The Last Godfall: Transmigrated as the Young Master

Dov raised himself from the cracked earth, coughing blood. His ribs felt splintered. Every breath scraped. The glow that had once clung to his veins was gone, leaving his body hollow. He touched the ground; it gave no pulse back. All the arc-light is gone.

He remembered the last surge. When Roselys's thread struck, it brushed the shared nerve of his tamed Archean—an echo web built for many Arksprens. Her weave had tried to reflect his pain through an emotional void, but hunger cannot echo; it devours what mirrors it.

His Archean drew from Devouring Absence, one of the fifteen Arche. Hers belonged to Entangled Will. Different roots, different hungers. Reflection worked on beings that held compassion, fear, connection. His held none of those.

The backlash turned inward. His Archean consumed its own arc-light to shield the shared link. The surge burned him empty inside, yet filled his body with the residue of that devoured light.

He stood. His vision swam, the air bending faintly around his outline. Roselys lay ahead.

"Keke… You did nothing wrong, kid. It was actually a good fight."

He stepped toward her, each movement rough, the taste of ash clinging to his tongue. His mind felt cold, detached. Just blame your luck for a bad matchup against someone like me.

He crouched over her, hand tightening on the hilt at his waist. The threads around her twitched once, then went still. Mercy would be kinder than letting her wake again to this failure. He lifted his arm.

A whistling cut through the air. Pain burst through his side as something struck. His body turned before his mind caught up. A machete was buried deep in his upper arm, its edge lodged through flesh and bone. His hand twitched, still attached, blood running down his sleeve in thick streaks.

He stared at it, then at the figure standing ahead.

Vencian Vicorra.

Blood streaked Vencian's face. His tongue hung past his lips, saliva mixing with the red on his chin. Platinum hair clung wet to his cheek. His eyes—once clear—seemed unfocused, trembling with some unseen weight.

Dov's gaze fixed on him. "Ran off while the girl bled, did you?" His voice scraped rough through the pain. "And now you crawl back. Different, though. What broke inside that pretty head?"

Vencian did not respond. His body shook like something barely conscious was driving it forward. The air around him wavered.

Then the man noticed it—the corruption of the chalice. It pulsed faintly from Vencian, leaking into the dust under his feet. The realization settled like a stone. What in the… What is he…?

His mission had been to recover it. An old artifact. Crucial for their plans. Now the body stood in front of him reeked of the same corruption he sensed from the chalice.

Dov's gaze fixed on him. "You people," he muttered, voice low. "Ignorant fools who think you can touch things meant for higher vessels." His breath rasped as he spoke. "You always destroy what you don't understand."

He flexed the arm that remained unharmed, blood slicking his sleeve. His balance wavered.

With arc-light drained, hand-to-hand was the only choice left. The pain from machete-embedded arm clawed at the edge of his focus. Still, contempt steadied him where strength failed.

He stepped forward.

Then so be it.

Dov squared his stance, left arm pinned by the machete buried through his bicep. Blood ran freely down his forearm. His fingers twitched around the hilt in his right hand, refusing to let go. A boy with a broken mind. This will be quick.

Vencian came forward in a staggered lurch. Bare feet scraped over the ash. His shoulders rolled with uneven rhythm, breath wet and heavy. There was no stance or guard—only advance.

Dov swung first. The cut came low, aimed at the ribs. Clean, decisive.

Vencian shifted aside, catching the blade against his forearm instead of avoiding it. The edge bit through skin. He didn't stop. The blow's momentum carried him forward into Dov's chest.

They collided and fell down the slope. The world tilted. Firelight and dirt spun in brief flashes. Dov's back hit first, air blasting from his lungs. He drove a knee up hard, catching Vencian in the stomach.

Vencian snarled, the sound raw and feral. Then teeth sank into his collarbone. Pain flared white. Is he a human or an animal? The shock tore a grunt from his throat. His left arm weakened. The machete ground deeper into the muscle, scraping bone.

He slammed his forehead forward once. The crack numbed his skull. A second strike broke something soft in Vencian's face. Blood sprayed. The pressure lifted as Vencian fell back.

Dov shoved him away and rolled, forcing himself upright. His breath came thin and uneven, ribs screaming. Vencian stood again too, blood stringing from his mouth.

Distance opened between them for a breath. Dov looked at Vencian across the scattered flames. The boy's eyes held something that made his throat tighten.

His breath caught. The hairs on his forearms stood rigid.

Fear? The thought arrived unbidden upon noticing. And me? Ridiculous. Just a matter of time before my arc-light recovers and I turn this lordling into smoke and bone dust.

He forced air through his teeth. Time was all he needed. The arc-light would gather again, slow but certain. Then he could burn this lordling down to ash and char.

Dov adjusted his footing. The slope betrayed him. His heel slid in the ash, and he caught balance too late.

Vencian charged. No form, only velocity. Dov tried to lift his sword, but the joint in his injured arm seized halfway. Move, damn it.

Vencian caught the wrist and drove an elbow into it. Bone cracked. The sword fell from his grip. The pain forced his vision to blur. He swung the pinned arm in desperation, trying to club the boy with the machete's handle still stuck through it.

The blow brushed Vencian's shoulder but lacked force. Vencian leaned aside, eyes wild and unfocused. He saw the weakness and went for it.

He trapped the damaged arm under his armpit and twisted. The machete shifted in the wound.

"Aaaaaaaggh!"

Dov screamed between clenched teeth.

Vencian's knee drove into his ribs. Once. Twice. Each hit crushed deeper. A third came with the dull crack of bone. He couldn't draw air.

Vencian snatched a broken roof tile from the ground. The edge slammed down against the flesh above the machete. The tile split apart, but the blow crushed muscle. His arm folded wrong at the joint.

Dov stumbled back, half-turned, trying to pull free. Pain fogged everything. Get space. Regain angle. He could feel his heartbeat in the wound, loud and uneven.

Ash slid underfoot. They were both moving downhill now. He braced to tackle, to end it before collapse. His body lurched forward. They hit the ground together, rolling through burning debris. Sparks scattered into the air.

They struck the frame of a fallen hut. The wood cracked beneath them. Vencian landed on top, driving his knee into Dov's stomach. The air fled his lungs again.

He reached for anything and grabbed a shard of wood, stabbing upward. It caught Vencian's ribs, shallow but enough to stop him for a heartbeat. Still alive.

Vencian growled through blood and pain. His hands closed on the machete handle lodged in Dov's arm. He twisted hard. The muscles tore.

Dov's vision swam. He felt the weapon loosen. His body arched, the scream forced out through locked teeth. Vencian pressed his knee on the shoulder joint and sawed.

Flesh parted. The arm gave with a ripping sound that felt distant, unreal. His mind lagged behind the pain. No—keep moving. I'm close.

He convulsed once. The cry came broken, half-swallowed by the noise of the fire. Blood poured down the slope, thick, and dark.

And at that instant, enough arc-light surged back into his veins. Finally. Black fire roared to life along his remaining hand, blightflame crackling with hungry heat.

"I've suffered plenty," Dov rasped. "Your turn to die."

He thrust his palm forward. The flame gathered, ready to tear through flesh and bone.

Nothing happened.

The power released but found no target, as if the world had forgotten what he wanted it to do. The blightflame scattered into empty air.

Dov's gaze snapped upward.

Roselys stood above the slope, one hand stretched toward him. Her fingers moved in small, precise motions.

What did she do?

Strangely the rapier he'd melted hung at her side, whole again. Silver and unblemished.

His arc-light drained away like water through broken stone. Empty. Again.

He fell onto his back. The world swayed. His remaining arm clawed at the dirt, but his strength vanished halfway. He tried to roll. Nothing answered.

Vencian stood above him. His face was streaked red, his chest rising with rough rhythm. The boy looked down at the severed arm, then at him. There was no triumph there, only a trembling exhaustion.

Dov's sight blurred. The heat against his skin felt far away. So this is how it ends? His thoughts scattered, sliding toward panic. Killed by a boy unaware of the corruption reigning over his sanity...

Vencian lifted the blood-slick blade. The sound of fire swallowed everything.

Dov waited for the blow.

And the world hissed around them as the flames climbed higher.

Vencian's' grip on the machete tightened as if remembering why he held it. His eyes lost their wild haze for a moment. The movement in his jaw looked forced, like words scraping through a broken throat.

"Any final words?" he asked, the sound uneven but human.

Dov tried to speak. The effort caught in his throat.

Vencian's head tilted. "Forget it," he muttered. "I probably won't remember anyway."

He raised the blade.

The muscles in his arms tensed, gathering to strike.

Then the ground between them erupted. A blast of force threw ash and soil into the air. The shockwave struck Vencian's chest, pushing him back several steps. He caught himself, coughing through the haze.

When the dust began to thin, a silhouette stood where the explosion had hit.

A man.

His outline came clear first—tall, straight, immaculately kept. The coat he wore was tailored and spotless, its fabric untouched by ash. One arm stretched out, blocking Vencian's view of the fallen man.

Unlike the ruin surrounding them, this newcomer looked precise. Every detail in place. As if he didn't belong to the same world at all.