chapter 67: The Battle of Madness – The Cry Before the Fall

Silence stretched across the sky—but it wasn't peace. It was suffocation, frost, a muted sound trembling on the edge of eruption.

The Third Eye still stared.

All across the Nine Realms of Blood… something was being torn from souls.

In the High Valhalla, the gods knelt and their statues crumbled.

In the Kingdom of Eternal Frost, time froze and giants ceased to breathe.

And on the Resurrection Grounds… Xiao stood alone between a world being rebuilt and a sky preparing to consume it.

"The collapse has begun,"

Pathimael said, his form beginning to fade—his purpose fulfilled.

"Either the eye is shut… or it will devour you all."

Xiao stepped forward, blood boiling in his veins.

He had seen his past, his future, and discovered he was not merely a bridge between curse and salvation.

He wasn't made to be used… but to fight.

"I won't be a tool,"

Xiao said, raising his fist.

His body exploded with black and red energy— *the Curse of Memory*: the power of every soul that died because of him, or for him.

Their voices rose with him—screaming, chanting, praying.

"One battle… will be the end or the beginning,"

he whispered as he soared into the sky, toward the open eye.

In the heart of the sky, he entered a non-physical dimension:

Void. Light. Darkness. And then—

The Curse revealed its true form.

A being made of countless eyes, mouths speaking forgotten tongues, and a body forged from shifting shadows.

But at its center… was a child.

Yes, a child.

"You?!"

Xiao gasped, seeing himself at three years old—smiling innocently within the terrifying entity.

"I am the beginning,"

said the child,

"And you… are the one who chose the end."

The sky erupted.

The battle began.

Every strike from Xiao shattered laws that governed reality.

Every scream from the entity split through time itself.

Xiao's sword, infused with his blood, blazed with deep blue flames.

"I'll free the world from your memories.

I'll let the dead rest and the living breathe without fear."

The child replied with a sorrowful smile:

"But I am all that remembers you… If you kill me, you'll be forgotten."

Xiao hesitated.

"Does the world's survival matter… if I'm erased from it?"

And then he recalled Ester's words before she lost consciousness:

> "Your existence isn't in your blood… but in the choices you make."

Xiao screamed—and surged forward.

One strike.

Light blinded the world.

And silence… lasted centuries in a single moment.

Then… everything returned.

But without the Eye.

Without the Shadow.

And most importantly… without Xiao.