Black sword in hand, the Returnee stood as the final bulwark against the anomaly. Across the shattered stone floor, the Time Patrol waited. TP face was a mask in the truest sense—a porcelain expanse of nothingness, stripped of every micro-expression that defined humanity. Yet, despite the smoothness of his features, the air around him radiated a freezing, mocking arrogance. The corner of his mouth twitched, forcing the skin into a sharp, unnatural crease.

  "Ahh… what a sorry little troupe," TP sighed. His voice was smooth, devoid of tension, echoing as if speaking from the bottom of a well. He spread his arms, gesturing to the collapsing void around them. "And such a tite stage, too."

  "Shut it!" Naz roared, the sound erupting from his barrel chest like a detonation. The veins in his neck bulged against his collar as he channeled every ounce of his massive strength into his legs. He didn't just charge; he launched himself like a siege engine, the stone beneath his boots turning to powder under the stress. His greatsword, a slab of iron that would crush a normal man, shore through the air with a terrifying, low-frequency hum, descending like a falling tower.

  At the same instant, Rize accelerated. She became a blur, a streak of light. Her [Lightning] tore a line through the stagnant air, leaving searing afterimages in her wake. Her blade was the opposite of Naz’s—silent, precise, a razor-thin line of death aiming for the jugular.

  And then, dragging herself up from the blood-slicked floor, Claval joined them. She was a ruin of a girl. Her skin was the color of ash, her armor wet with crimson, her body trembling with the shock of blood loss. But her eyes burned with a terrifying, diamond-hard clarity.

  "I’m paying you back—right now!" Her scream cracked the air. Her form was rough, her footing unstable, but the strike was propelled by a sheer, absolute refusal to die. It was a blow of pure will.

  Three vectors of death. Three pinnacles of violence. They converged on a single point in space.

  Time Patrol merely sighed. He didn't dodge. He didn't brace. He simply tilted his shoulder and raised one arm in a lazy, sweeping motion, as if brushing away a cobweb. SCREE-CLANG. It wasn't a block; it was a rejection of physics. Metal screamed in agony. Sparks spat like angry fireflies, blindingly bright against the dark void. A shockwave detonated outward, cracking the stone floor into a spiderweb of fissures and blowing the dust away in a violent ring.

  "How uncouth," TP murmured, his lips twisting in disdain as the three attackers were blown back by the recoil of their own strength.

  Claval growled, tasting copper in her mouth. She forced her shaking legs to stabilize, ready to launch again. Naz’s sword howled as he recovered his stance. Rize’s flashes crossed like a thunderstorm, seeking an opening that didn't exist. And still—TP parried every lethal strike with a smirk, his movements insults in motion.

  "Of course it’s uncouth." The gritty voice cut through the chaos, grounding the whirlwind of violence. The Returnee stepped through the dust cloud, his timing impeccable. "We’re the 'inspired style.'" His silver gauntlet flashed.

  For the first time, the porcelain mask shifted in genuine surprise. THUD. Impact detonated between them. It wasn't the sharp ring of metal, but the dull, heavy sound of meat and bone colliding with the density of a collapsing star.

  ?

  Behind the wall of concussive force, Hanara took one deliberate step back. She inhaled—deep and slow. For the first time since entering this hellscape, the air didn't catch in her throat. The static that had plagued her lungs cleared, replaced by the crisp, cold taste of potentiality. A strange distortion buzzed between her ears, but this time, it wasn't interference. It was connection. —This time… I can do it.

  Every attempt until now had failed. Her chants had been muted by the atmosphere, her formulas collapsing under the weight of the Time Patrol’s oppressive presence. But this fight was different. The Returnee’s interference was acting as a wedge, destabilizing the enemy’s dominance and unsealing the magic.

  Finally…Hanara knelt, driving both short swords into the cracked ground to anchor, she closed her eyes. Darkness sharpened her world. The heat of the sparks. The blinding light of Rize’s speed. The chaotic rhythm of Claval’s desperate heartbeat. The pulse of raw mana in the air.

  Ahead, the Returnee locked blades with TP. Black sword pressed against an invisible barrier. The silver gauntlet ground against the TP’s defense, sparks bursting between them like dying stars.

  "What—" The mask twisted in confusion, TP’s composure fracturing.

  "Now! DO IT!" TP’s voice was drowned out by the Returnee’s roar, a command that shook the foundations of the dimension.

  Hanara’s eyes snapped open. They were brilliant, cold, and void of mercy.

  "Single Number 008 —[T.O.R.]" Her voice dropped to a whisper that carried more weight than a scream, vibrating with the power of an invoked law.

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  ?

  White erupted. It wasn't light. It wasn't darkness. It was absence. A rushing flood of "deletion" stripped logic itself away from the world. Color peeled off reality like old paint. Sound drowned in a vacuum of absolute silence.

  "Single Number!?" Roa shouted, her voice thin and terrified against the rising roar. "Not here—this space is too small!"

  Rize halted mid-step, her breath stolen by the pressure. Claval, still glowing with her violet aura, gripped her sword as if it were the only anchor in a dissolving world.

  The White swelled. It swallowed Time Patrol whole. A torrent. [Torrent Of Ruin.]

  "…Not bad." For the first time, a genuine flicker of emotion crossed TP’s mask. A twisted smirk—half admiration, half scorn.

  "...Blow away with this." Hanara’s lips curled in response. It wasn't mockery. It wasn't pride. It was just raw, lethal intent.

  The White detonated. The shockwave cracked the world. It was a gut-punching blast of pressure that forced everyone to shield their eyes as the fabric of the dimension was scrubbed clean. Only Hanara didn’t move. She stood firm amidst the erasure, her gaze like sharpened steel, watching the result of her calculation.

  ?

  A voice—half-taunt, half-praise—rippled through the blinding white.

  "Claval… well done." The Returnee didn’t flinch. He forced his burning body forward, driving his black blade deeper into the form of the enemy. The words reached the violet-lit girl through the roaring silence. Her sword trembled in her hands. Her lips quivered. Tears stung her eyes, hot and sudden, blurring the image of the man who had given her everything.

  The White consumption closed in, eating the silhouettes of both combatants.

  "…We’ll meet again." A shadow creased the TP’s mask one last time. And then, Time Patrol vanished—erased in the torrent. So did the Returnee. His blade, his gauntlet, his scarred form—they didn't fall. They dissolved into drifting particles of light, scattering into the void like dust in a gale.

  "Grandpa—!!" Claval screamed. The White swallowed her cry.

  Then—Silence. The torrent collapsed inward, leaving only an empty, terrifying space where two lives had stood moments ago. The air cracked. The world shuddered. And then, with a violent, sickening tremor, the dimension itself began to collapse.

  ?

  Grass. Yu blinked, the sensation alien against his skin. He was lying in grass—soft, damp, cold, and undeniably real. The warped pocket dimension was gone. There was no black dome, no suffocating void. Only the familiar outskirts of Avlas, resting under a quiet, indifferent night sky. The crickets were chirping, oblivious to the battle that had just ended.

  "…We’re back," Naz muttered, his chest heaving as he pushed himself up from the dirt.

  "Status?" Roa asked, her voice tight. She was still holding a ball of healing light in her shaking hands, her knuckles white.

  "Everyone’s—wait." Rize froze. Her eyes locked onto a figure on the ground. "Claval!"

  The girl lay collapsed in the tall grass, her body pulsating with a faint, violet glow.

  "Claval! Please—!" Yu rushed over, sliding to his knees and lifting her into his arms. Her skin was cold, but the air around her hummed with heat. A throb answered him. Thump-hum. Mana pulsed from deep inside her chest. It wasn't the soft warmth of life; it was the aggressive buzz of energy. The terrible wounds on her body began to knit closed at a speed that defied nature. Flesh rewove itself in seconds, closing over exposed bone.

  "Regeneration…? No. This is… something else." Roa stared, stunned.

  "…Yu…?" Claval’s eyelids fluttered. Slowly, the eyes revealed themselves, dull but conscious.

  "I’m here! You’re alive—!" Tears spilled down Yu’s face, blurring his vision.

  "No. Listen carefully. This isn’t healing. It’s closer to... resurrection." But Roa shook her head, her face pale.

  "…Meaning?"Rize inhaled sharply.

  "She can’t live without mana anymore. Here, in this world, she’ll survive. But in Yu’s world—" Roa’s voice turned grave, the weight of her medical knowledge pressing down on them.

  "—I know." The whisper cut through the tension. Claval looked up at them, her voice faint but steady. She smiled—a soft. "I already knew that."

  Claval expression that broke Yu’s heart. Yu tightened his arms around her, a crushing pain dragging through his chest as he realized he had failed to save her future.

  "It’s okay. See? I’m alive." Claval lightly tapped his hand with her glowing fingers.

  "No," Roa said, her professional demeanor cracking. "Don’t move. Not yet."

  Claval bit down her frustration, closed her eyes, and let the violet glow settle into her bones. The night wind brushed her hair, carrying the scent of rain and loss.

  Everyone exhaled in relief, but the weight of the cost pressed down on them all like a physical load.

  ?

  There was nothing left on the grass. Just grass, and silence.

  "…Is it over?" Naz murmured, staring at the empty space where the enemy had been.

  "No," Rize said firmly. She didn’t look away from the empty air. "They’re gone. That’s all. They escaped, or were erased. I feel…It's not over."

  "We lived. But that’s not the same as winning." Roa continued to monitor Claval’s vitals, her voice tight with suppressed emotion.

  Yu held Claval, watching her eyelashes tremble faintly against her cheeks. The Returnee’s final words burned in his mind like a brand. Well done. A farewell he hadn't agreed to.

  "I’m the one..." Yu’s voice cracked, brittle and weak. "I'm the one who brought them together..." The wind swallowed his confession, carrying it away into the dark.

  "This isn’t over. You know that too… right?" Rize stepped forward, touching his shoulder gently. Her touch was grounding, but her words offered no easy comfort.

  Yu didn’t answer. He just looked at her, his eyes reflecting the vast, empty night. The grassland at night spread out quietly, filled with a sense of unease and loss.