,” Vale said. “But I know this, if the being who wiped out the Pendragons is the same one who saved us today… then yes. I’ll still be his friend.”

  Nym recoiled as if struck.

  She stared at Vale for a long moment, shock and fury warring across her face. Then she turned away sharply.

  “I should’ve never asked you to dance,” she spat, her voice tight with emotion, before storming off.

  Vale watched her go, regret settling heavily in his chest.

  He leaned back against Ember’s wing, tilting his head toward the sky as he exhaled deeply. The battle was over, but the consequences were only just beginning.

  Korin approached Vale slowly, his towering frame casting a long shadow over him. For a moment, he said nothing, just stood there like a silent sentinel, arms at his sides, eyes unreadable. The noise of celebration had begun to fade, leaving behind only distant voices and the crackle of cooling ice.

  Finally, Korin spoke.

  “Hey.” His voice was low, careful. “I want you to know something.”

  Vale looked up at him, still seated against Ember’s wing, exhaustion weighing down his limbs.

  “Even if that thing…” Korin hesitated, jaw tightening. “Even if he is the one responsible… I’d like to stay friends with you.”

  Vale blinked, surprised.

  “You’re a good guy,” Korin continued, his expression shifting between sincerity and pain. “That’s been my experience with you. It’s just that…” He trailed off, the silence stretching between them. When he spoke again, his voice dropped, quieter. “Callum lost everything to that thing.”

  The words settled heavily in the air.

  Vale stared at Korin for a moment, unsure what to say. Then he pushed himself upright, still dwarfed by the larger man, and nodded.

  “Thanks,” Vale said simply.

  For a heartbeat, everything felt still.

  Then Vale felt it, a shift. Not sound. Not movement. Something deeper, as if the world itself had flinched. His expression hardened instantly. “Something’s wrong.”

  Far from the platform, on the frozen ocean, the man lay broken and twisted upon the ice. His body was scarred, torn open in places where chrome and energy had ripped through him, yet his hatred burned brighter than ever. His teeth ground together with enough force to crack metal.

  “I lost,” he muttered.

  The words barely left his mouth before his expression twisted into something far darker. “No,” he hissed. “I didn’t lose. I just… haven’t used that yet.”

  His trembling hands summoned a holographic terminal. Symbols and commands scrolled rapidly as he typed with manic intensity. A deranged laugh bubbled from his throat, raw and unhinged, echoing across the frozen wasteland.

  He paused, his eyes lingering on the screen. A warning. A name. Miss Nebula.

  His fingers hovered above the final command. His breathing grew uneven. Then madness won.

  “If I can’t win,” he snarled, “if I can’t even kill a handful of children…” His grin stretched wide, eyes gleaming with lunacy. “Then I’ll destroy the world instead.”

  His finger slammed down.

  In the next instant, his body vanished in a flash of light, teleporting away from the catastrophe he had just unleashed.

  The air screamed.

  High above the ocean, space itself tore open. A rift, vast and horrific, bled into existence. It was crimson, the color of fresh blood, hundreds of meters tall, its jagged, unstable edges like a wound that refused to close. Chaotic atum poured from it in violent waves, warping the sky and distorting reality around it.

  The students turned as one. Cheers died in their throats. Hope drained from their faces.

  Vale felt the pressure first. His knees hit the ground as the sheer density of power crushed his senses. His breath hitched as realization struck him with brutal clarity.

  “What… did he do?” someone whispered.

  Vale didn’t answer. He couldn’t. Because he knew. That man hadn’t just ensured their deaths, he had doomed the entire world.