The penthouse was quiet, high above the city, wrapped in early morning stillness. Outside the glass walls, the horizon was beginning to pale. The sun had not risen yet, but it was close enough that the darkness no longer felt heavy. Buildings below reflected faint traces of light, their edges softened by distance.
The bathroom lights brightened automatically as she entered.
Warm water filled the large tub, steam curling upward in slow, lazy patterns. The scent was light and sweet, barely there, chosen more for comfort than indulgence. Madison slipped out of her clothes without hurry and stepped into the bath, lowering herself into the water with a quiet sigh.
She leaned back.
The warmth wrapped around her immediately, easing into muscles that never truly tensed, but still welcomed the sensation. Her long hair loosened and drifted outward, spreading across the surface of the bath like dark silk, catching bubbles between the strands. Foam gathered along her shoulders and collarbone, hiding more than it revealed.
For a while, she simply rested there.
The world felt distant. Safe. Predictable.
Her thoughts drifted briefly to Aetherfall. To the eight she had left behind. She had given them instructions before parting, nothing unusual. Places to secure. Things to avoid. What to watch for if the situation changed. They would execute everything without question.
They always did.
Madison closed her eyes.
The hum of the building faded into the background. The gentle movement of water steadied her breathing. Outside, the sky lightened further, dawn slowly pressing against the night.
She allowed herself to relax.
Then her eyes snapped open.
The amethyst hue darkened in an instant, deepening into something heavier, sharper. The calm in her expression did not break, but something beneath it shifted.
Madison sat up.
Water slid down her arms as she rose from the tub, droplets trailing across smooth tile. She reached for the robe hanging nearby and pulled it around herself, thick white fabric swallowing the warmth and dampness alike. The belt cinched loosely at her waist, the hem brushing her calves.
Her hair remained wet, clinging down her back, darkened further by water.
She stepped forward.
Bare pale feet touched the floor, leaving faint prints behind her. She crossed the room without urgency, stopping a short distance from the glass wall overlooking the city.
The sun was just beginning to crest the horizon.
Madison raised one hand.
The space in front of her resisted.
Not like glass. Not like air. More like a thin layer stretched too tightly, waiting to be disturbed. Her fingers pressed against it gently, and the surface rippled under her touch, confirming its presence.
She peeled it open.
The air parted soundlessly, folding back like fabric, revealing a deep, lightless opening beyond. It was not empty. It was not void. It was simply elsewhere.
Madison stepped forward.
The warmth of the penthouse faded behind her as she passed through the opening, robe brushing against the edge of reality itself. The space sealed closed without a mark, leaving the city untouched, unaware that anything had ever changed.
And Madison was gone.
~~~
The world did not freeze when Madison arrived.
It yielded.
Stone dust hung in the air without falling. Blood droplets hovered mid-splash, caught between motion and stillness. Shattered fragments of the chamber walls remained suspended, edges sharp and unmoving, like pieces of a broken sculpture waiting to be set back into place.
Time had stopped.
Not violently. Not forcefully.
It stopped the way a room falls silent when someone important steps inside.
Madison stood at the edge of the devastation, white robe untouched, bare feet resting on stone that no longer remembered how to tremble. The dark opening she had stepped through sealed behind her, leaving no trace.
What lay before her looked like a painting.
A tableau of carnage, perfectly preserved.
Bodies were strewn across the chamber in positions of defeat. Armor split. Weapons bent. Blood pooled beneath them, dark and heavy, yet motionless. Faces were locked in expressions of pain, fear, or stubborn refusal.
At the center of it all lay Theo.
His body was broken beyond recognition. Limbs twisted at wrong angles. Blood soaked the ground beneath him, spreading outward in a shape that suggested movement that would never complete. His eyes were half-open, unfocused, already empty.
Madison did not react.
She already knew Death had claimed his soul.
She could feel it. The faint absence where something should have been. The subtle tug that told her Death was busy elsewhere, irritated and working harder than he liked.
A little further ahead stood the cause.
Astrae.
She remained upright, one foot braced against fractured stone, wings half-unfurled behind her. Her armor was cracked, stained with blood that was not her own. Her expression was not triumph.
It was boredom edged with irritation.
To Madison's eyes, though, there was something else beneath it.
Amusement.
This was Astrae's first chaos since awakening. Her first real indulgence after being bound and forgotten for so long. Destruction came easily to her. Rage gave her purpose. Even now, frozen in place, she radiated the restless thrill of it.
Madison's lips parted slightly.
A small sigh escaped her.
She should not have been here.
That had been the plan.
She had intended to lend Theo a hand just enough to survive the expanse. To give him a foundation. A starting point. Nothing more. She did not want to involve herself too closely yet. Not before the proper time. Not before he was ready to bear the weight of it.
Awakening Astrae now was premature.
At his current strength, it would lead nowhere.
He would not gain answers. He would not grow. He would only be trapped here, cycling through death without progress, his mind breaking long before his body ever could.
Infinite death was not growth.
It was erosion.
Madison lifted her hand.
With a lazy motion, she extended her index finger and flicked it toward Astrae.
Time resumed.
The hold loosened around the goddess, just enough.
Astrae stiffened.
Her awareness snapped outward as the world rushed back into motion. She felt it instantly. The wrongness. The pressure. The presence behind her that did not belong.
She turned.
Her gaze landed on Madison.
For a fraction of a second, Astrae did not understand what she was seeing.
The woman before her looked small. Young. Wrapped in a simple robe, hair still damp, standing barefoot in the ruins of a battlefield that had moments ago been hers.
But time had stopped for her.
That alone told Astrae everything she needed to know.
Rage flared, raw and instinctive.
"You!" Astrae snarled.
She did not know who Madison was. She did not need to. For time itself to bow meant one thing only.
A being far above her.
That knowledge did not bring caution.
It brought fury. Astrae screamed.
The sound tore through the chamber, cracking stone and shattering what little remained intact. Her control slipped. Power surged outward unchecked, divine force pouring from her without restraint. She cursed Madison with every name she still remembered, swearing death, annihilation, unmaking.
She attacked.
All of her power gathered into a single strike. No finesse. No restraint. Just overwhelming force meant to erase the thing in front of her.
Madison watched.
Her expression did not change.
As the attack closed the distance, tearing space apart in its wake, Madison spoke.
"Down."
The word was quiet.
It was enough.
Astrae slammed into the floor.
Not thrown nor struck, rather she was pressed.
Her body hit stone with a sound that echoed like a hammer on an anvil. The force drove her flat, wings crushed beneath her, armor biting into flesh. Her power vanished in an instant, snuffed out like a candle blown from existence.
She tried to rise but she could not move.
Gravity wrapped around her, multiplied beyond sense, pinning her to the ground with impossible weight. Every attempt to struggle only drove her deeper into the stone.
Astrae turned her head, teeth clenched, and looked up.
Madison stared down at her.
Blank. Calm. Uninterested.
Astrae reached inward, calling for her power.
Nothing answered.
Panic crept into her rage.
She spat curses, voice cracking, fury still burning but now edged with fear.
Madison stepped forward.
She placed the tip of her toe against Astrae's back.
The contact was gentle.
The effect was not.
The entire dungeon shook violently. Stone groaned and collapsed beneath Astrae's body as the floor caved inward, dropping several feet in a deafening crash. Astrae's body convulsed as blood spilled from her mouth, splattering against the broken stone.
Madison did not move her foot.
With her free hand, she flicked her fingers toward Theo's body.
The thin black vein beneath his skin reacted immediately.
It writhed, sliding free, stretching outward like liquid shadow. It thickened and twisted, expanding into a glossy black mass that flowed across the ground. It rose, shaping itself with deliberate care, forming a seat that looked almost elegant in its simplicity.
Madison sat.
The surface adjusted beneath her, supporting her comfortably. The black substance shifted subtly, alive in a way that felt obedient rather than wild.
Her foot remained resting on Astrae's back.
Astrae saw it.
The black substance. The connection. The way it responded.
Recognition hit her like a blade.
Her entire body trembled.
This was not the fear she felt toward high gods. Not the wary respect she had once learned. This was deeper. Beyond Ancient. Crippling. Total surrender.
Her breath hitched.
She tried to speak.
Madison lifted her gaze.
Astrae's voice died in her throat.
Madison looked at her, eyes steady, unblinking.
Then she spoke.
"I was taking a warm bath," Madison said calmly. "It was comfortable."
She tilted her head slightly.
"You made a mess."
Her tone was mild. Almost curious.
Madison's foot pressed down a fraction more.
The stone beneath Astrae cracked again, splintering outward. Astrae coughed, blood spilling freely now, her body shaking under the weight.
"Will you pay for that inconvenience?" Madison asked.
The question hung in the air.
Not as a threat.
As an expectation.
~~~
Astrae could not speak.
Her mouth opened, but no sound came out. The pressure of Madison's presence pressed down harder than any binding she had ever known. Even pinned to the shattered floor, even stripped of her power, this silence was worse than pain.
Madison bent slightly at the waist.
Not enough to show effort. Just enough to look.
Her amethyst eyes met Astrae's.
For a single breath, the color changed.
They did not turn black.
They deepened.
The purple dimmed and stretched, becoming something vast and hollow, like space without stars. It was not emptiness. It was the absence of limits. An endless dark that did not reflect light, did not reject it, but swallowed it whole.
Astrae froze.
In that instant, she understood.
Not who Madison was. That knowledge was beyond her reach. But what Madison represented. The kind of existence that did not sit within hierarchies, did not answer to gods, and did not require acknowledgment to erase meaning itself.
Then, just as quickly, it was gone.
Madison's eyes returned to their luminous, gemlike purple, calm and distant, as though nothing had happened at all.
She straightened.
With a quiet motion, Madison lifted her foot from Astrae's back.
The crushing weight vanished.
Astrae gasped, air rushing back into lungs that had forgotten how to breathe. Her body trembled violently as sensation returned, pain flaring everywhere at once. She did not try to stand. She barely managed to roll onto her side.
Then she crawled.
Hands scraping against broken stone, fingers shaking so badly they could barely hold her weight. She dragged herself forward, inch by inch, toward Madison's feet. Her wings twitched uselessly behind her, feathers cracked and bent.
When she reached Madison, Astrae tried to lift her hand.
It stopped halfway.
Her fingers trembled, refusing to obey.
Madison looked down at her.
There was no anger in her expression. No satisfaction. Just weariness, faint but unmistakable, like someone interrupted in the middle of something peaceful.
Astrae swallowed hard.
"Where is my liege?" she whispered, voice hoarse and broken. " If anyone knows… it has to be you."
Her breath hitched.
"What happened to him?" Astrae continued, desperation creeping into her tone. "What happened to everyone?"
Madison did not answer.
She did not look away either.
"I don't owe you an explanation," Madison said calmly.
The words were not cruel. They were final.
Astrae's shoulders shook. Her head lowered until her forehead touched the stone.
"I know," she said, barely audible. "I know I have no right..."
She hesitated, then forced herself to speak again.
"But… please..."
The single word carried centuries of grief, anger, and loss compressed into a fragile plea.
Madison exhaled softly.
She shifted her weight and flicked her finger downward, brushing against the glossy black substance pooled near her feet. The tar-like mass reacted instantly, recoiling as if startled. It shrank and thinned, drawing inward, unraveling itself into a long, narrow thread.
The thread slid across the floor, smooth and deliberate, and flowed back toward Theo's body.
It slipped beneath his skin, disappearing into his arm as if it had always belonged there.
Madison nodded once.
"Over there," she said.
Astrae followed her gaze.
Her eyes landed on Theo.
The young man's body lay broken and still, blood dark against the stone. He looked fragile. Insignificant. Mortal in every sense Astrae understood.
Confusion cut through her fear.
"That one?" Astrae asked, disbelief shaking her voice. "How? Why?"
She clenched her hands into fists.
"Death already took him," she said. "I felt it. His soul is gone."
Madison turned her head slightly, looking back at Astrae.
"That," she replied, "is for me to worry about."
Her gaze sharpened just a fraction.
"You," Madison continued, "only need to listen. If you truly want the truth."
Astrae went still.
The anger that had fueled her rampage drained away, replaced by something colder and heavier. She lowered her head again, this time not in defeat, but in restraint.
For the first time since awakening, Astrae did not act.
She waited.