The ruins smoldered. The last sparks of Pride's shattering drifted like burning motes, ash falling with the silence of a battlefield bled dry.

Khael Corzedar stood in the center. His chest heaved, dragon scales receding in painful cracks, his fists trembling not with weakness, but with the storm inside him. Something had awakened, clawing in his veins, yet the cost pressed heavy against his ribs.

Around him, the survivors pulled themselves together.

Shigeo Motome knelt with one hand pressed into the fading lattice of lightning. His body shook from exhaustion, but his eyes still scanned the shadows. "The net's gone… no remnants linger. He's really gone." His voice was hoarse, half-relief, half-disbelief.

Saya just look at Shigeo….

Juno Arkai leaned against a shattered pillar. Blood filled his grin as he laughed anyway. "Hah… we did it. Damn it, we actually brought down a Sin." His legs wobbled, but he refused to fall.

Ceyla Nox stood apart, storm chains sparking faintly from her back before dissolving into air. Her eyes stared hollow at the crater. Her hand clutched her chest, as if holding the storm inside. "…Not we. Too many…" Her voice cracked not from weakness, but despair.

From the edges, Team 4 regrouped with Khael.

Tessa Veyra wiped soot from her glasses. Her trembling fingers still sketched nonsense diagrams on torn parchment, clinging to habit. "Echo resonance… recalibrate… redesign…" Her muttering blurred with tears.

Enji Morada's sparks jittered across burned sleeves. His jaw tightened. "…Lightning's supposed to be fast. I wasn't fast enough."

Baek Suwon stood, his navy coat in tatters, eyes grim. "Don't bury yourselves in guilt. We held the tide. Without that, none of us would be here."

Beyond, Team 8 fought the last straggling voidborn. Their Thunder mentor's fist crushed one to dust, his golden beard still sparking.

But the ground nearby told the truer tale.

Toran Vale lay lifeless, his grin frozen mid-defiance.

Isla Navori knelt beside him, hands trembling over blooms that sprouted helplessly from cracked stone. "I'm sorry… I'm sorry…" The apology spilled like endless rain.

Ryen Takar scribbled furiously, his pages damp with tears. "…Even in death, we must record. Otherwise, who will remember their stand?" His glasses slid down, unnoticed.

Team 11 fared no better.

Izan Korrel staggered forward, bandages soaked crimson, nearly tripping as always yet no laughter followed.

Kara Yun lay silent, ponytail fanned across rubble, her grin forever stilled.

Milo Drehn stood frozen, a half-eaten snack limp in his hand. His round cheeks were pale, lips trembling. "…She said she'd laugh again. Right before she charged. She always…" His words broke into a whimper.

At the heart of it all, the teachers bore the heaviest weight.

Shaia Maien, Wave tactician, knelt cradling Torvak Renn, the Tempest Rider. Her face streaked with saltwater tears that weren't only hers, but Shinrei spilling unchecked.

Drevan Hask stood beside her, arms folded though his hands trembled. His storm-gray eyes never left Torvak's still body. "Too many… too damn many," he murmured.

The silence pressed in, suffocating.

Khael looked at them all the broken bodies, the hollow eyes, the teachers drowning in grief. His dragon blood still smoldered, whispering of strength, of battles to come, of hunger for more. But what he felt most was absence. Names carved into his memory by death.

His throat tightened. Still, he forced the words out.

"…This wasn't victory." His fist clenched until scales cut his own skin. "It was survival. And survival isn't enough. Not at this cost."

Shigeo rose slowly, standing beside him. His sharp eyes flickered, voice rasping. "…What a complicated world."

Ceyla's whisper cut sharp, a storm rolling over graves.

"…Tch."

The survivors stood amid the ruins, battered, scarred, yet not broken. Their Shinrei flickered faintly, the last embers of defiance.

Above the silence, the wind carried Pride's fading laugh thin, venomous, mocking even in death.

Meanwhile The great hall of Veyl School was a ruin. Blood, broken stone, and silence filled the air. Shadows stretched unnaturally, pouring from a figure seated lazily upon the collapsed remains of a pillar.

Sloth.

Draped in tattered rags, they looked fragile neither man nor woman, face hidden behind strands of dark hair. Their chest rose and fell in long, slow breaths. Ordinary. Almost human. But the air bent around them. The light dimmed. Shadows bled like rivers of black Shinrei, flooding the ground until the entire hall seemed to sink beneath a tide of darkness.

Before them, on one knee, bled Sensei Kurozawa.

His long black robes were slashed, stained with blood. His blade trembled in his grip. One eye gleamed silver, sharp as steel. The other was pale, clouded white. His gaze moved like a sword, never leaving Sloth.

Behind him, two students screamed.

"Sensei!!!"

Darius Crow and Naomi Reiken. The last survivors of their teams.

But Kurozawa barked back, voice deep, commanding even as blood spilled down his chin.

"Don't come here!!! Stay back!"

The figure on the pillar tilted their head slightly. Sloth's voice was soft, almost bored.

"I commend you… you could hurt me to this extent."

They glanced at the shallow cut along their shoulder. Even as Kurozawa watched, the wound closed, threads of shadow knitting skin whole again.

His grip tightened on his blade. His thoughts burned.

"(This monster… even my best strike only scratched them…)"

Sloth's gaze drifted lazily, first toward Naomi, her fiery ponytail trembling as her fists clenched in terror and then to Darius, whose single visible eye glared coldly, though his body shook.

Finally, those half-lidded eyes returned to Kurozawa. The sensei was on his knees, bleeding, yet still standing between his students and the Sin.

Kurozawa pressed his hand against his side, blood seeping between his fingers. Shinrei flickered faintly as he forced his wound to close, even if only for a moment.

"(Tsk… I can't defeat him. But I can't fall. Not yet. I just need to buy time for these kids…)"

Then it happened.

Sloth's eyes opened a fraction more. Their slow breath trembled. Something vast shifted in the air. A whisper in the void.

They felt it.

Pride… was gone.

For the first time, Sloth's lips curved into a faint, unreadable smile.

"(Pride… died.)"

And in that instant, a surge of black-gold light flowed into them.

It wasn't the first. Sloth had already consumed the essence of Lust. Then Gluttony. And when Greed fell, Greed did not vanish—he had chosen to reside within Sloth. Now Pride's death added yet another power to their body.

A voice whispered inside Sloth's mind, smooth and honeyed.

"(Now you have the power of Pride too, my lord…)"

Sloth's eyes flickered faintly, not in surprise, but in quiet acknowledgment. Their reply was dry, almost irritated.

"What is your agenda, Greed? I know you. There must be a catch."

The voice laughed softly, warmly, almost lovingly.

"(I told you. I give you everything. All of it. I want to give it to you. I'm greedy for you. You know I love you… I've fallen for your majestic presence.)"

Sloth said nothing. Their expression did not change. But the silence was heavy.

For within Sloth were many voices.

Many souls.

Each Sin that died each fragment of a cursed existence drifted into Sloth. And with every soul, a new identity awoke. A new will. A new whisper clawing inside the endless sea of shadows.

That was why Sloth slept. Not because they were weak. But because only in slumber could the countless voices inside them harmonize. Only in silence could "they" remain whole.

The strongest Sin was not "he."

Nor "she."

Nor even "one."

Sloth was "they."

And in that ruined hall, as Kurozawa's blade trembled, and his students screamed his name, Sloth slowly rose from their seat. The shadows quaked, stretching outward like the arms of a thousand unseen beings.

The true battle had only just begun.

To be continue

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