THE FRUIT OF ANNIHILATION

The Nightmare Orchard – A Wound in Time

The air in Verdantia's Nightmare Orchard was thick with the weight of forgotten years.

What had once been a sacred grove, where alchemists sought wisdom among the whispering trees, had long since succumbed to temporal corruption.

Now, it was a place where time had lost meaning.

The trees stood upside-down, their gnarled roots clutching at miniature, dying suns like a desperate child grasping a fading ember. Their branches did not reach for the sky; instead, they stretched downward, weeping silver leaves that turned to ash before touching the ground.

The fruit that clung to these unnatural trees pulsed with an eerie, vein-like pattern, mimicking the delicate lattice of human circulatory systems. Some even beat with the rhythm of a heart, as though alive—as though listening.

And the ground beneath Lyra's feet…

It was not earth.

It was a mosaic of frozen screams.

Shattered fragments of erased timelines, woven together into a path that twisted and curled like the remnants of forgotten nightmares. Faces were etched into the stone—some mid-cry, others locked in silent despair.

Each step she took, the ground shifted, as if those who had been erased from history could still feel her presence.

She swallowed hard, gripping her satchel tightly.

This place should not exist.

Yet it did.

And in its center, resting on an altar of crystallized oblivion, was a single silver apple.

---

The Apple's Revelation – A Fruit of Impossible Betrayal

It was perfect.

Unblemished, smooth, metallic yet organic—as if the very concept of an apple had been sculpted by a god unfamiliar with human hands.

As Lyra reached out, her fingers brushed its surface—

And the world lurched.

For the briefest moment, she was not herself.

She was seeing through the apple's eyes—

A memory, but not her own.

A glimpse of her death.

---

The Vision

Pain.

Not the sharp agony of battle, but the slow, creeping terror of inevitability.

She saw herself falling, hands outstretched—

Her body riddled with silver veins, spreading like fractures through her skin.

Above her, a towering figure loomed—cloaked in fire, eyes burning with blackened light.

A whisper, not from the figure, but from the apple itself, curling into her mind like a tendril of smoke:

"Betrayal is inevitable. It is already written."

And then—

She saw Callan's reflection in the apple's surface.

Not as he was now—

But as he would be.

Dressed in High Alchemist robes, standing above her fallen form.

Watching.

Not with sorrow.

But with acceptance.

The vision snapped away like a severed thread, and Lyra stumbled back, the apple still cold in her hands.

Her breath came in short, sharp bursts.

She turned to Callan—

But he was already looking at her.

And in his eyes, she saw something she couldn't name.

Something he wouldn't explain.

Not yet.

---

The Guild's Coup – Trial by Lies

The streets of Verdantia were not as she left them.

News of her return from the Aetherial Dungeon had spread, but not as a triumph.

As a curse.

Veyra had worked quickly.

Banners were draped across the city's central plaza, each one painted with a single accusation:

"The False Flamekeeper Must Burn."

"Lyra of the Silver Scourge – Thief of Time."

"Verdantia Will Not Bow to the Maker of Monsters."

The crowd was not just angry—they were afraid.

And fear was far more dangerous than hatred.

Veyra stood at the top of the council's marble steps, her mithril mask gleaming in the sunlight.

"She has poisoned our alchemical wells," Veyra declared, her voice carrying over the gathered citizens. "Is it coincidence that now our children are aging within days, their bodies unable to hold time itself?"

A murmur of dread swept through the crowd.

"She has stolen from us," Veyra continued, her gaze locking onto Lyra. "Not just gold, not just power—but years.

Children have died.

Their blood is on her hands."

Lyra's fingers twitched toward her satchel, resisting the urge to lash out.

She had expected an attack.

She had not expected a war of words.

And then—

The final blow:

"She has betrayed the Flame itself."

The council shifted.

The verdict was already set.

A Soulbranding Ritual—a process that would sever her connection to the First Flame, rendering her a mere mortal.

Veyra turned to Elaris, the city's Warden.

"Deliver her, and Verdantia will be yours."

---

The Duel of Paradoxes – A War of Alchemy

Lyra refused to kneel.

If they wanted to strip her of her power, they would have to earn it.

So she did the only thing she could.

She invoked Ancient Law.

A Duel of Alchemy.

---

Stage 1 – Brewing from the Other's Memories

The first task was simple in theory—

Create an elixir from the opponent's past.

Veyra worked swiftly, her hands moving with the efficiency of an executioner.

Lyra, however, hesitated.

She crafted a Loyalty Elixir, designed to reveal the true allegiances of the one who drank it.

She should have known it would backfire.

Veyra smirked as she swallowed.

And in that instant—

A vision unfolded around them.

Not of Veyra's past—but of her true master.

A Titan, its form vast and ever-shifting, a being not bound by time or mortality.

The crowd gasped.

Veyra's smirk never faded.

---

Stage 2 – Surviving the Sip

Veyra brewed a Petrification Draught, one that should have frozen Lyra from within.

Lyra drank it anyway.

The pain was immediate—her veins crystallized, her heartbeat slowed.

But she had spent years learning pain.

She held on.

And she survived.

Veyra was less fortunate.

Her own potion turned against her, her body turning to living crystal mid-sip.

For a moment, silence.

Then—shattering glass.

Veyra's form fractured—and disappeared.

The crowd erupted in cheers.

But Lyra's victory was a lie.

Because the real Veyra was still there.

And she held a dagger to Finn's throat.

Her eyes burned black—the same shade as Titan Lyra's in the vision.

"You cannot win," Veyra whispered. "You were never meant to."

And the apple in Lyra's hand began to pulse—

As if something inside it was awakening.