As they recovered, the boy sat in silence for a moment before finally speaking.
"That technique… what was it?"
The swordsman didn't answer.
He wiped the blood from his skin, his expression unreadable. Instead of words, he focused on the boy's wound, pressing a mix of tree sap and crushed leaves against the torn flesh.
The boy grimaced at the sharp sting but said nothing more.
They traveled.
Through ashen plains, through howling peaks, through lands where the very air sought to devour them.
The boy had to reach the absolute peak of his physical and mental state. Only then would he be able to wield the dimensional blade—the key to their escape.
Their path was littered with monstrosities, each one more grotesque than the last. Some had once been human. Others had never known such a form.
They fought. They survived.
Years passed—five of them.
And in all that time, the swordsman only used The Embers of Infinity once.
The battle was hopeless.
Their opponent stood alone, yet his presence devoured the world around him.
At a glance, he was a knight—a towering figure clad in dark, plated armor.
But to truly see him was to witness something wrong.
The armor was not worn. It was fused to his body. Metal and flesh, indistinguishable. A prison of his own making.
He had once been human.
A warrior obsessed with power. He had scoured every ruin, slain countless foes, all in pursuit of something greater.
And in time—he found it.
The essence of dead gods.
Power beyond imagining.
For a fleeting moment, he had felt it.
He had become something more.
But the power was not his to wield. It was unstable, corrosive, unforgiving.
His body twisted under its weight, his flesh melting, merging with the very armor meant to protect him.
His mind was the next to break.
Now, he wanders the Red Horizon, not as a man, not as a god—
But as a hollow observer.
Trapped within his own body.
A coffin too small for him.
The Sun of Rot should have been a walking apocalypse.
Had his will been any weaker, the essence of dead gods would have twisted him beyond control. He would have become a force strong enough to erase entire cities—a calamity beyond reason.
But he had contained it.
Not entirely. Not perfectly.
But enough.
And before he could lose himself completely, he chose exile.
Chose to banish himself to the Red Horizon.
The boy—no, the man—lay in the dirt.
His chest was torn open, his blood soaking the ruined ground.
One strike.
Just one.
That was all it took.
This battle was never his to fight.
The swordsman stood, his blade shaking in his grip.
The knight advanced.
Their blades clashed, but it was clear—The Sun of Rot held the advantage.
Steel met steel in a flurry of blinding strikes. Each exchange pushed the swordsman further back, each blow forcing him closer to defeat.
Then—an opening.
A desperate plunge—his sword pierced the knight's visor, sinking deep.
The armored giant went limp.
A stream of black blood spilled from his helmet.
It was over.
Or so he thought.
A spike—dark as night—erupted from the knight's throat, piercing the swordsman's shoulder.
The armored hand rose.
A final blow.
Then—a flash of steel.
The boy—bleeding, broken, dying—stood between them.
His sword barely held back the knight's strike.
Then, his body collapsed.
The swordsman's scream tore through the battlefield.
"NOOO!!!"
A single kick sent the knight staggering back.
Then—everything stopped.
The air shifted, bathed in an orange glow.
Like before.
Like the web.
A disembodied voice filled the air.
"T-this energy… How… YOU FOOL!"
The knight burst into flames brighter than the sun itself.
The swordsman moved.
His strikes were simple, yet unstoppable—each one carving deep, burning wounds into the knight's cursed armor.
The voice grew more frantic.
"YOU FOOL! YOU FOOL! But how… where did I fail… How can you do… this?"
Blood poured from the swordsman's skin, his body unraveling with every attack.
But he did not stop.
He could not.
His blade moved with a speed that defied reason, an inferno of destruction that even the knight could not withstand.
The battle did not last long.
By the end, the Sun of Rot was nothing but a ruin of flesh and metal.
His right arm—gone.
His spinal cord—severed.
His face—half-destroyed.
His body—riddled with gaping holes.
Yet, he still clung to life.
The knight's soul, fragmented but still conscious, spoke.
"How are you alive? I-I could never achieve this… You are just like me, yet you remained…"
The swordsman—bleeding, broken, but standing—spoke through bloodstained lips.
"I am more than you."
His voice was not one of arrogance, but of understanding.
"You were foolish to use such power… Yet you are a brave soul. Now rest; your duty is done."
A pause.
Then—a whisper.
"…Thank you."