While Phyrn’s chosen slept, beneath the same stars, a battle continued to rage in the sands farther east. A god of unity and a goddess of madness rioted into the night as a god of judgement looked on. Closer to the strife, but slowly moving away, was a moralim limping west toward Dalamas, regretting ever getting involved with anything even remotely divine— even if it had saved his life. He looked up, and was happy to see Fyren was paying him no mind. Good, Bel thought, for once I’m glad to be beneath others’ notice.

All except for him, of course, the one who’d saved his life so long ago. He could’ve gone east - Ccidan was closer than Dalamas this far into the Cinnabar Expanse - but he knew he didn’t have the constitution to survive the Faeden Incongruence right now; he opted to die in the scorching-but-normal desert rather than the sinisterly seductive embrace of the algafae— that is, of course, if he really was about to die.

Don’t count on it, the voice of his damnable saviour rang in his head.

They can’t even unite now, Fyren thought, in this time of ultimate destiny. He hummed a dissatisfied hum, but continued to observe Ponima and Brightbrand clash from above and afar. He was fairly certain he’d have no trouble wiping the two of them out right now if he wanted… but something about their fight gave him pause. Not out of any sort of hesitation - he was set on doing his duty - but out of… morbid curiosity, perhaps, he wondered.

What a sorry lot of gods we turned out to be, Fyren lamented. Even when faced with me, a common enemy, they cannot truly work together. The Decakon, it would seem, had been doomed to fail from the moment the group was formed. Perhaps that is why killing them off has been so frustratingly easy.

“Ponima!” Brightbrand roared. “Stop this! I do not wish to fight you!”

“WHAT CHOICE DO I HAVE?!” Ponima was now only barely still capable coherent utterances, screaming as she threw volley after volley of explosive blasts at Brightbrand. If she’d been mortal, her vociferations would’ve destroyed her throat by now, and her tears would’ve blinded her, but on and on she thrashed, and though Brightbrand could’ve taken her down if he’d desired, he resigned to merely defending himself. “I do not want to kill, not like him, but WHAT ELSE CAN I DO?!”

She flew into the air and, with both hands, channelled a beam of burning hot pink light at Brightbrand. He put up both hands to stop it, his feet digging into the sand as the force of Ponima’s attack pushed him. He looked off to one side, and saw the moralim mortal fleeing. He was glad the would-be chosen had decided to listen to his senses. Then he looked up, and saw Fyren was still watching them. Why doesn’t he act? He had no idea. Perhaps he gets some sort of twisted pleasure out of watching us… oh Ponima, why won’t you listen to reason? He couldn’t answer that question either.

“GO AWAY!” Ponima screeched as her beam attack burst into a fireworks display of a thousand detonations.

Brightbrand exploded upward from the ground, propelled by the suddenness of the beam giving way to his own pushback. He rose to Ponima’s level and seized her by the shoulders. “I am not your enemy! He is!” he pointed up at Fyren.

“No!” Ponima sobbed, shaking her head violently. “He is punishing us, and we deserve it! This land could’ve been our paradise, but we RUINED IT!”

“You don’t believe that! You don’t have to do this, Ponima; you don’t have to burn Faeden to the ground!”

“YES I DO!” as she cried out, she reeled back and snapped forward, throwing her hands out and firing off a web of pink streaks in the general direction of the Incongruence to the east.

Brightbrand, though he ended up simply getting hit by one or two instead of defending against them, managed to impede them all, moving at impossible speeds through the air to intercept each one. “I’m sorry, Ponima, but I won’t let you do something we’ll all regret; I won’t let you slaughter this world’s people! You’re better than this!”

That’s when Ponima, in her grief-stricken frenzy, stooped to yet a lower level still of insane decision-making: she darted straight up at Fyren.

Oh, no, you absolute fool! Brightbrand cursed silently.

“THIS IS YOUR FAULT TOO!” she howled at Fyren as she flew at him like a rocket. “THIS WORLD IS MINE! I WON’T LET YOU TAKE IT FROM ME!” she spread her fingers apart like claws and readied to swing and slash with them.

Fyren reached across himself and gripped Vaargul’s hilt, ready to draw it.

Brightbrand got between them just in time, blocking Ponima with his leg and deflecting Fyren with his arm, managing to avoid the cutting edges of both with impeccable positioning. “I’VE HAD ENOUGH!” he thrust his hands skyward, and from his entire being flared a light so bright that it almost seemed as if it were day… but only for the briefest of instances. Ponima had been ready for this blinding spell, as she’d had to suffer it before… but Fyren was unprepared, and had has hands clamped over his eyes as he writhed and groaned in pain and disorientation.

Ponima grabbed Brightbrand by the ankle and dragged him out of the sky, back to the earth below, smashing him into the ground and sending a plume of sand up around them.

“No!” Brightbrand cursed. “We could’ve finished him off together! Have you totally taken leave of your wits?!”

“I told you,” Ponima sobbed, “mortals are one thing, but I do not want to kill my fellow gods! We will NOT be as bad as him— not if we don’t have to! There is method to my madness…” she gave up on words, swathing him in the same foggy aura she’d cast upon Phyrn a short time ago, and just like she had with Phyrn as well, pushed him into a spacial rift. She looked up, and saw that Fyren was still recovering from Brightbrand’s light burst… and she also realised she was facing him alone again. While he was preoccupied, she cast a huge illusory spell across the entire Cinnabar Expanse, hiding herself away in an invisible maze of non-existent mirrors.

By the time Fyren had regained his composure, he had lost all his targets again. No matter, he thought. Finding them again has not once proven to be difficult. He cast his gaze eastward, his face twisting in disgust. First, though… I wish to be away from here. He vanished in a blink of blue, and the desert became a coarse void once again.

Ponima, to herself, was just sat in the open, the occasional breeze ruffling her clothes and her hair… but to the rest of the world, she and her impromptu dungeon of deception were imperceivable. She watched as Fyren disappeared, and took a deep breath when she was finally truly alone. She started crying again as she gazed up at the stars she’d helped create so long ago. Part of her longed to fill the sky with yet more, and another wished to bring them crashing down upon everyone and everything. As her soul ebbed and throbbed, as if it were trying to tear itself into pieces, she managed to enter a meditative state akin to sleep… but no, she dare not let herself slip into the dreamscape. I am undeserving of that refuge. Even alone, she felt the torturous presence of her kith, alive and dead alike.