Sarandel tilted her head back, eyes tracing the tear in the sky where Arkanis had forced the astral tear open. Light from that wound bled downward in faint, unnatural currents, staining the already dark clouds in shifting hues. She exhaled slowly.
"Having regrets about not killing the Demon Lord?"
X stood a few paces behind her, hands tucked casually into his coat pockets, posture loose despite the devastation spread beneath them. His skull mask faced the horizon, unreadable.
Sarandel shook her head once. "No. I regret not breaking his limbs and rendering him unconscious."
A low whistle slipped through the vents of X's mask, warped and hollow. "Wow. Are you certain you are not a goddess of war? Or violence?"
She did not respond.
They stood atop the only guard tower in the district still intact, balanced on the tiled peak of its roof. From that elevation they had a broad view of the city. Fires burned in scattered pockets. Streets were fractured. Entire structures leaned at unnatural angles. They could not distinguish individual faces from this distance, but they could see the signatures of combat—explosions of mana, arcs of light, shockwaves that buckled stone.
Then both of them felt it.
A sharp spike of demonic energy pulsed through the air, heavy and oppressive.
"Well," X said, turning his masked gaze toward the western quarter, "looks like the Demon Lord I beat on transformed again."
Sarandel activated Divine Eyes.
"He is engaged," she said evenly. "One opponent. A swordsman. He appears to have an unhealthy fixation on the color black. He is also wearing a wolf mask."
X gave a small shrug. "I would make fun of someone for that. But I am currently wearing a skull mask." He tapped the side of it lightly. "So that would make me a hypocrite."
Another surge rippled outward—different in texture but equally demonic.
"Was that the Commander," X asked, "or the one you spared?"
Sarandel shifted her focus, Divine Eyes sliding across the city to locate the new epicenter. Her expression sharpened slightly.
"It is the one I spoke to," she said. "He is fighting… Ercale. In his human form."
X's hands slipped out of his pockets immediately. "Wait. What?" His tone lost its idle amusement. "Ercale is out and about?"
She nodded once. "Yes. He is not alone. Several other powerful mages are supporting him." A faint pause. "They are unlikely to make a meaningful difference."
X lifted a hand and rubbed the chin of his mask thoughtfully. "Alright. That does make my job more interesting."
Before either of them could say more, something streaked upward from within the city—a sudden blur cutting a straight line into the sky at extreme speed.
X leaned forward slightly. "Alright. What the heck was that?"
Sarandel adjusted her focus, Divine Eyes tracking the streak as it diminished into the upper atmosphere.
"That," she said calmly, "was the Knight Commander being launched into the sky."
X turned toward her slowly, the skull mask angling in disbelief, as though she had suddenly grown a second head. "What?"
She began again without inflection. "That was the Knight Commander—"
He cut her off, hands coming out in a sharp, exasperated motion. "No, I heard you. I am asking how that happened."
Sarandel's gaze dropped back to the point of origin, following the residual distortion where the figure had been propelled from.
"Violet?" she breathed.
The faint hitch in her voice was rare enough to be noticeable.
"Isn't that the name of one of your Chosen One's party members?" X asked.
She nodded once, eyes still fixed on the battlefield. "She disappeared." A pause. "She is likely pursuing the Knight Commander."
Her expression tightened, something sharper cutting through her composure.
"But… she is alive. She is back."
For a brief second, her Divine Eyes lingered as if to confirm what she was sensing. Then she closed them deliberately and exhaled, forcing the reaction down.
"I will verify that later. For now, we focus on our objective."
She turned her attention toward the center of the city. They were close enough that she did not need Divine Eyes to see what was happening. King Domine was engaged with multiple opponents. At the moment, he was on the ground facing Callum directly.
Sarandel lifted her gaze once more to the torn sky above. The astral wound carved by Arkanis pulsed faintly, its edges unstable.
"Arkanis may have inadvertently assisted me," she said. "The sky is already wounded. My power will bleed through more readily than it would have through the dark clouds from the portal."
She formed her bow in her hands. She drew the string back in one smooth motion. As she did, an arrow of pure white radiance manifested between her fingers—brilliant, concentrated, almost painfully beautiful to behold.
"As the old man once said at the beginning, Let there be light," she whispered.
She released.
The arrow streaked upward in a flawless arc, piercing directly into the tear in the sky. The moment it embedded itself within the astral wound, the fracture ignited—
And a brilliant white light spread outward, cascading over the entire city.