I Chose This Path, Now the Universe Will Know My Name

It started with a strange smell.

Faint. Acidic. Like something burned and never stopped burning.

We'd been walking for hours again, crossing frostbitten hills laced with shards of obsidian glass. The sky above was streaked in violent purple bands — a sure sign of a spatial tear forming nearby. Lyssira said not to look directly at it. I didn't ask why.

We set up camp just before nightfall. The winds were quiet again, but that only made the unease worse.

"Something's wrong," Tairo said.

"Phasari?" I asked.

He shook his head slowly. "No. This is older. Heavier."

That night, none of us slept.

The attack came in the dark.

No warning. No sound. Just—

A flash.

A shriek that wasn't natural.

A blur of shifting angles and flesh, like a nightmare folding itself into the world.

It wasn't a Stalker.

It was something worse.

A Raksha-born — a corrupted evolution of the shadow beasts, banned in most galaxies. Born through a forbidden breakthrough method — one where the soul is burned to fuel the evolution itself.

It had once been humanoid. Now it was… wrong.

A mess of writhing limbs and pulsing crystal veins. Its face was a jagged spiral, and every time it opened its mouth, a dozen different voices screamed at once.

It didn't talk.

It didn't threaten.

It just lunged.

I moved to help, but Tairo was already in front of it.

His arm shifted into glowing plates, lashing out with a hard strike that lit up the night like a flare. The Raksha screamed and staggered—but didn't fall.

Lyssira was chanting, fast and frantic, forming a circle of glyphs in the air. A dome shimmered around me, pushing me back.

"You're not ready for this," she said, voice tight.

I hated that she was right.

I watched as Tairo and the creature fought like titans — ground shattering beneath them, energy cracking the air with every blow.

It was a blur.A war.Then—

A mistake.

Tairo slipped.

A single moment.One step wrong.

The Raksha's limb—if you could call it that—pierced through his back.

He didn't scream.

Lyssira did.

The barrier vanished. Her spell shattered as she rushed toward him, eyes burning bright.

A nova of light burst from her hands, vaporizing snow in a hundred-meter radius. The Raksha staggered back, shrieking in voices that weren't its own.

"No no no—Tairo—!" she choked, catching him as he collapsed.

"Zavier," he croaked, voice ragged. "You… survive. That's what matters. Don't forget that."

"Stop talking," Lyssira begged. "I can heal—"

"No time."

He looked at me.

Not angry.Not sad.

Just… calm.

"Make it mean something," he said.

Then the light in his eyes faded.

And I felt something in me crack.

Lyssira didn't scream again.

She stood slowly. Her glow dimmed. Her eyes dulled to a soft, grieving white.

The Raksha lunged.

And then—

I didn't see what she did.

Only the aftermath.

The beast was gone. Erased. A smear of void and dust where it once stood.The snow around us was vaporized.Reality itself bent inward for a second, like it couldn't hold what she'd become.

Then she collapsed.

Hours passed.

I sat beside her as she held what was left of Tairo.

She didn't cry.

I did.

Not loud. Not messy.

Just tears.

The quiet kind. The kind that burns.

"He was all I had left," she said softly. "We weren't fighters. We just… wanted to understand the universe."

"You still can," I whispered.

"No," she said. "But you will."

She placed a small crystal in my hand.

It pulsed faintly — a memory crystal. Something only bonded pairs could make.

"Keep it safe. Let him be remembered."

I nodded.

And in that moment, something shifted in me.

This world didn't care about innocence.It didn't care who was peaceful, or curious, or kind.

It only cared who lived long enough to matter.

I buried Tairo with Lyssira.

We didn't speak.

Not because there was nothing to say.

But because we both understood that after this night… the tournament was no longer a cosmic game.

It was a war.

And I was done being a spectator.