NOVEL NEXT Chapter 62: Sweet Heat Lightning
Lukas returned to the world with the power of all the Lords before him still pumping through his blood. The Crest receded like a tide pulled violently from shore, and the sea of memory gave way to cold stone, shattered marble, and the sound of a voice still crying out his name.
The training yard of Kairos Castle was in ruins. In the centre of it all, there Styx was. But she was no exactly the woman he remembered, no longer simply just the Goddess he had spent centuries with—no longer just Styx, the woman who smirked at him as they stood in the kitchen cooking dinner, the one who lay beside him when sleep took him, who caressed his face like it was something sacred.
No—this was Styx, the Goddess of Unbreakable Oaths; the Embodiment of one of the Five Rivers that spanned the Underworld.
This was an immortal.
A being of pure mana, coalesced into the shape of something mortal only because of her own intention. Her hair, once black and curly, now fell around her shoulders like a river of midnight stars. Her eyes were pure white, like twin moons that had shed their veils, revealing the celestial fire that dwelled within.
Her limbs shimmered, wrapped in threads of living magic—ether given form, weaving through her like a second skin of divine light. Behind her floated countless sigils, ancient, glowing, alien—each one spinning slowly, orbiting her like planets around a sun.
And her presence—
Lukas felt it before he could think. His knees almost buckled beneath it. This would not be his first time coming face to face with the ones they call deities. But he had never come face-to-face with an immortal's true form. Had Styx revealed this form to him even just a few centuries ago, his soul would have crumbled to ash, his mind shattered and scattered across time. But as Thalarion Drakos had told him, Lukas had pushed himself to the point where he could barely considered to be mortal himself.
Still, Styx could have killed him. Even against the dragon who had lost his mind, carrying the power of all the Lords before him in his wake, the Goddess' strength would have prevailed. She could have easily erased him from reality, just as she should have when he had lost himself to the madness of the Crest. As she should have as the Mistress of Kairos Castle.
Instead, the Goddess fought for him. Styx held him down, withstood his draconic insanity and she'd waited for him for what seemed to be hundreds of years.
Styx had been his anchor, till the very end.
Even now, glowing with godhood, she reached for him with a hand that shook, her voice cracking through the radiant mana that coiled off her like a storm barely leashed. She recognized his gaze, not the one of the beast that Lukas had been reduced to but the gaze of the man she fell in love with.
"Lukas." She whispered as her hands cupped his face.
It wasn't the power of Styx that broke him. It was the tenderness in the way she said his name. Her form softened, the raw magic settling like a cloak over her shoulders, no less divine. As Lukas shifted back into his humanoid form, she fell into his open arms. Not out of weakness. But out of genuine relief, the comfort of knowing that Lukas had returned to her.
"Hey." He whispered, so overwhelmed with emotions that he didn't know what else to say.
Styx pressed her forehead against his, shaking her head in disbelief. She had never truly thought this would be possible. She had thought he had been lost to the Crest forever. Yet she continued to fight for him regardless of what seemed to be the inevitable. Because to her, there was no world she wanted to live in where she did not have him.
"Hug me already, you damn bastard." Styx wanted to say more, shout and curse at him, but her words quickly dissolved into sobs—no elegance, no restraint, just broken, raw sound.
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Lukas laughed and nodded. His arms wrapped around her gently, his hand cradling the back of her head as he pulled her close, fingers running through her hair.
"I'm here," Lukas murmured, voice low, steady. "I'm here now."
And he did not let go of her, not for a single second. Not when her knees buckled. Not when her voice shattered under the weight of emotions she'd been holding back all this while. Not when she trembled in his arms like a dam giving way. Lukas held her for what felt like hours. He would've held her for years, if she needed. Because he would not risk losing her again.
He would not take this moment for granted. Not after all they had been through.
Lukas had spent three hundred and sixty eight years within the Crest. That meant the Fourth Flip would soon be coming to an end.
Much damage had been done to the castle as Styx attempted to restrain Lukas as he slowly lost his mind to the Crest. Together, they rebuilt it. One room at a time. Styx also made the artistic decision to decorate the castle, for she found it far too bland.
She painted the ceiling with constellations from before the gates. Lukas, who never claimed to be an artist, still painted stars beside her, splashing the sky with his crooked, childlike brushstrokes.
She laughed. He smiled.
They raised the walls again. Repaired the stones. Sealed the holes. Cleaned the halls. Then decorated it how Styx wanted it—flowers she summoned from memory, tapestries of old battles and new dreams, light pouring in from the sea-glass windows Lukas carved himself. Some days they still got into arguments, bickering like an old married couple. Most days they didn't fight at all. Lukas told her of the lives he had lived through in the Crest with her head laying in his lap. Styx traced his scars while she listened to his every word.
At night, they sat before the fireplace.
At morning, they watched the sun rise over the vast training yard. They had picnics. They collapsed in the grass. Laughed and tumbled through it, like time didn't exist.
Somewhere, beneath the surface of all those years, they both knew—this wouldn't last forever.
Styx never said it. She didn't need to. She could feel it in him—a pressure building like a tide. The pull of a world beyond the sea, beyond Kairos Castle. A purpose larger than this sanctuary. A calling Lukas could not ignore forever. But she did not try to stop him for she knew it was not her right. She would not run away from him either, out of fear, out of doubt and insecurity. Not anymore.
The Goddess chose joy instead. She chose twenty years of building a life—a real one, filled with laughter and quiet mornings and midnight confessions. She chose love with an expiration date, because even if it came to an end, it would be worth it if it meant she could have him at all.
And Lukas?
He had never been happier.
In the warmth of Kairos Castle, beneath the ancient stars and the endless shimmer of magic woven through its halls, Lukas forgot the burden of strength. The question of whether he was enough, the gnawing hunger that had once driven him to clash with the strongest he could find—it all faded.
There were no more insecurities to overcome. No more new heights to reach. Not with her by his side.
Lukas laughed more than he ever had. Slept soundly. Woke with her in his arms. Together, they rebuilt the castle, carved a home from the ruin. He let her choose the colors on the walls, the tapestries of forgotten realms. He didn't think about training. In truth, there was not much Lukas could do even if he wanted to. He had already gone where no mortal had gone before. Styx had acknowledged it herself: he was no longer truly mortal. Not quite a god. Not quite a man. Something in between. Something forged by sacrifice, fire, love, and time.
When Lukas returned to living, it wouldn't be as a warrior starved for purpose, but as a Lord ready to lead—ready to protect the people he loved, to keep the promise he made to them long ago.
Whatever happened next in Hiraeth, he would face it with his head high and his heart open.
As he died in the octagon, Julien Fronterra had prayed for a single thing. And finally, he had it. Lukas had a love that felt like home. They had this. And it was enough. It was more than anything Lukas could have wished for.
He had somebody who he could call his own.