Chapter 26: The Arbiter’s Gambit

**The Final Climb**

The Worldroot's branches became a vertical battlefield. The team ascended through:

- **The Hall of Forgotten Names**: Walls etched with the identities of consumed realities. Ghosthand found his parents' names and carved them into his prosthetic.

- **The Nursery of Stars**: Infant galaxies cradled in webbing, their light siphoned by the serpent.

- **The Arbiter's Throne**: A skeletal structure holding Xiaoyu's original corpse, still clutching the first Core.

**Lin Shen's Revelation**: *"You never rebelled. You *became* the Cycle to control it."*

Xiaoyu's voice echoed from the corpse. *"And I failed. Now finish it."*

#### **The Blade of Balance**

Lin Shen plunged the Entropy Flame into the throne. Reality screamed.

**Consequences**:

- The Worldroot shattered, its fragments birthing new realities.

- The serpent's essence split—half merging with Lin Shen, half dispersing into the void.

- Xiaoyu's corpse disintegrated, her final whisper: *"Plant a garden in the ashes."*

#### **The Price of Victory**

Neo-Kyo reappeared, but altered:

- The Spire was now a tree of light and shadow, its roots healing the city's wounds.

- Citizens retained hybrid traits—glowing veins, silvered eyes—but free of the serpent's will.

- Bai Ye's photon dagger had become a key, its blade inscribed with the names of dead timelines.

**Lin Shen's Fate**:

He knelt by the Spire-Tree, his body half-crystalline, half-human. *"The Cycle is broken. Now we build something… flawed. Something *ours*."*

A shadow stirred in the Spire-Tree's branches. A child—Mira reborn—plucked a fruit of condensed time and bit into it. Her eyes glowed serpent-green. *"It's not over. It's never over."*