The portal deposited them back into the Sanctuary's gateway chamber. A system prompt glowed before them:
Jade ignored it, his mind immediately reaching for the World-Eater. The connection was stronger now, a low, steady hum in his soul, but a status bar appeared in his vision:
[World-Eater Evolution Progress: 37%]
Thirty-seven percent? Jade's eye twitched. After all that? The broken sword, the bull, the broken rib—it had only advanced by a quarter. Why is it evolving now? What is it even evolving into? The lack of control, the unanswered questions, grated on him. The fight hadn't sated the hunger; it had only sharpened it.
He and Zero parted ways with a nod. Jade stalked to his room, the silence echoing his frustration. He didn't bother with the lights, simply collapsing onto the floor and plunging into his mindscape.
The throne room was vast, cold, and empty. Alter-Jade's throne stood vacant, the silence more unnerving than his usual taunts. Jade ignored the absence and began his drills. For hours, he moved through the forms, the phantom weight of the rusted sword in his hands, the impact of the bull's hooves against his ribs. He pushed until his spiritual form screamed in protest, then pushed further.
He checked the status again.
[World-Eater Evolution Progress: 88%]
A growl of impatience rumbled in his chest. So close. He pulled himself back to the physical world, his body aching with a deep, pervasive numbness. He took a cold, mechanical shower, the water stinging his burns and bruises, then fell onto his bed, consciousness fleeing the moment he hit the sheets.
He was torn from a deep, dreamless sleep by a chime that was both familiar and alien, resonating in his very soul.
His eyes snapped open. Elation, sharp and clear, cut through the fatigue. He immediately reached to summon the scythe, to feel its familiar, hungry weight.
A new prompt flashed, contradictory and confusing.
But he couldn't see it. He looked around the dark room. Nothing. Then he felt it. A weight against his side. A warmth. The soft texture of skin against his own.
He looked down.
He was naked.
And lying beside him, curled against his side with her head on his shoulder, was a equally naked woman.
His brain stalled. Her hair was a cascade of living darkness, so black it seemed to drink the light from the room, spilling over the sheets and across her pale shoulders. Her face, now peaceful in sleep, was one of devastating, ethereal beauty—high cheekbones, full lips, long dark lashes fanned against her skin. She was perfection carved from shadow and moonlight.
The noise he'd made woke her. Her eyelashes fluttered, and she opened her eyes. They were the same violent, psychotic purple as his Nether-Flame. She looked up at him, a slow, possessive smile gracing her lips.
"Master," she purred, her voice a silken, intimate whisper. "You're awake."
Jade's mind was a void of static. "...Who are you?"
She pouted, a theatrical, heartbreaking expression. "Oh, Master. You have used me for so long, and you do not know me? It breaks my heart." She traced a single, cool finger down his bare chest.
A horrifying, impossible realization dawned. "World-Eater?" he whispered, the name a question, a prayer, a curse.
She smiled wider. "Well, I wasn't a weapon in the first place. This is my true form."
Jade's jaw was on the floor. His mind raced, trying to process the metaphysical implications, the violation, the sheer absurdity. Then, his eyes darted between their naked states. "But... what happened? Why are we...?"
Her luminous purple eyes gleamed with mischief and hunger. "After the evolution was complete, I needed a certain... essence to stabilize this form. You were the only one present, Master." She leaned closer, her breath cool against his neck. "And you were very good. Even asleep."
Jade felt the blood drain from his face. His first time. Stolen. By his own scythe.
"And now that you're awake," she whispered, her hand drifting lower, "I find I want more."
A sharp, forceful knock echoed through the room, followed immediately by the door hissing open.
Seraphina stood in the doorway, her crimson eyes sweeping the scene—taking in Jade's nakedness, the stunning, unknown woman in his bed, their intimate position.
Her expression, which had been one of cold authority, froze. Then it shattered into a maelstrom of pure, undiluted, frostbitten rage.
The silence in the room was colder than the void between stars.
Seraphina stood frozen in the doorway, her regal posture rigid. Her crimson eyes, usually burning with predatory amusement or icy command, were now wide with a shock so profound it seemed to have physically struck her. They darted from Jade's horrified face, to the unfamiliar woman's naked form, to the intimate tangle of sheets. The air around her began to crystallize, a fine frost creeping across the doorframe.
The woman—World-Eater—merely tilted her head, a lazy, unimpressed smile playing on her lips. She made no move to cover herself, her posture one of casual ownership.
"Master," she purred, completely ignoring the livid vampire in the doorway, "we have company. How... intrusive."
Jade's mind, which had just rebooted, promptly crashed again. Every possible explanation died in his throat. This is my sentient scythe who just evolved into a naked woman and may or may not have had sex with me while I was unconscious was not a sentence that would de-escalate the situation.
"Seraphina," he began, his voice strangled.
"Who," Seraphina interrupted, her voice a whisper sharp enough to flay skin, "is this... creature?"
World-Eater finally deigned to look at Seraphina. She sat up, the sheets pooling around her waist, her movements fluid and unnervingly graceful. "I am his," she said, her tone implying a world of meaning. "His partner. His blade. His completion. Who are you?"
"I am his patron!" Seraphina's voice rose, the frost around the door thickening into jagged spikes of black ice. "I am the one who owns his Vow! I am the one who—"
"Owns?" World-Eater laughed, a sound like shattering crystal. "You own nothing. You are a custodian. A temporary fixture. I have been with him since his soul first hungered for annihilation. I am part of him. You are merely... exterior."
Jade saw Seraphina's fingers curl, her claws extending. The psychic pressure in the room intensified, a suffocating blend of ancient vampire bloodlust and the nascent, chaotic hunger of a newly-born divine entity.
"Jade," Seraphina's gaze snapped to him, the betrayal in her eyes as sharp as her fangs. "Explain. Now."
Trapped between a furious ancient vampire and his literally soul-bound, amorous weapon, Jade did the only thing he could think of.
He looked Seraphina dead in the eye, his face a mask of glacial calm, and told a version of the truth.
"She's my scythe."
The silence that followed was, if possible, even more profound.
Seraphina blinked. The frost stopped spreading. "What?"
"The World-Eater," Jade continued, his voice flat. "It finished evolving. This is the result."
World-Eater preened, running a hand through her shadowy hair. "See? His."
Seraphina looked from Jade's utterly serious face to the smug, naked woman, and then back again. The rage on her face did not disappear, but it was joined by a dawning, horrified comprehension. The political rivalries, the Beast-kin girls, were one thing. This... this was a problem on an entirely different, metaphysical level.
Her eyes narrowed to slits, the temperature plummeting once more.
"A sentient weapon," she breathed, her voice dripping with venomous disbelief. "You've been bonding with a sentient weapon that turns into a... a harlot."
World-Eater's playful smile vanished, replaced by something ancient and cold. "Choose your next words very carefully, blood-drinker."
Jade sat in the center of the bed, naked and utterly defeated, as the two most dangerous women in his existence prepared to go to war over him.
He had conquered a bull with his bare hands. But this? This was a fight he was woefully unprepared for.