The stars dimmed.
Across the multiverse, time slowed. Civilizations halted mid-breath. Trees paused their rustle. Even thoughts faltered. For in that moment… two eternal forces awoke.
From the heart of the newly written reality, Steven Lethal—now the living Codex, the Quill— stepped forward. His form shimmered like ink and stardust, a flowing script of all that had been and could ever be. Each step rewrote the space beneath him, reweaving the threads of destiny.
Across the fabric of unreality, Pain emerged—transformed by the Gate of Ruin into his final form: The Eraser.
No longer man, god, or monster, he was pure entropy. His body was a canvas of broken laws, unmade matter swirling in the shape of a being. Where he walked, existence flickered like a dying candle.
They met at the edge of all things, where the last star burned.
No words were spoken. None were needed.
The final war had begun.
---
Round One: Will vs. Void
Pain struck first, tearing a hole through dimensions. His attack wasn't energy—it was deletion, unraveling reality. But Steven countered, his hand sweeping across the air like a pen across parchment. The Codex shimmered, and what was broken was rewritten, stronger.
"You still don't understand," Pain growled. "You write. I erase. That is balance."
"I redefine balance," Steven replied, launching a blast of pure concept—hope, pain, love, war—compressed into a beam of living meaning.
The explosion shattered three timelines.
They clashed again—cosmic shockwaves ricocheting across dimensions. Planets aged, reversed, were reborn. Myths collapsed. Laws twisted.
---
Elsewhere, Aetheron and the others watched the heavens spiral.
"They're rewriting everything with each blow," Zethion muttered. "How do we even help?"
The Archivist closed his eyes. "You can't. This is beyond gods. Beyond fate. This is the quill and the void. And when it ends—so does the multiverse. Or begins anew."
---
Back in the fracture-point of the cosmos, Steven was bleeding ink.
Pain loomed over him, cracked with power. "You're losing. Because deep down… you're still human. Still afraid."
Steven smiled through the pain. "You're wrong."
The Codex in his hands flared.
"I'm not afraid. Because I know one thing you never understood."
He rose, light radiating from his very soul.
"A story isn't over when it ends. It's over when it's forgotten. And I will never forget."
He reached inside himself—into the heart of the Rewrite Absolute.
Pain lunged. Steven wrote.
Reality collapsed.
---
And then—silence.
A flash of pure light.
And the echo of a final word.
-
--
To be continued