Wokji_Dimfwina

Superheroes were supposed to be immortalized. Legends. Symbols of hope.

But one by one, they vanished. Erased from history, from memory—like they never existed at all.

Riven Steele, once the world’s strongest protector, awakens from a decades-long stasis to find reality itself rejecting heroes. No statues, no stories—only fragmented echoes of a world that refuses to remember them. A new generation of unstable, dying heroes rises in their place, their powers unraveling, their existence hanging by a thread.

At the heart of it all is a whispered name: The Hollow Monarch. A being that doesn’t kill. Doesn’t destroy. It simply erases.

As Riven fights to uncover the truth, he begins to unravel, his own reflection warping, his memories twisting. The Monarch’s influence isn’t just erasing heroes—it’s rewriting them. And when it finally speaks to him, it says the one thing that chills him to his core:

"You were never real."

Now, Riven must lead the last surviving heroes in a battle not just for survival—but to prove they should exist at all. Because if they fail, history itself will erase them forever.

And this time, there will be no one left to remember.

THE LAST SENTINEL

The world wasn't holding together anymore.

One second, Riven stood in the dimly lit safe house, Vera and Vex at his side. The next—

The walls warped, stretching like melted wax. The floor tilted at an impossible angle. A deafening crack split the air as the room twisted inside out, and suddenly—

No sound. No struggle. Just emptiness.

One blink, and he had never been there at all.

Riven staggered backward, breath ragged. "Vex—where—?"

Vera's face was pale. "I don't know."

She turned, eyes scanning the collapsing space around them, her grip tightening on her pulse rifle.

Riven clenched his fists. He could still feel the presence of the Monarch, pressing against the edges of his mind like a vice.

"This is how it happens," the voice whispered, soft as a lover's breath. "One by one. Until there is nothing left."

Objects blurred, flickering between existing and not.

A chair twisted into something unrecognizable before snapping out of existence. The walls peeled away in layers, revealing—nothing. Just an endless, consuming void.

Riven reached out for Vera. His fingers brushed hers, just enough to ground himself.

"We need to go," he said, voice barely steady.

"Go where?" she snapped, eyes darting around. "The damn world is falling apart."

Even the air itself felt wrong—thin, stretched, broken.

The Monarch wasn't just erasing things.

A shifting force in the air, like something was stepping closer without stepping at all.

The air pressure dropped. His ears popped.

And standing in the void, just beyond the breaking walls of reality—

This wasn't the doppelgänger from before.

The figure had his face, his stance, his everything—

Like he had never existed to begin with.

Riven felt something claw at his mind. A pressure. A pull.

"This is where it ends," the copy said.

Vera raised her rifle. "Screw that."

Vera blinked—and suddenly, she wasn't holding a gun anymore.

Her face twisted in horror. "What the—?"

Riven grabbed her wrist, pulling her back. "It's not just erasing us. It's rewriting us."

He turned back to the figure—his unmade self.

Riven's breath came sharp and fast.

For just a fraction of a moment—

He turned to Vera. "If we stay here, we're gone."

Her jaw tightened. "Then how do we fight something that doesn't even exist?"

But if the Monarch was rewriting reality, then there had to be a way to write themselves back in.

His eyes flicked to Vex's abandoned wrist console, still flickering where he had been standing.

It was a long shot, but it was all they had.

His fingers wrapped around the console—

And suddenly, the world exploded in light.

Chapter 11: The Vanishing Point