Chapter 283: Silver Got A Companion

The vision shifted once more.

She was older now.

Clad in deep green robes laced with golden vines, she walked slowly down a grand hall carved of living wood and white crystal.

Elves knelt on either side of the path, heads bowed, their bodies trembling. Not a single word was spoken as she passed, only the sound of her footsteps echoing through the silence.

At the end of the hall, towering doors opened to a massive gallery suspended in the sky. She stepped out, wind brushing past her robes as she looked down upon the city below—her city.

It stretched far in all directions, a marvel of elven beauty and symmetry. Floating gardens, towering spires, light bridges—all under the gentle golden hue of a setting sun.

Then the sky cracked.

A tear split through space above the city. Deathmist churned from it like a bleeding wound in the world. It pulsed, spiraled—and then something stepped out. A Phantom.

Her eyes narrowed.

Wind coiled around her ankles as she rose slowly into the air. She raised one arm overhead.

The space behind her warped, and then it formed—green and enormous, a translucent finger carved from pure Essence. It hovered for a breath.

Then it launched forward.

But before the result could be seen, the vision flickered.

And changed.

Now the city was in ruins.

Spire after spire lay shattered. The floating gardens were gone—nothing remained but scorched land, deep tears in the earth, and deathmist blanketing everything like a suffocating fog.

Buildings crumbled into heaps. Blood stained the streets. Fires smoldered.

At the center of it all, amid the rubble of her once-great hall, she lay broken.

Half her body was gone—burned, torn, as if it had been erased from existence. The rest of her was twisted by corruption. Black veins ran like cracks through what was once vibrant, living flesh. Her hand trembled, just once, reaching weakly toward the sky.

Then it went still.

Her golden eyes—those same eyes that had once shone with warmth, then with fierce determination—dimmed slowly. Like the last light of dusk fading into night.

And just like that, the vision ended.

Darkness wrapped around me again.

But it wasn’t empty.

A rush of information flooded my mind, a storm of thoughts, impressions, fragments of comprehension—and all of it was tied to the Law of Creation.

At first, I couldn’t even tell where I was. There was no floor beneath me, no sky above. Only endless dark. So I let go. I stopped resisting and allowed the knowledge to come. And as it happened, I started to understand.

Along with more of her memories, there were insights—pieces of knowledge Lyrate had earned across her long, tragic life. Her thoughts, her realizations, her truths.

She had started her journey with an affinity for wood, for life, for nature. That was where her heart had been. Gentle. Living. Growing.

But she hadn’t stopped there.

As her understanding deepened, she pushed beyond those roots. She began touching on greater concepts—creation in its rawest form. Birth, transformation, evolution, the shaping of reality itself.

In her lifetime, she had reached the peak of Grandmaster rank in creation laws.

And yet... it hadn’t been enough.

She had died fighting the Phantom. Even with all her mastery, she fell. Not because her will was weak—but because her path had turned hollow in the end.

The stream of knowledge drawn from her life—the memories, the insights, the weight of her experience with creation—flowed through me without pause, and I absorbed it all.

When it finally ended, I lay still.

I knew her now—not just her strength or mastery over creation, but the depth of her sorrow, the weight of her choices, the loneliness that followed her every step.

I had seen more of her life than even her closest confidants. It felt like I had lived beside her—witnessing her quiet victories, enduring each loss that carved pieces from her soul.

I felt her love for her sister—unyielding, protective, the only family she had left. I felt the fury when she failed to protect her. And I felt her final thought before death—gentle, almost grateful—as if, for just a second, she believed she might see her again.

My eyes fluttered open.

The vision faded, replaced by a soft blue sky above. I exhaled slowly as my perception reached outward, brushing against the world.

I was back. But my mind wasn’t.

It still played the echoes of her life—her strength, her fall, her final breath.

I closed my eyes, breathed in, and stood up.

"I’m glad you’re okay."

I turned to see Azalea floating a short distance away, her expression bright with relief and excitement.

But when I looked at her, I couldn’t stop the image of Lyrate from flashing in my mind.

Both had endured devastation. Both had stood alone at the edge of ruin. But Azalea survived—somehow. Lyrate didn’t. Her soul never found peace; it had been twisted, corrupted, turned into a Phantom.

I gave a faint smile. "Yeah. How long was I out?"

"Two days," she answered.

I nodded silently, my attention shifting inward as I felt the subtle changes within the generator core.

At its center, the white core—Null Heart—floated in stillness. Now, orbiting around it, two distinct cores spun in slow rotation. One belonged to Silver. The other pulsed with a darker hue—the newly acquired Phantom core.

A part of me itched to summon it, to see what physical trait I would gain from it. But I held back, forcing the curiosity down as I heard Azalea speak beside me.

She continued, "There haven’t been any Deathmist surges during the nights. The humans managing this realm noticed the change. They’re planning to investigate tonight."

I rolled my shoulders, feeling a dull stiffness. Physically I was fine, but my mind still felt stretched thin.

"I would’ve done the same," I murmured.

She pointed toward the hovering ruins. "Let’s go to my castle. We still have unfinished business there."

"Do you have a bath?" I asked.

"I don’t," she replied, grinning. "But I can create one for you."

I chuckled. "That’ll do."

I summoned Silver. We took to the skies, heading straight for the ruins. I didn’t care if the Holts saw me. I wasn’t in the mood to care. Whether it was the vision or something else, I just wanted to cause some destruction and the Holts were on the top of the list.

*****

All three of us stood before the broken castle. I dismissed Silver with a thought and turned to Azalea.

"So... you used to live here? Alone?"

She nodded.

"Yes."

There was a pause before she spoke again, softer this time.

"I didn’t want anyone to see how desperate I was becoming. I had failed... and I wanted to hide that. I wanted them to remember me as a great Naga warrior, not as someone who faded away."

I gave a quiet nod.

Azalea moved forward, through the grand archway into the castle’s hollow interior.

"Come. We have much to discuss before I depart. As promised, I’ll be handing this realm over to you—along with your bath, of course."

I followed her down the main hallway, the echo of my footsteps lost in the silence of the place.

The walls bore fractures and faded scorch marks, but even in its ruin, the place held a strange dignity.

Regal patterns still adorned the pillars, and intricate carvings stretched across the corridor’s sides—images of Naga warriors locked in battle against Abominations, Phantoms... and even Eternals.

I slowed, my eyes drawn to the image of a Naga striking at an Eternal wreathed in golden energy.

"Did you ever fight one?" I asked quietly.

She didn’t answer right away.

Then, finally, "Yes. Once. When I was a new Grandmaster."

"And?"

"I lost," she said simply.

"Why?"

Her voice was calm.

"He was stronger. Far stronger than me... and younger, too."

She didn’t sound bitter—just honest. There was no shame in her tone.