Deacon opened his mouth to speak again. But Finn wasn't about to allow that.

With fury, he urged his divine essence, uncaring of the meager amount left. If he could kill one of these traitorous bastards, it would be worth it. He stacked a chain of invalidations, focusing his intent on Deacon's words that were about to be spoken.

Immediately, the air grew heavy. Deacon strained visibly to speak, as if he could sense the life-threatening backlash he would experience if he did.

The divine essence burned through Finn like acid, eating away at what little remained. His mask flared brilliant green, so bright it cast shadows in the apocalyptic chamber.

"Your opponent is me!" Casmir snarled and clapped both hands together with a thunderous slam in Finn's direction, releasing a wave of pure spatial chaos that Finn had no choice but to face head-on, giving Deacon the leeway to cast his declaration.

Finn weathered through the devastating spatial attack by maintaining a glitch state for the entire duration. In his glitch state he was normally invulnerable to spatial attacks. But Casmir, being the Space Transcendent, had a deeper understanding of space than someone like Deacon.

Despite the fact that Finn should have been able to move freely, he found that doing so would actually threaten the integrity of his glitch state, especially because he currently had Ailin strapped to his back, also within the effect of his glitch state.

If he moved wrong, the glitch would collapse. Ailin would be exposed. And Casmir's spatial chaos would tear them both apart.

So Finn held position, enduring, while Deacon spoke words Finn couldn't quite hear over the roar of destruction.

The attack thundered chaotically, a deafening roar that radiated outward. It vaporized everything in its path for three miles in the subterranean depths they currently occupied. The resulting vacuum sent thousands of tons of earth cascading down, threatening to crush everyone… until, abruptly, the falling mass stilled. The debris hung weightless in the air, mirroring the suspended state of the earth that had loomed over them from the start.

Casmir strained slightly but straightened, watching Finn with predatory eyes primed for anything the Error bearer would throw at him.

So he's been holding up the earth while also fighting me, Finn noted coldly. He's this strong already but was hiding it. How much else has been a lie?

"Has anything about you been real at all?!" Finn roared in a voice thick with indignation, charging at Casmir.

He frame skipped, covering four times his normal distance in one go, but Casmir kept up with his pace, lengthening the distance by the same margin. Finn chained his frame skips, glitching forward in one continuous motion, but Casmir matched him regardless.

He's studied my Error, Finn realized grimly. Even with my divine essence boost, he knows my range and can still keep up with me—

Suddenly, out of nowhere, a body was hurled in Finn's direction. He wanted to disregard it, as it had no chance of reaching him, but he noticed more carefully that it was actually Thalia.

He stopped and caught her in the air, dampening the momentum of her fall with a brief application of Reversion to undo the kinetic energy, allowing Casmir to slither away and join the other Transcendents.

Three — or rather, four Transcendents stood by the breach: Himothy, Deacon, Casmir, and Keeva. Keeva had only just appeared, tearing away the disguise spell that had kept her hidden from the chaotic fights far above her league. They watched Finn, Thalia, and the unconscious Ailin with varying expressions, but all shared a common look of cold decisiveness.

"What did you do to me, Deacon!!" Thalia screamed.

Finn could feel anger roll off her like a physical thing. She was utterly incensed, but she seemed not to know why. Her rage had a quality of confusion to it, as if she was grasping for something just beyond her mental reach.

Deacon must have made her forget something… Changed what she knows about whatever they're doing.

Finn observed coldly behind his mask. He had tried repeatedly to understand what was happening, to provide a logical reason, or even an illogical one. Something that would explain the mind-boggling series of events that had occurred within the last few seconds. But he came up blank every time.

And very quickly, he defaulted into the familiar numbness of his hollow years. In this state he didn't need to understand human reasoning or motives. He simply acted according to the situation detachedly. People became chess pieces. Emotions became irrelevant. Survival became the only calculation that mattered.

That was all he could do now.

He bottled all the anger he felt, all the confusion, all the feelings of betrayal, and simply observed.

Right now, he didn't even trust Thalia. He'd saved her out of necessity for his survival going forward, nothing more.

He was already thinking ahead with cold calculation. Casmir would most certainly close access to that portal once the four Transcendents crossed, and the thousands of tons of suspended earth would come crumbling down on them. Having Thalia around would increase his odds of survival and navigating his way out alive.

Even Ailin. The only reason he had her strapped to his back and hadn't discarded her yet was because of the knowledge she might possess. That was the same reason Deacon had come after her first, tried to erase her with that Truth declaration. If she woke up, she would prove resourceful for their indefinite stay in this God-filled world.

He watched passively as Thalia bolted forward with her hair disheveled, screaming in anger that she knew was deeper than the betrayal of her comrades.

She knew she had known something, been told something that hurt even deeper than this betrayal, and yet she had been robbed of that knowledge. A truth had been forced upon her mind, overwriting whatever Casmir had told her moments ago. And she no longer remembered this vital thing that made her rage burn with such intensity.

Seeing her fury as the four Transcendents disappeared wordlessly into the barrier triggered something in Finn. A sense of déjà vu that made him frown behind his mask.

It almost felt like something similar had happened to him at some point. That sensation of grasping for a memory that should be there but wasn't. That wrongness of knowing you've forgotten something crucial but being unable to remember what.

He glanced up briefly as Casmir and Deacon, who were last to cross, suddenly tore their gazes from Thalia, who was charging toward them, never to reach in time. Their eyes locked onto Finn, panicked and utterly shocked.

Huh?

Finn frowned deeper as the two faded from view, their expressions of panic and shock the last thing he saw before they vanished completely. They barely escaped the wrath of Thalia as her fist landed on the breach, which had solidified after Casmir passed through.

A shockwave spread outward, sending her flying back from the impact. The breach didn't so much as ripple. Sealed completely.

The shockwave signaled the start of chaos as everything Casmir had held in place with his spatial power came crumbling down immediately.

Finn frame skipped toward Thalia before the frightening mass descended, grabbing her roughly and pulling her into his glitch state. He shook her out of her frenzied state, his voice drowned out by the overwhelming roar of thousands of tons of earth, stone, and molten rock descending to crush them.

The last thing Finn saw before everything went dark was the sealed breach, still faintly glowing where the Gods and the traitors had escaped.

Then the world came crashing down.

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