The battlefield was a cathedral now.
No longer a place of blood and blades, but of fire-etched memory—threadfire dancing in the air like the ghosts of stories never told.
Serythae stood in its center, cloaked in flickering silk that shifted between faces and forms, every step reshaping the very soil.
She looked not at the armies. Not at the Severers who still clung to shape.
She looked at Lira.
"You summoned too much," the Flame said.
"You drew me from rest. That demands cost."
Lira didn't flinch.
"I'll pay it."
But Serythae shook her head.
"Not just yours. This war has rewritten a world. That debt must be shared."
Kaelen stepped forward.
"What do you mean… shared?"
Serythae turned her golden gaze on him.
"You remember your dead. You grieve and shape them into weapons.
You restored names that had no place in this chapter.
And every name reshaped the pattern."
She pointed to the battlefield, where flickers of other timelines still sparked—where Serana Firewake stood in ghostly stillness, awaiting her next memory-call.
"You wanted a better world," Serythae said.
"So now I will burn the old one."
Ashrel raised his blade.
"You're saying you'll destroy this world for remembering it?"
"No," she replied. "I will burn what should never have been.
And what survives will be true."
Davin's voice was low.
"And what if none of us survive that?"
Serythae smiled.
"Then your story ends. But it ends honestly."
Lira stepped forward.
"There has to be another way."
"There always is," said Serythae.
"But it requires a keeper. One who holds the untruth, so others may live in truth."
Kaelen's eyes widened.
"You mean… a sacrifice."
Serythae nodded once.
"One must hold the world that could have been. Alone.
Forever."
The battlefield held its breath.
Ashrel clenched his jaw.
"I'll do it," he said.
But Lira shook her head.
"No. I made this choice. I called her."
Serythae's gaze narrowed.
"Would you give up your name, Lira Vale?
Your love? Your memories of every soul who ever mattered?"
Lira blinked back tears.
"If it means saving them? Yes."
Davin stepped forward, furious.
"You can't! You—you're the reason we've come this far!"
"Which is why I have to end it right."
Kaelen reached out, grabbing her arm.
"There has to be another way. We're stronger together."
Lira looked at him—and in her eyes was every sunrise they'd shared, every battle fought back to back.
"We were," she said softly. "But this is mine."
Serythae raised her hand, fire gathering like a slow sunrise.
"Then step forward, Lira Vale. Keeper of the Ashes.
And walk the path no one else can hold."
But just as Lira took her final step—
another voice spoke.
From the south.
Cool. Certain. Commanding.
"No. She doesn't walk it alone."
Eren Tel'Vareen entered the flame-lit field.
His cloak was torn. His blade gleamed with names carved deep.
He walked with the weight of every war he'd fought—and every truth he'd hidden.
"If this world needs a Keeper," he said,
"then let it have two."
Serythae paused.
The flame in her hand faltered.
"Why?"
"Because she remembered," Eren said, "and I forgot.
Balance."
The First Flame smiled.
And—for the first time—lowered her hand.