The void stared back with Cid's own face—a cosmic mockery stretched across the bleeding sky. The Void Eater's new form was perfection in horror: a planetary-scale replica of Cid Kagenou, its obsidian skin crawling with living constellations that pulsed in time with his heartbeat, its teeth made of shattered moons. When it spoke, cities crumbled from the vibration alone. "You crafted me, Shadow," it boomed, Cid's voice warped into a chorus of dying stars. "Your hunger for control. Your fear of being ordinary. I am your masterpiece." Cid stood frozen on the cliff's edge, his shadow faint—the Sovereign's Gambit had burned too much of his essence. For the first time, the Eminence in Shadow had no script, no grand reveal. Only the echo of his own emptiness.
Saitama's fridge yawned open beside him, its black hole maw belching void-smoke. "Uh," he said, peering into the infinite hunger, "anyone order dimensional takeout?" A tendril lashed out, wrapping around his wrist—and yanking him into the abyss. The last thing City Z heard was his annoyed "Seriously?" before the fridge imploded, leaving a perfect sphere of nothingness where his apartment once stood.
Claire screamed as the ground split beneath her, the journal's blank pages fluttering like dying moths. The Void Eater's laughter shook the continent, its gaze pinning her like an insect. "Little sister. Shall I show you how many times he's sacrificed you in other worlds?" Its pupil dilated—a vortex projecting nightmares: Claire impaled on Cid's blade. Claire begging as he ignited I Am Atomic. Claire's corpse used as bait. She collapsed, retching, as the visions seared her mind.
Shadow Garden's remnants regrouped in Midgar's ruins. Alpha—free of the Herald's corruption but forever scarred—clutched her bleeding ears. The void-worm in her skull had gone dormant, not dead. "We need the bald one," Gamma hissed, her scythe arm cracked. "Without him—" A shockwave silenced her. The horizon bent as the Void Eater took its first step, Cid's likeness crushing mountains underfoot. "Where's your protagonist now?" it sneered, its shadow swallowing the sun.
Inside the fridge's void, Saitama tumbled through a tunnel of screaming faces—past versions of himself from erased timelines. A Saitama who never lost his hair. A Saitama who became a villain. A Saitama who failed. "Boring," he muttered, punching a hole through the kaleidoscope. He landed in The Backstage—a realm of floating script pages and broken projectors, the raw scaffolding of reality. The Void Eater's true core pulsed here: a throbbing, cancerous heart wrapped in chains of inky text. Saitama squinted. "So you're the guy who keeps resetting the sales ads?"
Cid's sword shattered against the Void Eater's eyelid. "Fight me, not the scenery!" he roared, but the titan only smiled, flicking him into the stratosphere. "You already lost. Your sister knows. Your cult pities you. Even your rival abandoned you." It raised a hand, preparing the final stroke—
"Hey, Ugly."
Saitama dropped from a rift above, the Eclipse Core lodged in his fist. "Caught your cold." He sneezed—and the Core detonated inside the Void Eater's eye. The titan staggered, howling, as its form destabilized. Cid free-fall tackled it, driving Slayer of Gods into its throat. "I AM ATOMIC—"
The Backstage trembled. The scripts burned. The Void Eater's last whisper was almost tender: "You'll miss me when I'm gone."
The explosion painted the sky white.
Epilogue: The Last Page
Claire woke to birdsong. The scarred earth was healing. Alpha's worm had crumbled to dust. And Cid? He sat alone on the cliff's edge, flipping a coin—heads marked with Saitama's face, tails his own. It never landed.
In a blank white room, Saitama microwaved cup noodles. "Hell's weird when it's empty," he told the flickering light.
Somewhere, a single rift glowed—small, patient, and hungry.