The battle continued.
Blood covered the streets.
The three stood together.
General VAREK.
ZARQEN.
Minister NAREV.
And in front of them...
Safuu.
The city around them was barely recognizable anymore.
Buildings burned.
Blood flowed between the streets.
The sky was filled with smoke.
Yet Safuu remained completely calm.
She looked at the three men.
They had finally gathered in one place.
Exactly where she wanted them.
VAREK attacked first.
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The blood around him rose from the ground and formed massive chains.
They moved toward Safuu from every direction.
Safuu stepped aside.
The chains struck the ground.
The impact shattered the road beneath her feet.
ZARQEN followed.
Blood gathered around his arm and became a long blade.
He swung it toward her.
Safuu blocked it.
The collision sent a wave through the street.
NAREV remained behind them.
Watching.
Calculating.
For a moment...
the battle became completely silent.
Then—
Safuu heard a voice.
Not from the battlefield.
Not from the three men.
A voice she knew.
A voice she had been waiting to hear.
“Safuu.”
She stopped.
The three men noticed.
The voice continued.
“It is time.”
Safuu slowly turned her head.
The person standing behind her was someone she had protected for a very long time.
Someone she had never allowed the three to find.
Someone who had been waiting for this exact moment.
“We finally found them.”
Safuu looked back at the three men.
Her expression changed.
Not fear.
Not anger.
Something deeper.
Recognition.
The moment she had been preparing for...
had finally arrived.
VAREK raised his hand.
More blood began gathering around him.
ZARQEN stepped forward.
NAREV narrowed his eyes.
Safuu closed hers.
For one second...
everything became still.
The wind stopped.
The blood stopped moving.
Even the sound of the burning city seemed to disappear.
Safuu opened her eyes.
She had already awakened her Origin.
But this was different.
She was no longer simply activating it.
She was going deeper.
Into herself.
Into the part of her that had existed long before the battle.
Long before the war.
Long before the three men had even realized she was still alive.
Her Origin was not merely something she possessed.
It was an expression of who she was.
And now...
she allowed it to fully manifest.
The air around Safuu changed.
The ground beneath her feet began to tremble.
Her presence spread across the battlefield.
Not like an attack.
Like a will.
A will so strong that reality itself seemed forced to acknowledge it.
The three men felt it.
VAREK's chains stopped moving.
ZARQEN's blood blade trembled.
NAREV took a step backward.
For the first time...
none of them understood what they were facing.
Safuu stood completely still.
She did not shout.
She did not give a command.
She did not need to.
Her will had already spoken.
And now...
her full Origin had manifested it.
Safuu took one step forward.
The three men finally understood that the woman standing before them was no longer simply fighting them.
She had come to end them.
The real battle...
was about to begin.