Riven stood in the center of the city.
Two suns hovered frozen in the sky, casting identical shadows that never moved. The streets were empty except for echoes — people repeating the same gestures, the same smiles, over and over.
His hands glowed faintly with white light — the Architect's energy still coursing through him. He could feel the threads of the timeline stretching taut, begging him to stop.
He whispered to himself, voice low and trembling:"This ends now."
He walked through the looping streets, eyes scanning the frozen lives.
A man spilled coffee — then the liquid unspilled itself, returning to the cup.A child fell from a swing — and floated back into the air, laughing again.Lira walked past, hair swinging exactly as before, humming the same tune.
Riven's fists clenched. Rage burned hotter than sorrow.Every loop. Every false smile. Every second stolen from reality.All of it was because he loved her too much — or perhaps. After all, he loved himself too much to let go.
He stopped in the center of the plaza, raising both hands. The light from his palms stretched outward, touching the streets, the buildings, the people.
Time screamed.
The first cracks appeared.
A streetlight flickered, buzzing like it was alive.The suns twitched in the sky, shifting slightly, almost imperceptibly.A man walking past froze mid-step — his eyes wide in terror, realizing he could see the impossible.
Riven shouted, voice echoing across the city:"I AM DONE!"
The plaza shivered. Reality warped. Buildings twisted, stretching like paper in water.People's faces flickered, revealing hundreds of versions — lives that had been erased, rewritten, repeated endlessly.
Lira turned toward him, eyes glowing faintly. "Riven… what are you—?"
He didn't answer.He reached for her — and the second she touched him, the loop began to shatter.
The ground cracked like porcelain.The streets folded into themselves.The skies tore apart, suns exploding into fragments of light.
Lira screamed.And he realized — the world he had built around her — the only way to free her was to destroy it entirely.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I have to fix this… even if it kills us both."
Her hand slipped through his. She tried to reach him, but the light was too strong, too consuming.
"Riven, don't!" she screamed. "I—"
Her voice ended as the city imploded into a white-hot void.Time unspooled, reality unraveling faster than his mind could process.
He saw fragments of every timeline — the first loop, the Clockwork Sea, the Paradox Core — all spinning around him in chaos.Every moment of joy, terror, and grief collided in a storm of memory.
And in the center, the echo of Lira — smiling, terrified, and infinite — reached toward him.
Riven gritted his teeth. "It ends now."
He let go of the energy within him.Let the timelines burn.Let the paradox consume itself.
The world collapsed in a single heartbeat.
For a moment, there was nothing.No light. No air. No sound.
Then —
A single, faint heartbeat echoed.
And Riven opened his eyes.
The world was gone.The sun didn't exist.The streets, the buildings, the echoes of millions of lives — all vanished.
He floated in nothing.Alone.
"Riven…"
Her voice — faint, impossibly distant.He couldn't see her. He couldn't touch her.But he could feel her, like a memory burned into the marrow of existence.
Riven's tears fell into the void."I… I freed you," he whispered."And now… I'm nothing."