Lightning didn't kill him.
It erased him.
One moment, Kael Draven was sprinting through an alley behind Wrenhall High, rain hammering his hoodie, cursed phone flickering a low battery warning. The next, the sky shattered with a sound like breaking glass—and reality tore down the middle.
Not light.
Not death.
Erasure.
His body dissolved into something cold, endless, and hungry.
[SYSTEM BOOT SEQUENCE: ERROR]
[SOUL-ANCHOR NOT FOUND]
[RECALIBRATING CORE…]
Welcome, [Kael Draven]
You are now the Sovereign Core of [VOID REALM - CLASS OMEGA]
WARNING: THIS REALM SHOULD NOT EXIST.
WARNING: YOU SHOULD NOT EXIST.
Kael screamed without lungs.
He was falling—but not down. Through layers of black, of non-space. Words crawled across his vision like glowing centipedes. He didn't know what they meant, but they felt like they were inside him.
And then—
He hit something.
A surge of cold exploded in every direction. Kael opened his eyes and gasped. He was lying in a crater of obsidian crystal beneath a sky that pulsed purple-black like a dying star's heartbeat. Floating debris hung in the air—shards of buildings, broken blades, frozen lightning.
Everything around him was shattered. Even the air was cracked.
"What… where—?"
A shadow moved.
Not a normal shadow. Wrong. It slithered up the edges of the crater, a tangle of bone and smoke. Eyes—no, sockets—flared with violet flame.
"You are the glitch," it hissed.
"The Sovereign that never should have been."
[NEW THREAT DETECTED: VOIDWRAITH LVL 27]
[COMBAT PROTOCOL: SOUL-BIND ENABLED]
Kael flinched as violet chains of light burst from his chest, wrapping around his arms, pulsing with heat. The creature lunged—and instinct took over.
He threw out his hand.
Clank.
Chains erupted from the ground like spears, piercing the shadow. The Wraith screamed, unraveling into strands of soul-flesh and black mist.
[SOUL-BIND SUCCESSFUL]
[DOMAIN: ETHEREAL GRAVEYARD – 1% STABILIZED]
[YOU HAVE DEFEATED A VOIDWRAITH]
YOU GAIN: 1 Memory Fragment | +15 Realm Stability | +Voidshard Core
Kael stood trembling. His hands were flickering—glitching between bone and flesh, data and blood.
This wasn't Earth.
This wasn't heaven.
This wasn't anywhere he should be.
[REALITY INTEGRATION IN PROGRESS…]
WARNING: MULTIVERSAL TRIBUNAL INCOMING]
Estimated Arrival: 72 Hours.
Tribunal? Who the hell's putting me on trial?!
A humming sound filled the air. The ground rumbled. A throne of black crystal burst from the crater's center, rising like a blooming flower from the void.
Kael turned toward it slowly, heart hammering.
His name was etched into the throne.
Not in English.
Not in any language he knew.
But somehow, he understood it.
[Claim Throne and Stabilize Core?]
[Y/N]
He swallowed. There was no other choice. No path back.
"Yes."
The throne pulsed.
The void roared.
And the war began.
The moment Kael sat on the throne, everything went wrong.
A pulse exploded from the obsidian seat—not outward, but inward, like it was swallowing him into its core. He gritted his teeth as violet chains coiled around his arms and chest, searing into his skin.
[SOVEREIGN CORE INITIATED]
[REALM INTEGRATION: 3%]
[WARNING: STABILITY CRITICAL]
[ENEMY SIGNATURES DETECTED IN BOUNDARY ZONE]
Kael's breath came in ragged gasps.
He could feel the Void now. Every flicker of flame. Every cracked piece of reality orbiting in frozen stasis around him. The throne was a conduit—and he was the lightning.
Suddenly, the sky trembled.
Something was coming.
"System," Kael gasped, "what's approaching?"
[IDENTITY: WARDEN OF ERASURE – LVL 45]
[PURPOSE: DELETE ANOMALY]
[ETA: 60 SECONDS]
Too fast. Too strong.
Kael leapt from the throne. The ground cracked with each step. Around him, the world quaked like a fragile mirror on the edge of collapse.
[EMERGENCY FUNCTION UNLOCKED]
[CONSTRUCT: VOID-WEAPON PROTOCOL – INITIATE?]
"DO IT!"
A shockwave fired out from the throne, and from the swirling mist before him, something began to form. Black metal spun together in mid-air—slabs, gears, wires—until they snapped into shape with a final clang.
A blade. Long, jagged, etched in glowing script. Voidsteel.
The System spoke again—colder this time.
[WEAPON FORGED: "REMNANT EDGE"]
[BOUND TO SOULSIGNATURE: KAEL DRAVEN]
Kael grabbed the hilt just as the sky ripped open.
A figure dropped through the breach like a falling god.
Towering. Armor of liquid gold. Eyes like white fire. Behind it trailed a dozen spiraling glyphs—each a seal of execution.
"YOU DO NOT BELONG," the Warden said, its voice a grind of collapsing stars.
"RETURN TO THE UNMADE."
Kael's feet dug in. The Voidsteel blade buzzed in his hand, hungry.
"I didn't ask to be here," he snarled. "But I'm not leaving until I figure out why."
He charged.
The Warden moved with impossible speed. A golden spear formed in its hand and slammed down—but Kael was already rolling aside, lashing out. Voidsteel met divine metal, sending arcs of light and darkness in every direction.
[DAMAGE: 3%]
[SYSTEM ALERT: REALITY TETHER WEAKENING]
The ground behind them cracked and fell away, revealing infinite depth—a chasm into unbeing. Kael's foot slipped at the edge, but the throne flared with energy.
[SOVEREIGN LINK ACTIVE]
[DRAINING POWER FROM DOMAIN CORE]
Strength surged through him.
He struck again—this time cleaving through one of the golden glyphs floating around the Warden.
The Warden flinched.
[GLYPH OF FINALITY – DESTROYED]
[TARGET POWER LEVEL: DOWNGRADED]
They're shields, Kael realized. Each one I break makes it weaker.
He roared and pressed forward, blade flashing. One glyph. Then two. Then three.
The Warden screamed, a warping, digital howl. It lifted both hands—and the sky turned white.
[WARNING: DELETION BLAST INCOMING]
[TIME TO IMPACT: 5 SECONDS]
Kael had no more tricks. No backup. Only one thought:
I was nothing. I had no place. No power.
And now they want to erase me just because I exist?
"Then I'll EXIST LOUDER!"
He raised the Voidsteel and threw it with all his might—straight into the Warden's chest.
The blade pierced the final glyph and sank into core-light.
The Warden staggered.
Boom.
It imploded, fragments of golden armor twisting into dust.
[WARDEN DEFEATED]
[VOIDCORE ABSORBED]
[REALM STABILIZATION +15%]
[NEW FEATURE UNLOCKED: DOMAIN SHAPING]
Kael collapsed to one knee, chest heaving.
[System Reboot Complete]
[Welcome, Void Sovereign]
[Would you like to name your realm?]
He stared across the broken sky.
A throne. A blade. A warning of more to come.
"…Not yet," he muttered. "Let's see if I survive the next day first."