The Last Believer

A month after the world had turned its back. Billboards were torn down. Monuments defaced. Kazimir's name—once etched in gold across global broadcasts—was now spoken only in curses or not at all. History scrubbed clean of the boy who bled to keep the skies blue.

But not everyone forgot.

A small corner of the city remained untouched by the riots. Wind brushed softly through the alley where it sat: the ruined Prismic Gathering plaque. Cracked. Covered in red paint. The word Tyrant scribbled over it in harsh strokes. Rain had long since dried the blood that once splattered here. People passed it by now like it was nothing more than an eyesore of shame.

But one figure stopped.

An older man—clad in a worn coat, face weathered by time—knelt before it. He didn't wear armor. Didn't carry a weapon. Just calloused hands and tired eyes.

He reached out, wiping the plaque clean with the sleeve of his coat, gently revealing the original words beneath:

"Prismic Gathering – The Ones Who Chose to Stay."

He took a breath, as though the weight of silence had been waiting for this moment.

"They spat on your name, boy," he said quietly. "Called you the devil… the Nullity King… a monster wrapped in lightning."

He shook his head.

"But I remember. I remember the first time you came down from the skies like thunder. You were just a kid, barely grown, sword in your hand and sorrow in your eyes. You didn't ask to be worshipped. You didn't want statues. You just wanted peace."

He looked up at the faded symbol of the team.

"You saved my daughter in the Outer Ring. Gave her a coat and said, 'No one gets left in the cold.' You probably don't even remember, but she never forgot. And neither did I."

His voice cracked.

"So let them forget. Let them rage. But I'll still be here. Wiping off the dirt. Speaking your name. Because when the next storm comes—and it always comes—they'll look to the skies again. And they'll beg for the one they banished."

He stood, placing an old, faded badge at the base of the plaque. The symbol of Kazimir, slightly cracked, but still gleaming faintly in the sunlight.

Miles away—on the balcony of a palace in Vrasnia—Riah stood in silence.

She paused mid-thought, her phoenix senses tingling with something faint and distant. Her eyes flickered gold, feeling a whisper of heat not from fire, but from faith.

She smiled gently.

"Kaz," she whispered, turning to the wind. "There's still someone who remembers."

And in that quiet moment, far beyond the crowds, protests, and curses—hope bloomed again.

Just one believer was enough.