We didn't move for a long while.
No dramatic victory poses. No cheering. Just five bodies sprawled across ruined stone and scorched earth like we'd been dropped there by the world itself and forgotten.
I stared up at the sky, chest rising and falling too fast, counting breaths like they might run out if I didn't keep track of them.
Everything hurt.
Not sharp pain anymore, just that deep, full-body ache that settles in after you survive something you really weren't supposed to.
"We're… alive," Zeref muttered beside me, sounding genuinely surprised by the concept.
Kael snorted weakly. "Temporarily. Give it a minute."
Despite myself, I laughed. It came out hoarse and ugly, but it was real. My fingers twitched against the grass, still half-expecting the system to flash another warning, another curse, another impossible mechanic.
But nothing came.
