On the Path of Eternal Strength.

And Sebastián was left alone.

But no longer divided.

The echo of his steps no longer sounded like rupture.

It sounded like part of the place. As if, at last, the Rift of Mirrors accepted him not as a guest… but as a complete reflection.

There were no enemies.

There were no guides.

Only crystal, shadow… and the breathing of a world that still did not consider him worthy.

The Qi within him no longer roared for space.

It turned slowly. Dense.

Like a sleeping serpent coiled around the inverted core, absorbing and digesting every thought, every unresolved emotion.

The Dao showed no words.

Only pressure.

Pressure that did not come from outside… but from himself.

Sebastián sat down.

Not in haste.

Not in fear.

But with a calm so pure it seemed alien to his age.

And as the Rift began to change —as if it breathed alongside him— Sebastián closed his eyes.

The inner world did not open as a landscape.

It compressed.

Everything he had seen, what he had destroyed, what he had felt… now returned.

Not as judgment.

As raw material.

Qi began to flow.

Not from outside, but from within.

From that living core that pulsed not as an organ, but as a contained scream.

And there, in that silence where time was not measured by light or shadow, Sebastián began his ascent.

It was no longer enough to endure.

Now he had to go deeper.

Because if he wanted to reach Realm 6: Active Qi Core, it was not enough to absorb more energy.

He had to understand his existence.

And let the Dao show him… what he had to leave behind.

A new cycle was beginning.

And this time, it was not about fighting.

It was about remaining.

Qi no longer sought immediate strength.

It sought root.

Each inhalation was a question.

Each exhalation… a necessary loss.

In that place where there were no seasons or clocks, Sebastián began to count time differently:

By each change in his intention.

The first month passed like a slow exhalation.

His body remained the same.

But his interior… no longer obeyed him through commands, but through resonance.

His Qi zones were no longer external territories.

They were extensions of his will.

The Path of the Indomitable Body, once a technique of brutal resistance, began to refine itself.

The muscles no longer tightened.

Now they contained.

The bones no longer creaked when receiving Qi.

They embraced it as a rhythm.

As if they had awaited that kind of flow for years.

But it was not simple adaptation.

It was transformation.

Because something deeper than technique, older than practice… began to pulse.

The Dao.

Not as doctrine.

Not as a master.

But as an inverted mirror: it did not show what he was, but what he had not yet been able to assume.

Sebastián knelt before that idea.

Not because he surrendered… but because he no longer needed to impose himself.

The second month came with distorted memories:

Virka, in her first days.

Narka, when he was silent with intention.

And his mother… with eyes he no longer remembered, but whose emptiness still hurt.

He did not cry.

He did not roar.

He only let all that enter… as emotional Qi.

As layers of meaning.

And by letting it pass, he understood:

That his strength would not come from ignoring his past.

But from holding it… without letting it devour him.

The vortex within him changed color.

From impure white… to dense gray.

It was not clean, but it was his own.

And for the first time, Sebastián understood that his cultivation… was not about climbing upward.

It was about going deeper.

And as he went deeper… pain changed its form.

It was no longer sharp.

It did not scream.

It was a dense pressure.

Silent.

As if each layer of Qi he reached demanded not more strength, but more honesty. With the passing of time, his breathing began to slow.

Not because he was tired… but because his body no longer needed as much oxygen.

Qi had become nourishment.

And nourishment, nothing more than a ritual.

The Rift of Mirrors, for its part, began to mutate.

New crystals sprouted from the floor and the walls, soundless, as if responding to what was happening inside him.

But they were not reflections of enemies.

They were reflections of decisions not yet taken.

Each one showed a different path.

A possibility.

A destiny that might have saved him… or dragged him down.

And he looked at them.

Not with nostalgia.

With curiosity.

Because at last he understood that he was not a product of destiny.

He was the author of his path.

As he advanced, the Qi within his vortex began to spin in the opposite direction.

As if something in his core refused to follow the natural flow.

But it was not rejection.

It was identity.

His Inverted Origin Core began to merge with the pulse of the Dao.

And the result… was not stable.

At times he felt as if his entire soul were compressing into a dark point.

At others, as if his whole body stretched toward a future existence that still had no name.

But he endured it.

Because he no longer sought to understand.

He sought to resist… until something revealed itself on its own.

With time, his skin began to resonate.

Literally.

He could feel the humming of Qi beneath his epidermis, as if every pore were a channel.

The power did not only enter… it also left, controlled, soft, contained.

And it was then, among the echoes of the Rift, that Sebastián understood:

That his Dao could no longer be tied to the past.

Nor to suffering.

Nor even to desire.

Only to one thing.

To remain.

Not as obstinacy.

But as the certainty that, even if the world shattered, he would still be there.

Not the same.

But present.

And when his body felt the brush of a new threshold, Realm 6: mid-sublevel… it accepted him.

Not with light.

With silence.

As if the spiritual world recognized him… without celebrating it.

Because what was being born inside Sebastián…

did not need celebration.

It only needed to last.

And that verb —to last— began to take on a new weight.

A weight that was not only symbolic.

As he tried to continue delving into his cultivation, Sebastián felt it:

The vortex of his Inverted Origin Core did not stay still.

It grew.

It expanded not like a flower… but like a fracture rearranging itself.

A living crack that widened to contain more Qi.

More energy.

More essence.

But that gift was not free.

Where other cultivators held a concrete amount of Qi to advance…

he had to contain much more.

Not because he needed it.

But because his core demanded it.

As if Eternity itself… were gluttonous.

Progress began to slow.

Not stagnant.

But each small step felt like an enormous decision.

As if each drop of Qi had to be negotiated with the abyss that dwelled inside him.

And the worst part…

was that the abyss also fed on him.

On his soul.

On his emotions.

On his unresolved past.

That was why cultivating was no longer simply breathing energy.

It was emptying himself.

And filling himself again with something new, unknown, sharp.

And in that process…

Time ceased to be an ally.

He did not know how long he had been there.

He did not know if outside days, months, or years had passed.

But his body did not age.

It did not wither either.

It only mutated…

From within.

The Dao was no longer an idea.

It was a necessity.

There was no way for Qi to circulate through his body without also crossing his will, his history, his contradictions.

As if each spiritual route were made of questions.

And the price for each advance…

was a real answer.

Not a beautiful answer.

Nor a noble one.

Only a real one.

—Why do you keep going? —his inner rift asked him one day, without words.

—Because I cannot stop —he answered, without hesitation.

And in saying it, something within his Qi aligned.

A new pattern, minimal, almost imperceptible… but more solid.

More his own.

That was his cultivation.

It did not shine.

It did not roar.

It did not wrap him in golden auras nor make him levitate.

It did not fill the biome with resonances.

Nor provoke tremors.

But each breath was an anchor.

Each clear thought… a firm step.

And each shadow acknowledged… a deeper layer of himself.

He was not advancing toward a goal.

He was becoming a space.

A place within which eternal strength could dwell.

Without shouting.

Without corrupting.

Without imposing.

Just being.

And from that center…

The Rift itself seemed to wait.

Not to attack him.

But to watch him finish being born.

But birth… hurt.

Not in the muscles.

Not in the bones.

Not in the organs, already tempered by his Path of the Indomitable Body.

It hurt in coherence. His Qi kept refining.

Slow. Precise.

His internal channels were no longer simply conduits.

They were living tissues learning to speak with Qi.

To stop it.

To drive it.

To make it vibrate with different purposes.

And the core —that throbbing crack in his chest— spun like a deformed sun.

Each turn it made absorbed not only the world's energy,

but the old version of what Sebastián believed himself to be.

His body began to store Qi with an impossible density.

It was heavier.

Deeper.

More silent.

But something failed.

Something did not advance.

The pinnacle of Realm 6 did not arrive.

No matter how much Qi circulated.

No matter how many hours, days, or years —whatever it was that was passing— of meditation, containment, and refinement…

the limit would not yield.

And then he understood.

It was not a matter of more energy.

Nor of more resistance.

It was that his Dao did not follow him.

His Qi was already ready.

But his path… was not.

Not out of weakness.

But out of insufficient depth.

And in that instant of comprehension, his cultivation trembled.

It did not collapse.

It did not retreat.

It simply… stopped obeying.

Qi did not respond to his commands with the same precision.

It stood still.

Expectant.

As if waiting for a real reason to continue.

And it was there that the trance began.

Not by accident.

Not by voluntary meditation.

But because his soul was pushed to the edge of his own intention.

He fell into himself.

Not like free fall.

But as if the mind were splitting into layers.

In one he saw his childhood.

In another, his monster.

In another, the echo of all his decisions.

And in the deepest… he saw nothing.

Only emptiness.

A space where his Dao still had no form.

Where eternal strength was only an ideal…

without column…

without substance…

without flesh.

But he did not flee.

For the first time, he did not want to understand.

He wanted to hold that emptiness.

To inhabit it.

And something there… reacted.

A thread.

A subtle vibration that came neither from Qi nor from his body.

But from his existential desire.

Not for power.

Not for vengeance.

Not for redemption.

But to remain, even when everything breaks.

And that desire… was not shouted.

It became Dao.

It was not born as a word.

Nor as a philosophy.

It was born as a heartbeat.

And from the depths, a new energy began to weave itself between his Qi, his core, and his thoughts.

It was not yet the pinnacle.

But it was what would allow it.

One step further…

toward something from which there would be no return.

Because whoever begins to inhabit their Dao…

From the void… the vision emerged.

It was not a memory.

It was not a hallucination.

It was a presence.

A version of himself wrapped in motionless fire.

It did not consume.

It did not burn.

It only floated, as if heat were a decision, not an effect.

That Sebastián did not walk.

Did not speak.

He only watched with closed eyes.

And yet… he saw him.

—Is this the Dao? —asked the real one, with inner voice.

The figure did not answer.

It only extended a hand.

Not toward him.

But upward.

And in that gesture, the fire rose…

not as flame,

but as released intention.

As if every fiber of that body were a pact with the impossible.

Sebastián trembled.

Not from fear.

From comprehension.

Because he understood —without need of words—

that what he was seeing was not a goal,

nor a final form,

nor even a guide.

It was a direction.

A path that imitated no one.

That served no one.

A trail carved in the unknown,

by a will that no longer asked permission.

And then he thought.

Do all cultivators… go through this?

Do all face visions of the soul, nameless voids, fragmentations of themselves?

Or is this… only his?

Because his Dao did not resemble the others.

It was not a code.

It was not a legacy.

It was not a belief.

It was a single idea,

alive,

pulsating,

obsessive:

"Not to disappear."

And for the first time, that idea hurt.

Because he knew that to remain…

he would have to leave things behind.

Humanities.

Bonds.

Perhaps… himself.

Was that the price?

To become a fire that burns inward…

without burning outward?

The vision broke.

Not with violence.

But with acceptance.

The fire dissipated.

The figure disappeared.

The void closed again.

And his consciousness… returned to the biome.

But something had changed.

His Dao was no longer abstract.

It was a reflection.

A choice that looked back at him…

and asked him if he was truly willing to live with the consequences of resisting oblivion.

And he, for now…

still did not have the answer.

But the Qi began to react as if he did. The crystal trembled.

Not as a physical quake.

But as if a memory of the biome had cracked… from within.

Sebastián opened his eyes.

No figures stared at him.

No enemies surrounded him.

Only the ground… opening.

Slowly.

With respect.

From the rift, no monster emerged.

A reflection did.

Not his own.

One older.

More eroded.

More forgotten.

A Qi cultivator who seemed made of dry stone, with petrified veins, and an open chest that harbored a broken core.

His eyes did not shine.

His pupils were empty… as if the Dao had abandoned him long ago.

And he walked.

Without staggering.

Without roaring.

Without saying anything.

He just… walked toward him.

Sebastián did not take a defensive stance.

He did not speak either.

Because he understood.

That was not an enemy.

It was a possible future.

A response from the biome.

A silent warning:

"If you choose your path… you must hold it."

The stone cultivator did not attack.

He only stopped a few meters away.

And, for an instant, Sebastián felt something impossible.

Fatigue.

Not his own.

The other's.

As if that forgotten reflection begged him —without voice, without face—

not to repeat the mistake.

—Did you also want to endure? —Sebastián murmured.

The other did not answer.

He only cracked.

From the base of his feet to his forehead, his body began to fall apart…

not into ash,

but into fragments of failed intention.

Dry fragments of the desire for eternity.

Remains of a will that wished to transcend without knowing what had to be renounced.

And when the last piece touched the ground,

the biome returned to silence.

But Sebastián… did not.

Because the Qi within him kept vibrating.

Not with doubt.

With weight.

The Dao was not a path one took.

It was a trail one upheld.

With each step.

With each decision.

With each renunciation.

And while the vortex in his chest kept spinning —slower, denser, more his own—, Sebastián understood what the biome had just shown him.

Oblivion does not kill.

It only waits.

For one to grow tired of resisting it.

And in that instant…

he decided not to tire.

Even if that… destroyed him as well.

The biome did not speak.

But it invoked him.

The crystal walls began to melt… without heat.

They did not drip.

They slid, as if the liquid memory of the world had decided to flow elsewhere.

And that place… was him.

The environment did not disappear.

It changed texture.

It was no longer pure stone.

Nor transparent mirror.

It was skin.

It was voice.

It was touch.

Sebastián breathed.

And as he exhaled…

she appeared.

She had no clear face.

She was a silhouette.

A feminine outline covered by soft shadows, almost liquid.

Her hands did not extend.

They did not beg.

They did not seduce.

They were simply there.

And in her presence… Sebastián felt something he did not expect.

Desire.

Not carnal.

Not immediate.

It was that unnamed need.

The one born when one chooses a path… and begins to understand all that path demands to lose.

The figure did not speak.

She only walked toward him…

and with each step, the biome's walls whispered a different word:

Companionship.

Touch.

Comfort.

Surrender.

Abandonment.

Belonging.

Sebastián did not retreat.

But he did not advance either.

Because he understood the trial.

It was not a trap.

It was an offer.

The biome showed him —without cruelty—

what his eternal strength could not carry.

Because no body, however powerful, can sustain the infinite…

without letting go of what made it human.

And still… his Qi kept flowing.

It did not stop.

It did not doubt.

It began to course down his back like a silent river.

It descended through his chest.

Pressed into his arms.

Breathed from his abdomen.

And for the first time…

Qi did not feel like power.

It felt like a living mirror, responding not to his will…

but to his truth.

The female figure stopped a few steps away.

And with a voice that was not hers —nor human—, she whispered:

—And if there is no strength without absence?

—Then I will make space —Sebastián answered, without hatred or arrogance.

Qi surrounded him.

And for an instant, it seemed that the figure would touch him.

But she did not.

She only dissolved into a burst of obsidian particles, that spun around him like stardust…

and then were absorbed into his vortex.

The mid-level of Realm 6 was no longer a point of power.

It was an inner dimension.

And Sebastián inhabited it.

Not by external choice.

But because he had accepted it.

And the biome… too. Qi moved.

Not as obedient energy, but as a living tongue that curved according to the shape of his will.

It was not speed.

It was not strength.

It was intention turned into substance.

And Sebastián, in the middle of that invisible expansion, did not raise his hand.

He only thought of advancing.

And space split into lines of pressure.

There was no explosion.

There was no drama.

Only the loaded silence of a perfect movement, where each crack forming in the crystals was an affirmation that Qi no longer left his body.

It was his body.

For an instant, he remembered everything he had felt when he repressed.

The impulses.

The desires.

The raw rage.

The need to be touched by something other than pain.

The tenderness he feared to confess.

And the hatred for what had once been weak within him.

Before… he buried all of that.

Because he believed that to be strong was to endure without looking back.

But there, under the eternal gaze of the biome, he understood that that kind of strength was only a more elegant version of fear.

A will that denies what it is, divides.

And a divided will… breaks.

It was not a matter of ignoring his desire to crush enemies.

Nor his urge to discover what he might feel when he was no longer forced to fight.

Nor his curiosity for bonds, for touch, for love, for chaos.

All of that was still there.

But now… he chose it.

Not to yield to it.

But to rule it.

The Path of Eternal Strength did not require purity.

It required coherence.

To be one.

Even when that unity was stormy.

And it was there, in that relentless acceptance, that Qi responded.

Not with a new technique.

But with a new form.

It rose like a dense mist, spreading from his back as if he had wings.

They were not real.

But the symbolic weight they projected could not be ignored.

They were testimony to something that could not be trained.

It was survived.

The entire Rift grew tense.

Not as a threat.

But as respect.

Because the boy who once entered seeking power… now held power without seeking it.

And in the center of that dense calm, his voice emerged low, without imposing itself:

—I do not need to suppress what I am.

—I only need to decide who uses it.

And in saying so, something else rose within him.

An echo.

Not of the past.

Of what was to come.

As if eternity itself —not as time, but as purpose— recognized in that phrase a signal.

It was not enough to survive.

One had to remain.

And for that… one had to accept.

Then, one last inner pressure was released.

And Sebastián advanced a step.

Just one.

But the entire biome groaned as if the world itself had had to yield a little… only to allow him to continue.

He was not a warrior.

He was not a protector.

He was not a sage.

He was a walker.

And his path did not bend.

It did not accelerate.

It only sustained itself.

Like the kind of strength that, at the end of all screams… is still there.

Qi condensed.

But it was not obedience.

It was presence.

He did not need to raise his voice in his mind nor expand his will like a shout.

The Realm now responded with another logic: the silent respect of what had been upheld with blood, with certainty… and with identity.

And yet… it was still not enough.

Because although his Dao had been defined with the clarity of a wound that became a scar, the Qi within his body —and outside it— was still not sufficient.

Not because it was scarce.

But because his Inverted Origin Core, hungry by nature, had grown.

It was no longer just a crack.

It was a throat.

A deep spiral that could devour the sky, if allowed.

But to sustain it, Sebastián had to learn something more than channeling energy.

He had to understand how to contain it without becoming it.

His body allowed it.

His soul sought it.

His Dao guided him.

But the Realm… demanded.

And it was then that he felt it: a limit that was not physical.

A formless wall.

It was not ahead.

It was within.

In the connection between his Qi and his Dao.

A murky, dense zone, as if he still could not completely translate his conviction into structure.

It was frustrating.

And not because it hurt.

But because he already knew what he wanted to be, yet still could not express it with all his strength.

One breath anchored him.

Another tempered him.

And then, he remembered.

Not all growth is an ascent.

Sometimes… it is a lateral expansion.

A slow digestion of what has already been absorbed.

Like snakes that do not hunt until they finish assimilating their last prey.

So was his core.

So was his Qi.

And he… was in no hurry. Realm 6: Active Qi Core.

The one that transforms the cultivator into an internal generator of pressure, molding Qi as if it were part of the circulatory system.

The one that is not about using more energy… but about sustaining it.

And he was not fully doing it yet.

Not out of weakness.

But because he had changed the size of the container, and now he had to fill it with something more than eagerness to advance.

—I understand… —he murmured in the crystalline darkness—.

It is not enough to have a purpose.

One must sustain it… even in the void.

The Rift seemed to hear him.

And it did not celebrate.

It only grew tense, as if admitting that sometimes, the steps that make no sound… are the most solid.

And so he continued.

Without breaking.

Without surrendering.

Only cultivating.

Because the next advance would not come as an outburst.

But as one more breath…

…that did not stop.

Qi began to weigh.

Not from saturation…

But from definition.

It was no longer a sea spinning within his core.

It was a defined presence that began to mark his body from within, as if at last every trace of his existence were being written with invisible fire.

The muscles did not tense.

They refined.

As if his very physical structure were beginning to adapt to a more constant, more precise, more complete pressure.

And then… the Rift noticed.

Not with a tremor.

But with an echo.

A pulse that did not come from the ground…

But from the reflections.

All the crystalline surfaces around began to vibrate, as if the versions of himself he had not yet faced… recognized that something was consolidating.

And one of them, different, opened.

Not as a threat.

As an invitation.

A new reflection emerged from the farthest wall.

It did not walk.

It did not float.

It was simply there, as if it had always been waiting for the exact moment when Sebastián stopped desiring to advance… and began to sustain his form.

It was another Sebastián.

But not distorted.

Not corrupted.

Not wise.

Only… complete.

He walked toward him with neutral step. Without hurry. Without murderous intent.

But his eyes… had something different.

Not judgment.

Understanding.

—You are close —he said—. But it is not enough to endure the weight of Qi.

Sebastián did not answer.

It was not the time to confront. Only to listen.

—The pinnacle is not a gift —the figure continued—. It is an affirmation. An internal declaration that the world must hear without needing to be shouted.

And then, he raised his hand.

Not to attack.

But to touch his own chest.

—Do you truly know what you hold?

Sebastián nodded.

But the figure shook his head.

—It is not enough to know it. You must bear it even when it begins to change you. Qi… Dao… the body… None of it remains immobile when it rises to its highest form.

And he disappeared.

Not as a defeated enemy.

But as a stage… exhausted.

The Rift closed again.

But not as an ending.

As a last demand.

Because now…

the core pulsed with a denser pressure.

And each breath…

no longer relieved.

It forged.

Sebastián closed his eyes.

And he knew…

That he was close to the pinnacle.

But he still had to absorb it without breaking.

He had to hold his truth in complete silence…

…and not let it overflow.

Because the pinnacle is not reached with strength.

It is deserved with permanence. The pressure of Qi did not increase.

It changed direction.

As if it no longer spun within him…

but through him.

And then, the ground split.

Not with noise.

With meaning.

From the exact center where he had sat all those cycles, a crystalline column emerged.

It was not tall.

It was not sharp.

It was… hollow.

And inside it, something waited.

Not a creature.

Not a test of strength.

A heart.

Black. Alive. Beating.

It belonged to no being.

It belonged to a concept.

Sebastián understood it without words: the biome was offering him the synthesis of all he had cultivated… and all he had not wanted to face.

The column broke.

The heart fell.

And it began to spill dark blood upon the crystal floor.

It did not stain it.

It transformed it.

The Rift mutated.

Every reflection he had seen on his journey… became shadow.

And those shadows began to walk toward him.

Not to attack him.

But to merge with him.

They were versions of himself: the arrogant, the fragile, the one who once doubted his path, the one who wanted to surrender.

Even… the one who desired power above meaning.

All approached.

One by one.

And Sebastián…

…did not move away.

Because he knew.

That this trial was not about winning.

Nor about resisting.

Nor even about understanding.

It was the biome's last chance to ask him if he still wanted to remain only one.

And when the shadows touched him…

His body shuddered.

His Qi vibrated as if recalling everything he was, everything he feared, everything he no longer needed to be.

The black blood covered his feet.

And he did not feel dirty.

He felt complete.

The heart kept beating. Not outside him.

But inside.

And then, the column dissolved completely.

An invisible voice —the biome's, or perhaps his own in another time— whispered without pronouncing:

"What you have been… also deserves to remain."

Sebastián opened his eyes.

His breathing… did not change.

But his inner center of gravity did.

As if all that had once been weight… was now anchor.

And that anchor did not hold him back.

It defined him.

There was no outburst.

There was no light.

Only a sensation.

As if every cell of his body… stopped asking permission to exist.

Qi rose in a spiral, but it did not escape his body.

It danced around him like an obedient serpent, spinning in silence, ever denser, sharper, more his own.

And in that instant…

the Inverted Origin Core expanded.

Not as explosion.

As acceptance.

It was no longer just a receptacle that swallowed energy.

Now it assimilated everything without overflowing.

Qi ceased to be a loose current within him.

It began to have a structure.

A logic.

And in his chest, in that point where the living crack of his Core pulsed like a wound that never closed… something new appeared:

A rhythm.

It was not the same as a human heart.

It was the pulse of his Dao.

His way of understanding the world now had a voice.

And that voice molded his Qi.

He could feel it pushing his bones, lightening his blood, tightening his muscles.

Not as something added.

As if it had always been there, waiting for his will to name it.

Then he knew.

—Realm Six… Pinnacle —he whispered.

Not as an announcement.

As a verdict.

The Qi that surrounded him ceased floating.

It folded back.

And everything in him —soul, body, will— compacted as an idea that no longer needed to prove anything.

The entire Rift stirred.

Crystals trembled.

The shadows dissipated.

And for the first time… the biome seemed to bow before someone.

Not out of reverence.

Out of coincidence.

Because now Sebastián was no longer a guest.

He was part of the landscape.

A crack among the cracks.

A will that no longer sought to leave…

…but to transcend what had entered.

And while his eyes remained closed, his Qi began to project into the environment not as extension…

But as atmosphere.

A nameless domain.

A space in which, simply by existing under his presence… one entered his world.

Realm Six had been crossed.

But the most important thing was…

That Sebastián still did not want to leave. The silence that followed his ascent was not peace.

It was pause.

Sebastián opened his eyes. Not like one who awakens…

But like one who returns.

The Rift no longer trembled.

But neither did it release him.

And it was then, in the midst of that tense stillness, that he pronounced her name.

—Draila.

He did not raise his voice.

He did not need to.

The energy of the biome contracted. And from one of the fractal edges of the crystal, her ethereal figure appeared, walking as if she bore no weight. As if she had been there… always.

—Are you no longer alone? —said Draila with a soft voice, yet laden with undertones.

—Never was —Sebastián replied—. I only didn't understand it.

She smiled. Not like one who rejoices. Like one who confirms.

—And now what? —he asked.

—Now you choose —Draila answered—. This was the last biome. Not because the world ends… but because you no longer need the environment to force you to look within.

Sebastián lowered his gaze, letting his fingers brush the crystal beneath his feet. The Qi surrounding him still pulsed, but it no longer sought combat. Only echo.

—And Virka…? Narka…?

Draila did not reply immediately.

—They remain in the Prairie of Blood. Walking their own path. They too have changed, Sebastián. But not like you. Each one finds their reflection… where life breaks them.

He closed his eyes for a moment. Imagined Narka's silhouette, firm, silent. Virka's face, ever more human, freer. More herself.

—Will we see each other again? —he asked.

—Yes —Draila affirmed—. But not here. Not now. What is to come… cannot be shared with anyone. At least, not at the beginning.

—Then, where must I go now?

—Where no one can guide you —Draila said, drawing closer—. The rift has already given you all it could. There are no more trials. No more mirrors.

—And if I am not ready yet?

—Then you will fall. And that will also be part of your Dao.

Sebastián drew a deep breath.

Not with doubt.

With weight.

The kind of weight that does not come from fear…

But from understanding.

Because to go on was not to grow.

It was to lose things that would never return.

And he was willing.

Draila faded slowly, as if her presence were only necessary until that last word. And when she did…

The Rift ceased to resist him.

An opening revealed itself at the far end. Not bright. Not dark. Only open.

As if now, at last…

The world awaited the Sebastián he had decided to be.

The rift breathed one last time around him.

Not as a threat.

But as a farewell.

Sebastián did not move right away. He only sat again, cross-legged, as if his body knew the journey was not yet over. That, before leaving… he needed to recognize himself.

He passed his hand over his chest. He no longer felt Qi as foreign energy.

It was his.

Not by possession.

By fusion.

Everything he had accepted —the pain, the desire, the shadow, the echo— was inside. There was no longer contradiction, nor guilt, nor fear of feeling.

Only conviction.

He looked at his hands.

Not to see his strength.

But to remember who he was before having it.

And in that instant, he knew.

—There is still a battle I have not finished.

He whispered, not seeking an answer.

But the biome seemed to hear him.

A subtle vibration ran along the crystal walls. As if even that place… knew what he meant.

—Not for revenge —he said, standing up.

—Not to prove something to myself.

—But to look in the eyes… what once overcame me. Each step he took toward the opening was not farewell.

It was promise.

That he no longer needed trials to evolve.

Now, the path was his decision.

And settling accounts… was also growth.

A pale light, without direction, awaited beyond the threshold.

And Sebastián, for the first time without fear…

smiled.

The rift did not break.

It unraveled… as if it had fulfilled its purpose.

There was no explosion, no light. Only a slow dissolution, almost sorrowful.

As if the biome itself knew Sebastián no longer needed more reflections, more mirrors, more trials.

Only path.

One more step, and the ground beneath his feet ceased to be crystal.

It was red earth.

Warm. Dry. Thirsty.

The Prairie of Blood received him without ceremony.

There was no wind.

There was no silence.

Only that constant emotional gravity that seemed to rise from the world's core.

As if every grain of earth remembered what had been spilled… and what was yet to bleed.

The sky remained the same.

A thick red. Stagnant.

Without sun. Without moon.

Only that immobile tide that seemed to rust with time.

But Sebastián… was no longer the same.

He did not look around.

He did not call anyone.

He did not wait for explanation.

He simply walked.

His steps left faint marks, but not from weakness.

Rather because the ground, at last, recognized him.

—I'm back —he whispered.

And not even his voice felt human.

The Qi around him did not stir with fury.

It dragged.

As if it feared that new balance.

As if the calm radiating from Sebastián… were more dangerous than any rage.

The air pushed against him as if to test him again.

And it failed.

Because now, Sebastián was no traveler.

He was weight.

One that could not be displaced by doubt, nor by nostalgia, nor even by the echoes of the past that still floated in that prairie.

He stopped at the edge of a low hill.

Where once he trained. Where once he killed. Where once he doubted.

And there, he sat.

Not to rest.

To remember.

The roar.

The burning breath.

The gaze of that creature covered in living scales and boiling blood.

The interrupted battle.

The broken promise.

His eyes lifted to the sky…

Not seeking guidance.

But to warn the world.

—I no longer fight to survive.

His voice was low.

But the earth heard it.

—I fight to uphold what I am.

A thread of dry wind brushed his face.

Not as welcome.

As recognition.

And then, he stood.

Not in haste.

With destiny.

Because in that prairie, a debt still remained.

A pending clash.

A roar that needed to be silenced…

or answered.

The final battle of Draila was about to begin.

And Sebastián was no longer a boy searching for meaning.

He was the weight of all he had accepted.

The formless strength.

The unadorned desire.

The walker of eternal strength…

Ready, at last, to face what once made him retreat.

_________________________________________

END OF CHAPTER 15