Orion lay on his back, his eyes drifting across the floating screen before him, projected by an ethereal sphere. He was still catching his breath after yet another intense, private battle with Lyra. His breathing was deep, but his body, relaxed, seemed ready to surrender to rest—although his mind, as always, resisted.
Beside him, Lyra was nestled against his chest, her hair splayed across the silvery sheets of the celestial bed. Her fingers moved lazily over his skin, with no purpose beyond savoring the silence that enveloped them.
But that stillness vanished the moment Lyra's eyes fixed on something on the screen.
"Dear…" she murmured in a sleepy voice, her head still resting against his chest "who is that? And why is she walking freely in my Realm of Dreams?"
Orion arched an eyebrow and followed her gaze to the image.
On the screen, Pyralis appeared, her flaming footsteps illuminating an ancient castle forgotten by the ages.
"She? She looks like a Fire Goddess… maybe lost. Or perhaps someone testing the limits of space–time" he replied in a drawling voice, as if the matter were just another random cosmic event.
Lyra let out a dry laugh, heavy with sarcasm.
"You're going to let her wander around there, burning living illusions, just for fun?"
Orion made a vague gesture with his hand, his eyes still fixed on the screen.
"We can consider it a test. If she survives what's there, she might become interesting. Or, at least, useful."
Lyra stretched slowly, her curves revealed beneath the undulating sheet made of lunar energy. She smiled, provocatively.
"Then we'll leave her alive for now. We still have a score to settle… fifty–three to fifty–three, if I recall."
Orion smiled at the corner of his lips, not taking his eyes off the screen.
"Draws are never the end."
She pulled him toward her.
"Then let's finish the game."
Meanwhile, on the other side of mental space–time, Pyralis advanced resolutely through the corridors of the castle that seemed suspended between worlds. The ancient walls carried the scent of eternity, and the silence there was so thick it felt as though it held too many secrets for one mind to bear.
No sound.
No living presence.
Only forgotten echoes and dust floating in the golden light filtering through cracked stained glass.
"A castle like this… empty? It reeks of a trap" she murmured, her eyes burning like living embers "or madness. Maybe both."
She did not retreat.
She never retreated.
The next hall seemed to breathe. The air pressure shifted subtly, and the temperature varied as if a hidden consciousness lurked there.
Pyralis pushed open the double doors with the palm of her hand and was met by a presence that made her arch an eyebrow.
In the center of the chamber, a throne forged from burning obsidian lay covered in ashes. And upon it… a silhouette wreathed in black fire.
The flames surrounding that being were different. They were unstable, vibrant, and almost painful to behold. Melted runes trickled down its skin. Its eyes, completely incandescent, flickered between madness and hunger.
It was like staring into a warped mirror of what Pyralis could become if she lost the balance between power and reason.
She halted a few steps away.
"So it was you. Is the castle your tomb or your cell?"
The creature rose with a drawn, cracked laugh, like glass splitting.
"Tomb? Hahaha… No, my dear. This is my temple. I am fire. I am everything."
Its words sounded like a dissonant chorus. Overlapping voices, with no clear origin, filling the space like smoke.
"You lost your sanity long ago" Pyralis murmured, summoning her Stellar Plasma Spear with a twist of her hand "and now you will lose what remains of your existence."
The creature lunged without warning. It was like a bolt of chaotic fire—a blur of destruction hurled at her without hesitation.
Pyralis raised her shield of flame, absorbing the impact of the explosion that followed.
Columns around her burst into fragments under the heat wave.
The floor cracked.
Statues melted like wax.
She counterattacked with precision. Her blades spun in concentric motions, slicing through the black flames and raking wounds across the enemy's chest.
But the monster laughed. Every drop of its blood transformed into new, distorted flames.
"That's it! That is life!" it roared, its arms raised as if conducting an insane symphony.
Pyralis felt the distortion. He had activated something… illusory.
Visions. Echoes. Fragments of the past. Whispers. The castle around her dissolved. The floor turned into dark sand, and voices of the dead echoed in her mind.
'You abandoned them.'
'You could have saved that world.'
'Why is it always you left over?'
Shadows tried to envelop her. But she was Pyralis.
She did not burn with ordinary fire.
She was the primordial flame.
Her scream tore through the illusion like a solar eruption. Waves of stellar flame blasted outward in all directions, reducing the false memories to ashes.
The castle trembled.
And the being before her staggered back, surprised by the force.
The mad god's body wavered, still attempting to recover from the stellar flame explosion that Pyralis had unleashed. But it was like facing a wound that refused to heal. Even broken and burning, it smiled.
"You… are fire. But I am chaos."
With a beat of its wings, it unleashed a new wave of distorted fire. It was as if reality and heat fused into an insane force, breaking the laws around it.
Pyralis retreated, sliding across the molten ground. Her eyes never lost focus. She knew that being fed on imbalance—on madness.
"You are not fire. You are the mistake of someone who wanted to be eternal" she said with disdain.
Then she raised both hands.
The ground beneath her feet began to tremble. Fissures opened all around, and from the earth's depths, torrents of magma erupted in violent bursts. It was the call of the Goddess to the primordial volcanoes. Living flames climbed around her like flaming serpents.
Ignarion howled. His uncontrolled energy attempted to retaliate, but there was no more balance. He was consuming himself. His own powers no longer obeyed him.
"You are what happens when fire loses consciousness" Pyralis whispered.
With a leap, she burst through the field of flames and drove her Plasma Spear straight into the creature's chest.
The impact resounded like a stellar thunderclap.
Ignarion froze. The flames that enveloped him extinguished one by one. The runes glowed for the last time before shattering like broken glass.
Without a cry, without protest, he dissolved into dust.
Pyralis stood in silence, breathing calmly. Victory did not bring satisfaction. Only confirmation that the madness of gods was a greater danger than any army.
"Power without consciousness is just meaningless destruction."
The castle shook. Its walls crumbled like sand slipping through fingers. The forest around it evaporated into smoke and starlit mist.
Before she could react, everything went dark.
When light returned, she found herself in a translucent chamber. The walls looked like glass exuding soft light. The floor was smooth and reflected the cosmos like an eternal lake.
In the center of the room, a divine cube floated.
She approached. A glow enveloped it, and a voice echoed inside her mind.
"Impressive."
Pyralis stopped.
"Who's there?"
The voice sounded like a teasing song, but charged with power.
"Ah, forgive the manners. I'm in the next room. Door on the right."
Suspicious but composed, Pyralis passed through the veil of light that formed.
The next room was unlike anything she had ever seen. Runes of creation and destruction pulsed on the walls. Stellar diagrams spun on the ceiling. A silver hearth burned silently in the center, emitting warmth without flame.
And before that hearth, two figures stood.
A woman with long purple hair, her gaze sharp yet languid, sat casually. Her presence exuded power, but her smile was one of someone who observed and waited.
Beside her, standing, was a man with blue eyes and a crushing presence. His mere existence seemed to distort the air. Time moved differently around him.
"Orion… she has arrived" said Lyra, crossing her legs with elegance.
The man turned.
His eyes studied Pyralis as though reading an ancient, rare book.
"A Fire Empress Goddess. If she could not destroy a broken god like that… she would have destroyed herself."
Pyralis held his gaze.
"Who are you?"
Orion did not answer immediately. He took a step forward. The room trembled imperceptibly.
"Orion. God of Creativity, Reality, and Desire."
Lyra smiled faintly.
"Lyra. Goddess of the Void and Destruction."
Pyralis remained steadfast. Within her burned a flame of curiosity.
"Why have you brought me here?"
Orion walked to the hearth. A miniature constellation spun above his hand.
"Because, Pyralis… we are gathering forces. Something greater is forming. Something that even isolated gods won't be able to contain."
"You want to recruit me?"
"No. I want you to see. To choose for yourself."
Lyra stood with grace.
"You are flame. But do you know what comes after light?"
Pyralis responded with a slight smile.
"Shadow."
"No" said Lyra, stepping closer "comes the Void."
Orion turned, extending his hand.
"And before light?"
Pyralis hesitated. Then she answered.
"Desire."
He smiled.
"Then you already understand more than many."