Paraxis no longer resembled a realm of observation.
It was a theater of annihilation.
The flat, floating world fractured into layered plates of reality, each one breaking and reforming as the Sole Exception Army surged forward. Thousands of Watchers descended like a silver storm—eyes burning, laws screaming, weapons forged from rewritten causality.
And at the very front—
Malthior stood still.
Not because he hesitated.
But because wars had learned to move around him.
A Watcher lunged first—six observation-spears converging into a singularity strike meant to overwrite existence within a radius.
Malthior took one step forward.
The ground beneath him collapsed inward, not from force—but from submission.
He lifted his greatsword.
Not fast.
Not slow.
Perfect.
The blade came down.
The singularity didn't explode.
It bowed—then shattered.
The Watcher split into fragments of broken narration, each piece erased before it could even understand it had died.
Malthior exhaled.
"Advance," he said calmly.
The Sole Exception Army roared.
Malthior did not fight like a berserker.
He fought like a general who had already seen the end.
Every step repositioned the battlefield. Every swing redefined engagement ranges. Where he walked, Watchers found themselves out of place—too far, too close, attacking angles that no longer existed.
A dozen Watchers attempted to flank.
Malthior reversed his grip and slammed the pommel of his sword into the ground.
VOID COMMAND — DOMINION SHIFT
Reality tilted.
Left became down. Distance inverted. The Watchers slammed into one another as spatial priority reordered itself around Malthior's presence.
Veloria moved.
She blurred into existence behind the cluster, twin void-blades singing.
"ECLIPSE VEIN."
She carved once.
Every Watcher she passed through forgot what defense was—their protections collapsing as if they had never been learned.
Alyth laughed mid-air, spinning her spear.
"Too slow!"
She hurled it.
The weapon multiplied mid-flight—one spear becoming a constellation—each impact pinning a Watcher to frozen frames of time, locking them in moments they would never leave.
Thariel descended like a god reclaimed.
His roar bent the sky.
He grabbed two Watchers by their heads and slammed them together hard enough that observation itself cracked, their cores imploding into lightless dust.
Vorynn raised one hand.
"ABSOLUTE NULL—LOCALIZED."
An entire section of the battlefield ceased.
Not destroyed.
Stopped existing.
They weren't losing because of numbers.
They were losing because this army was not bound by consequence.
Watchers that struck fatal blows watched their enemies reform—void knitting flesh, authority recalling will.
A Watcher screamed in realization.
"THEY ARE HIS WILL—"
Malthior appeared in front of it.
He didn't raise his sword.
He punched.
The Watcher exploded into fragments of erased purpose.
"As long as Lucien lives," Malthior said calmly,
"we do not fall."
He lifted his blade again.
"And today," he added,
"you learn why he lets me walk ahead of him."
The remaining Watchers attempted one last convergence—thousands merging into a singular, towering construct of observation and rewritten law.
Malthior planted his sword tip-down.
"SOLE EXCEPTION FORMATION — FINAL MARCH."
The army aligned.
Veloria, Alyth, Thariel, Vorynn—every commander stepping into perfect position as if they had rehearsed this moment across eternities.
Malthior drew his sword.
The blade screamed—not from sharpness, but from authority.
He swung once.
The construct split.
Not cracked.
Not shattered.
Split cleanly in half, the cut extending infinitely upward and downward, severing every layer of Paraxis it passed through.
The Watchers disintegrated mid-motion.
Silence fell.
The Sole Exception Army stood alone.
Smoke drifted across broken reality.
Malthior sat down on a massive boulder, resting his greatsword across his knees.
Veloria leaned against the stone beside him, arms crossed.
Alyth sat on the edge, legs dangling.
Thariel stood behind them, arms folded, wings half-unfurled.
Vorynn and the others gathered naturally—some standing, some seated.
They didn't speak.
They didn't need to.
It looked—
Almost like a pose.
As if an invisible camera had frozen the moment.
From afar, Elyndor watched.
His countless eyes tracked the battlefield's end, the impossible victory.
He exhaled slowly.
"So that's how it is…" he murmured.
Then his expression tightened.
"But why would the Creator influence events to this degree?" he whispered.
"It can't be only because of Lucien…"
Unease crept into his being.
Elyndor turned sharply.
And ran.
The Library of Reality welcomed him with silent gravity.
Elyndor rushed to the central table.
There—
The book Götterdämmerung lay open.
No longer at the first page.
The second page had revealed itself.
Elyndor swallowed.
And read.
"The previous Creator was not as it once was."
"The reason it sought to destroy the coming New Creator was corruption—its will influenced by a False Creator being."
"The Original Creator slew the False Creator, but not before corrosion spread into itself and the narrative."
"Before losing itself, the Original Creator acted."
"It separated the White from the World Tree."
"Whoever masters the White exists outside all rules and laws of creation."
"The Sole Exception to Everything."
"Should that being find the Original Source of the White—World Tree Ydris within the Primordial Void—he would grow beyond even the Creator."
Elyndor's breath caught.
The text continued.
"The end of the era is inevitable."
"When the New Creator enters Paraxis, rules will change."
"The majority of Watchers will be sent to eternal rest—except the Unobserved King."
"The army of the coming New Creator will be victorious."
"The New Creator will enter the Room of White—home to the Sub-Creator—between the Creator's realm and Paraxis."
Elyndor trembled.
Then he read the final lines.
"Though the Sub-Creator may fight the coming New Creator, it will only last a time."
"For unlike all else, the New Creator is ever-growing."
"His arsenal is infinite—of what is, and what is not."
"He exists outside everything."
"He is the greatest threat to all that is—and all that is not."
"The Sub-Creator will know agony."
"And true death."
Elyndor closed the book slowly.
"…So that's the truth," he whispered.
Far away—
Lucien Dreamveil sat before a white throne.
And the Twilight of the Gods continued to unfold.