The battlefield was already a graveyard.

Voidborn corpses twitched in heaps, fading into black mist. Blood—red and violet—stained the cracked courtyard. The air itself seemed heavy, pressing down like a crown of iron.

And in the center, Pride stood.

His form was regal, grotesque in its perfection. His body shimmered with veins of dark-gold Shinrei, cracks glowing like molten arrogance. His claws gleamed obsidian, each strike earlier having carved through stone and flesh alike. No chains wrapped him like Greed—he didn't bind. He crushed. Wings of fractured light unfurled behind him, feathers sharpened into spears. His eyes were pits of burning superiority, as though every life around him was already beneath his heel.

He bled from his ribs, one wing torn, skin scarred by Khael and Shigeo's last strikes—yet still he stood straighter than a king, grin sharp and venomous.

"Pathetic gnats," he snarled, voice booming like a cathedral bell. "Do you think bruises make me falter? Do you think you've earned this fight? I am Pride. I am the pinnacle. And you—" he dragged his claw across his chest, Shinrei flaring dark-gold and violent— "—are nothing but dust to decorate my victory."

Around him, survivors formed their circle.

Khael's dragon-blood aura shimmered faintly, scales glowing emerald at the edges of his arms. Shigeo stood silent, scarf fluttering, lightning humming across his fingertips with clinical calm. Saya's braided blonde hair whipped as she steadied her Blighted Bloom Shinrei, her sharp eyes never leaving Pride.

Team Four, battered but alive: Tessa's ink-stained fingers sparked with metallic light, sketches of gears swirling into hovering blades; Enji's sparks crawled across his lean frame; Baek's wave aura circled around his steps like flowing tides.

Team Eight staggered closer: Isla's moss-green eyes wet with tears, healing blooms wilting at her shoulders; Ryen's glasses cracked but his notes still clenched in hand, pages stained with blood; Toran's body lay broken behind them, chest pierced through by a voidborn claw.

Team Eleven dragged themselves forward: Izan bleeding from his knees, bandaged legs trembling; Kara's thunder had burned out, her body crumpled in the shadows; Milo dropped his half-eaten snack, eyes wide and hollow, forcing himself to stand though his whole body shook.

Silence, save for breath.

Pride raised his claw, Shinrei sparking like storms and suns colliding. "Bow, children. I'll carve your names on the stone so the world remembers your arrogance before you vanish."

Shigeo's voice, quiet, cut through the pressure. "What a complicated world. Even kings bleed."

Khael's smile flickered, faint but steady. "Even dragons bow… but never to you."

The survivors cried out, voices ragged but burning:

"FOR TORAN!"

"FOR KARA!"

"FOR FARON!"

The courtyard erupted.

Pride's claw cleaved first, a swipe that shattered air itself. Stone split like parchment. But Juno roared, bones cracking as he slammed open the Tendon Gate, body twisting to intercept. His fists met claw, sparks and blood flying. Pride's strike hurled him into the wall, but he pushed himself back up, teeth clenched.

(Not while I can still stand… not while they're still alive!)

Saya's blighted bloom flared, thorned vines erupting from her hands, wrapping Pride's legs. He sneered, Shinrei flaring, breaking half of them, but the roots dug deeper, glowing with her fury.

"Chains bind the body. My blooms bind the pride in your veins!"

Baek surged in, Wave Shinrei spiraling, water crashing over Pride's lower body, amplifying the grip.

Pride snarled, lifting his wings, feathers launching like spears. Enji dove forward, sparks bursting into a barrier.

Echo Art: Lightning Break, Static Guard!

His arms screamed under the weight as feathers shattered against the barrier, sparks burning his skin.

Isla's hands glowed as she poured her Bloom Shinrei into Ryen, sealing the gash in his arm. He nodded, shoving cracked glasses up, and shouted, "Note this—Pride bleeds when bound!"

Khael moved. His fists swirled with dragon wind, emerald gales tearing through Pride's feathers. He leapt high, half-dragon aura bursting, scales flaring along his arms. His strike collided with Pride's jaw, snapping his head to the side.

Shigeo followed instantly, no wasted motion. His lightning flickered into a spear that drove straight into the wound in Pride's ribs.

Echo Art: Lightning Spear!

The Sin roared, claw lashing blindly.

"YOU THINK YOUR SCRATCHES HUMBLE ME?!"

His claw ripped across the courtyard—Ryen was too slow. Kara's body already lay dead. Toran gone. And now—

"RYEN!!" Isla screamed, dragging him down as Pride's claw passed overhead, but the wind still tore half his notes to shreds, blood smearing the rest.

Milo, cheeks wet, whispered, "Stop eating… stop running…" He slammed open his Core Gate, body swelling with borrowed endurance. With a raw scream, he charged, Bloom Shinrei flooding into Khael's dragon aura. Together, they struck Pride's midsection, Milo's fragile frame breaking, but amplifying the gale.

Pride staggered just a step. His golden Shinrei flared violently, arrogance screaming from every pore.

"BOW TO ME!"

The courtyard quaked as he expanded, his body shimmering with golden cracks. Wings spread wider, feathers now burning as lances. His claw stretched longer, black-gold veins crawling across his arm. His presence suffocated the world.

Every survivor felt their hearts shake.

(This is Pride… the living peak… the Sin that will never kneel… how can we—)

Shigeo's voice cut through the despair. "I have another plan."

Khael turned, eyes narrowing. "Did you use your Thousand Way?"

Shigeo nodded. A combat technique only a genius like him could create. Not a supermove. Not raw power. A predictive web. A thousand possibilities simulated in a split-second.

He raised both his hands, palms facing one another like he was holding something invisible between them. Lightning danced across his skin, not wild, not uncontrolled but measured. Every spark was a line, every arc a branch. His palms, held apart as if grasping an invisible sphere, trembled with infinite calculations.

(Every strike. Every feather. Every motion of his claw. A thousand futures. A thousand deaths. One path to survive.)

The ground crackled beneath him, a lattice of lightning spreading outward like a spider's web, marking arcs, directions, vectors. The others felt it not power, but certainty.

Khael's eyes narrowed. "So… you're mapping him."

Shigeo's voice was steady, though sweat streamed down his face. "Not mapping. Forcing him. Pride thinks he stands above us… then let him walk exactly where I want him to."

Pride tilted his head, golden cracks glowing brighter, feathers twitching. He grinned with venom.

"Petty tricks. Do you think your fragile sparks can tell me where to step?"

But when he moved, the feathers he loosed were cut off mid-flight—arcing into vines Saya had already raised, exactly where Shigeo's lightning had marked. When he swung his claw, Khael's dragon gale already struck its underside, redirecting it wide, smashing into stone instead of flesh. When he spread his wings, Baek's waves surged, collapsing the air around them, breaking the angle before they pierced.

Shigeo's Thousand Way wasn't about overwhelming Pride.

It was about trapping him in inevitability.

(If he's arrogance incarnate, then make his pride the cage.)

The survivors moved like extensions of Shigeo's will. Tessa's gears spun through the air, intercepting feathers exactly when they curved into blind spots. Enji's sparks jumped at the perfect second, sealing Baek's opening. Isla pushed Ryen forward, her healing forcing him to keep scribing notes, his voice guiding placement: "Three seconds east! Chains bind the ankles!"

And then Khael roared.

Dragon scales erupted across half his body, emerald fire lashing his arms. With Milo's bloom still surging in his veins, he became more beast than boy. He rushed Pride head-on, fists striking like storms. Pride raised his claw to crush him

"NOW!" Shigeo's voice thundered.

Khael ducked exactly into a gap Shigeo had calculated, Shigeo's lightning snapped down the opening. Saya's vines burst upward, entangling Pride's injured ribs. Baek's waves slammed his ankles. Enji's barrier flared, halting the counter-swing. Tessa's blades dove in, carving cracks across his wings. Isla's bloom healed Khael mid-strike, forcing his broken arm to snap back into use just as he landed the final blow on Pride's jaw.

The Sin staggered golden Shinrei flickering, arrogance burning brighter but struggling to stabilize.

Shigeo's hands trembled as the lattice of lightning cracked around him. His voice was low, almost breaking.

"One path… left…"

His palms clapped together. Lightning roared outward, condensing into a single sphere between his hands shaped from every possibility he had denied, every failure he had rerouted.

"Echo Art: Lightning Sphere!!"

He thrust it forward.

The sphere of lightning shot like a star, not raw power but a destiny strike, carrying with it the sum of every path Shigeo had cut away. It tore straight through Pride's chest, exploding in silence no thunder, no scream, only inevitability.

Pride staggered, golden cracks spreading wider, his regal frame faltering for the first time. His grin, sharp and venomous, did not fade.

"…A thousand tricks… to cut down a king?" His voice rattled, heavy with both scorn and recognition. "…Then perhaps… even a peak… can be forced to bow…"

His body flared with black-gold light, wings shattering into spears of dust. He smiled still, even as he bled, even as the survivors closed in.

(Pride never kneels… but even Pride can fall.)

The survivors surged for the finisher.

Saya's blooms erupted, chains of thorn binding legs.

Baek's waves locked them tighter, anchors of sea.

Juno bellowed, "Taishin Path….. Core Gate Reinforces, OPEN!" His fists collided with

Pride's claw, stone will against arrogance.

Ceyla's storm chains pierced his wings, dragging them apart, lightning caging the sky.

Shigeo funneled the lattice inward. "No future where you stand."

And Khael soared. Emerald gale erupted, his aura a dragon's roar.

"Eclipse Art:Emerald Catastrophe!"

Juno shattered the guard.

Ceyla's chains snapped taut.

Shigeo collapsed inevitability into the wound.

Khael's meteor fist struck, the gale detonating into blinding emerald-white.

The courtyard vanished.

When the haze cleared—

Pride was on one knee. His chest torn open, light spilling through cracks. He bled, but he smiled.

"…So this is the weight of your defiance," he rasped. "But remember" He coughed blood, laughter rattling.

"…Pride never kneels."

His body shattered, black-gold fragments scattering like glass. His laughter lingered, venomous, echoing through ruin.

For the first time, Pride had fallen.

To be continue

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