Kael was burning. Again.
Not with fire—but with memory. Rage. Chains of molten gold wrapped around his limbs, anchoring him to the void-wrought pillars that loomed in the center of the Gate. They pulsed with power—not to hold him prisoner, but to feed from him.
Each breath he took echoed across the Hollow Realm. He couldn't tell how long he had been there. Hours? Days? Years? Time slipped in this place like blood through broken fingers.
His screams had stopped long ago.
But the voice—the voice—never did.
"You were always meant for this," it whispered through the dark.
"Not Jack. Not Nyssa. You."
"The last ember of a forgotten line. The sword none dared wield."
Kael's fingers twitched against the chains. He could feel it inside him—something clawing, waiting. The thing the Devourer had touched but never fully taken. The spark that had always made him angrier, faster, stronger than he should have been.
The thing Auren had tried to cleanse.
The Dark Lord's mark.
He laughed bitterly. It sounded like a sob. "Is this what you wanted?" he whispered to no one. "You waited centuries… for me?"
"Not waited," the voice said.
"Prepared."
The chains tightened. The pillars throbbed like hearts. And then—
A fracture.
A pulse.
A presence.
Kael's eyes snapped open.
A figure was falling—no, descending—from above, cloaked in light and shadow, trailing ribbons of flickering energy that bent the very shape of the Gate. Gold fire licked at the edges of his form. The chains shuddered.
"Jack," Kael gasped. "What the hell took you so long?"
Jack landed hard. Dust spiraled. The floor cracked beneath his boots. His eyes blazed—half light, half dark.
Kael blinked. "You look… taller."
Jack smirked. "Merged with a mirror demon. Long story."
"Good. I was starting to think this place was boring."
Jack stepped closer, hands outstretched. "I can break the chains."
"No," Kael said sharply. "You can't. They're not just binding me. They're feeding on me. You break them without knowing how, you unleash him."
"Then what am I supposed to do?" Jack growled. "Watch you bleed out?"
Kael gritted his teeth. "No. You're here now. Which means it's time."
"For what?"
"For the truth."
The air trembled.
A second voice joined the first.
Older. Crueler.
"Ah. The prodigal son. And the vessel. Lovely reunion."
From the darkness behind the pillars stepped a figure cloaked in emberlight. His face was hidden behind a mask of shifting shadows, his body armored in bone and ruin.
Jack tensed. "Isolde."
"No," the figure said. "What remains of her. She and the Devourer merged. And what they left behind… is me."
Jack's breath hitched.
"You're the Dark Lord."
"I am the Sundering," the figure replied. "The correction of an arrogant age. The reckoning of gods who thought they could bind eternity in glass and gold."
Kael coughed blood and grinned. "He talks a lot."
"Silence," the Dark Lord snapped—and Kael's chains flared, drawing a scream from deep in his throat.
Jack stepped forward. "Let him go. This isn't his fate."
"Is it yours, then?" the Dark Lord sneered. "You, who carry Thalon's legacy. You, whose soul split the sky. You've walked among gods and ghosts, Jack. And you've come to beg for a friend?"
"No," Jack said. "I came to stop you."
The Dark Lord raised a hand.
The Gate shook.
From the void around them rose echoes—twisted reflections of Jack and Kael. Corpses of memory, malformed and burning, faces smeared with shadow and flame.
"Then fight," the Dark Lord whispered.
And the chains snapped.
Kael dropped to his knees—but the fire in his eyes surged.
"I'm not done yet," he snarled.
Jack moved beside him. "Can you still fight?"
Kael rose slowly, bloodied and shaking. "Try and stop me."
The first of the echoes lunged. Jack's blade met it mid-air—shattering the thing's mask. Behind it was his own face, ruined, dead-eyed. Another rushed Kael, who spun and slammed it into the pillar, his aura flaring with golden-black fire.
For every echo they destroyed, another rose.
Jack grit his teeth. "He's buying time. These things aren't meant to kill us. They're meant to drain us."
"Then we don't play his game," Kael said. "We end it."
"How?"
Kael met his eyes. "You merged with Thalon. I am the key to the chains. Put the two together—"
Jack stepped back. "No. That could kill you."
"It'll kill him, Jack. That's the point."
The Dark Lord began to descend the steps. "Such lovely ideas. But you're too late. The Gate has already begun to open. The world above is already cracking. The Second Sundering has begun."
Kael grabbed Jack's wrist. "Listen to me. You said it yourself. This is about choice."
Jack's eyes flared. "Then I choose you. Not to sacrifice. To save."
He raised his hand.
Power surged.
Chains burst upward—not to bind, but to connect.
To fuse.
Kael's aura ignited. Not black. Not gold.
Both.
The fusion began. Jack and Kael, soul to soul, ancient to new. Sparks danced across the Gate. The echoes howled and vanished. The pillars shattered.
The Dark Lord screamed.
And the Gate of Chains—
Exploded.