Joke?

Even with Hemera's healing, the damage Klaus had sustained was… ghastly, to say the least. His vision remained clouded, his limbs barely responsive, and his balance faltered as if the ground beneath him had turned to smoke. He had no time to recover properly—not yet.

Together with Hassan, he had butchered every last zealot of the Red Sect. All but one. A high-ranking War Maiden had been spared, though not out of mercy. No, Klaus had use for her.

He stood amidst the carnage, surveying the aftermath with a long, weary sigh. Effie… well, her condition was far from stable. Let's just say, she was not taking things well.

Klaus was not blind to the cruelty of his actions—he was many things, but delusional wasn't one of them. What he had done was merciless, perhaps even monstrous. But he could not afford to leave them alive. Not only did those cultists had earned their fate with blood and torment, but allowing any survivors to regroup would invite future danger. Eliminate the variables. That was his logic. That was his choice.

And yet… they wouldn't understand.

No — perhaps they would understand, but that wouldn't stop them from condemning him. He had already seen the resistance in their eyes. Effie, in particular, looked torn. Maybe those cultists had become familiar to her — a twisted sense of home formed over the months she had spent with them, despite the pain and torment they inflicted. Her reluctance to exact vengeance… it made sense, even if Klaus couldn't share it.

Kai, meanwhile, was adrift in a different sea of turmoil. Dazed. Conflicted. Perhaps he had never witnessed cruelty of this magnitude. Klaus knew the Forgotten Shore had shown Kai many horrors, but to remain opposed to such merciless executions… it revealed something. Kai was kind. Honorable, even.

It wasn't easy to stand in opposition to someone like Klaus. He might wear the mask of a idiot, but he was terrifying in truth — and he knew it. He wielded fear like a sword and used it to shape the battlefield long before blades were drawn.

Sunny, by contrast, appeared far calmer — though beneath that calm lay something darker. A treacherous and selfish streak, perhaps even cruelty itself. He might have killed simply for the sake of it. A pointless endeavor… but that was who Sunny was: sharp-edged, spiteful, and unpredictable.

Still, even he seemed shaken. He had seen death before — he dealt in it — yet what he had witnessed here disturbed him. The mangled body of the Elder, half-devoured, and the brutal executions of every last War Maiden… it was a blood-soaked massacre with no poetry, no righteousness — just raw, merciless violence.

And then he looked at Klaus, who was smiling. That damn smile. Sunny shivered. He had once thought Mordret a monster — but now? Now Klaus seemed far, far worse. Mordret's cruelty was methodical, a strategy for sowing chaos. Klaus… Klaus seemed born from it.

No wonder they were friends. Both of them were beasts — unchained and godless.

Klaus let out a quiet groan, rubbing his temple with an amused smirk.

"Well, duh. Why the long faces?"

Sunny blinked, confused.

"So, what… that's it? we really won? Just like that?"

Effie stared at him in disbelief — and then exploded.

"'Just like that'?!" she shrieked. "We just wiped out over a hundred battle-hardened Awakened zealots! And you!" she pointed at Klaus, trembling. "You lunatic! You killed three Ascended War Maidens — and the Elder! Do you even understand who she was? Even Saints avoid her like plague! Gods help me… they were insane!"

Sunny tilted his head, mulling it over.

"...Well, when you put it like that… I guess it was a little tough."

Klaus shrugged, leaning against a crumbling pillar, the usual grin dancing on his lips.

"Eh, not really. That bitch was a perverted masochist anyway. Made things easier. Took me, what, a few minutes?"

A few minutes — in this world. But inside the Temple of Astral Pain? One second here equaled an hour there. He blinked, doing the math. If six minutes had passed out here… then fifteen days had passed within that cursed realm.

His grin twitched slightly. No wonder the entire temple was drenched in gore and littered with corpses. He and Serka had slaughtered each other thousands of times. A dance of death that stretched on for weeks.

Klaus had always believed his will to be unshakable — indomitable. But this time… this time, he had nearly broken. It was only his true name, the anchor to his identity, that had preserved his sanity. Without it, his mind would have been lost to agony and madness.

And Serka? That monster had thrived in that realm. No wonder even Transcendents feared her. If one couldn't escape her domain, she would drag their soul into a spiral of unending torment.

Kai, who had remained silent all this while, finally stirred. His eyes swept over the ruined hall, though it seemed as though he were staring beyond the walls — into some far-off place.

Then, with a hoarse voice, he asked:

"…Were there other children? The sect took in orphans, right? Do we… need to find them?"

Sunny froze, scratching his head awkwardly.

"Oh. Uh… I didn't think of that. They did take in orphan girls, didn't they? Where would they be?"

Effie's face drained of color. Her lips trembled as she turned to Klaus, horror dawning in her wide eyes.

"Klaus… the children… they were in the temple… don't tell me… don't tell me they died in the explosion you caused…"

Klaus tilted his head, that mischievous clownish glint in his gaze returning.

"Eh… maybe? I went all out, so I kinda forgot?"

Effie stared at Klaus in utter disbelief and seething fury. Kai and Sunny were no different—each wore the same thunderstruck expression, their gazes fixed on Klaus's infuriatingly smug grin. The sheer gall of it sparked a shared, violent urge: to punch that grin off his face until every last tooth rattled loose. Effie, ever the embodiment of action, was already marching forward to do just that.

But her dramatic assault on the self-proclaimed Great Evil, Klaus Zakharov, came to a sudden halt as the sound of hurried footsteps and soft, muffled sobs reached their ears.

All eyes turned toward the towering stone pillars at the edge of the battlefield. From their shadowed embrace emerged Hassan, solemn and clad in his obsidian armor, leading a small line of children—four girls, no older than ten or eleven, trailing behind him with timid steps. Their faces, pale and weary, reflected a haunted, shattered innocence. Effie recognized something of herself in them.

Hassan, ever the silent sentinel, was guiding the little ones toward his liege.

When the battle had begun, Klaus had given him a singular order: to wield the veil of elemental darkness and infiltrate the temple's depths. His mission had not been to fight, but to seek out survivors—specifically the children—and escort them beyond the bloodshed. That was why Hassan had not joined the fray, though his strength might have tipped the scales with ease.

Instead, his darkness had cloaked him as he moved, unseen and unheard, through fire and ruin, rescuing the innocent with quiet precision. Yet a part of him still ached—regret for not standing at his lord's side in battle. But he was, first and foremost, a warrior. And what greater duty is there for a warrior than to shield those who cannot defend themselves? In that, he had fulfilled his charge with honor.

The cohort watched in silence as the frail girls followed their dark guardian, their presence grounding the aftermath in a sobering reality. Effie, for her part, was caught in an emotional maelstrom. Relief, rage, confusion—all collided within her chest. She didn't know whether to cry, hug Klaus, or still punch him in the jaw.

Klaus, meanwhile, appeared disgruntled, his ever-present smirk fading as he clicked his tongue in irritation.

"Why now, Hassan?" he groaned. "Their faces were perfect. You couldn't wait just one more minute? Kekekeke, they really believed every word I said."

He chuckled, flopping dramatically to the ground and slapping his knee, as if the absurdity of it all were too much. That moment of victory was short-lived, however—Effie lunged at him, fists flying.

Klaus vanished into thin air mid-beating, his body turning intangible as he phased through the ground to escape her wrath. Even so, using his aspect for those few seconds nearly drained him to unconsciousness.

"Effie! Halt, you barbarian whelp! Wait, stop! Let me tell you something! Let me tell you something! Stop it! Let me explain!"

After several more bruises and one impressive black eye, Klaus reluctantly explained everything. From his emergency food stash—enchanted bags filled with canned meat, beans, dried fruits, and protein-rich rations—to the strategy behind his orders. The food was barely palatable, but it would keep the children alive.

An hour later, once the group was fed and rested, Klaus quietly slipped away.

Back within the temple, he stood before the monumental chalice that blazed with the Annihilating Flames of the Sun God. There, suspended within the inferno, lay the object of his true desire.

A simple knife, forged from ghostly glass, floated untouched in the heart of divine destruction. It gleamed with a spectral luster, utterly unmarred by the furious white flames licking at its edges.

Klaus hesitated for only a moment, then bent down and picked up a small rock. His eyes lit with power. With a whisper of will, the stone and the knife exchanged places in the blink of an eye.

Now, the artifact was in his hand.

It was lighter than expected. Cool to the touch. Beautiful in its simplicity. And deadly in its purpose.

He had found it.

The key to an immortal's death.

The blade fated to end the Ivory Lord.

"How curious…" Klaus murmured.

He slipped the knife into his enchanted bag and cast it into his spirit sea, letting the bag vanish into the depths of his soul.

Outside, the world was beginning to stir. Dawn painted the heavens in hues of lilac and lavender, a soft serenity settling over the landscape in stark contrast to the violence that had ravaged it.

Klaus sat on the earth, Satan—the cursed spear—cradled in his lap. It had survived Serka's corrosive magic, seemingly none the worse for wear. A small blessing, and a satisfying one.

Sunny crouched nearby, inspecting the odachi and the Spear of the War Maidens, tracing the ancient runes etched into their surfaces with a scholar's curiosity. Kai, now free of his armor, stood silently nearby. His eyes were distant, filled with thoughts unspoken.

Effie was there, too. Despite the bruises and lacerations painting her small body, she had not stopped moving. She knelt before a growing pile of weapons—some whole, others melted or broken—and thrust each one into the scorched earth with deliberate care.

A graveyard of swords was forming around the Temple of the Chalice.

Klaus watched her for a while, then exhaled a quiet sigh. She really did care about them.

That realization brought a strange weight to his chest. Did that mean he had slain the mentors and comrades of his friend? Well... damn. That was complicated.

Effie seemed determined, perhaps driven by guilt—laying each weapon like a silent apology to the fallen.

But Klaus's thoughts had already drifted elsewhere.

In the future he remembered, there was no graveyard here. The Temple of the Chalice had been reduced to ruins. Scorched. Erased.

That meant his actions had altered the timeline.

This… had been his hidden goal all along. Not just to survive. Not just to retrieve the blade. But to change fate.

He didn't care for destiny or the threads that claimed to bind him. If fate could be broken, then it was not divine. It was fragile. And beneath him.

Of course, he knew that was arrogance. Some things could not be changed, no matter how fiercely one resisted. Fate often lured you into believing it could be defied… only to reveal the inevitability of its cruel end.

But Klaus… Klaus was an anomaly.

Somehow, he could fight it.

He didn't know why. But his theory was simple.

The Law of Original Sin. It resisted all attempts to control him. His Attribute seemed to shield him from external influence—granting him awareness, autonomy, and freedom.

And what is the greatest sin, if not to defy the will of the gods?

To question the divine… and survive.