Keeper of Fractured Time

The moment felt suspended—like a single note held too long, trembling on the edge of collapse. Eryn Noctis stood in the Null, where time fractured and bled into itself. The swirling void at his back whispered promises of oblivion, but the more immediate danger came from the man standing a few paces away: Varis Grell, the Keeper of Fractured Time.

Varis gripped his halberd, the runes along its shaft glowing brighter with every breath. His armor seemed to shift with the passing of unseen ages, black steel flickering with images from lost centuries, as though he carried the weight of forgotten timelines on his shoulders. His gaze locked onto Eryn—cold, determined, unyielding.

"You don’t belong here, Noctis," Varis growled, his voice low and steady. "Every second you draw breath threatens to unravel the timeline. Your existence is a crack in the foundation of reality."

Eryn smirked, though there was no humor in it. "Then maybe the foundation wasn’t built to last." His silver eyes glimmered faintly, reflecting the shifting fragments of alternate realities around them.

Varis pointed his halberd toward Eryn. "You don’t understand what’s at stake. If you remain, you will destroy everything—past, present, and future. I won’t allow it."

Eryn tilted his head slightly, his white hair catching the flickering light from Varis’s runes. "You say that as if there’s anything left worth saving." His voice was quiet, almost wistful. "Reality is already falling apart. I’m just... helping it along."

"Enough!" Varis snarled. He slammed the butt of his halberd into the ground, and the air around them warped violently—a ripple spreading outward, distorting time and space like a stone tossed into a still pond.

The Battle Between Control and Chaos

The world twisted as time shattered around them. In one heartbeat, the two men stood in the Null; in the next, they were surrounded by ghosts of overlapping timelines—fractured moments from the past, present, and futures that would never be.

Eryn blinked, and suddenly, he was standing in the ruins of an ancient battlefield, littered with the corpses of soldiers that hadn’t yet died. In another instant, the scene shifted—a bustling market from a forgotten timeline, the faces of the people blurring as they flickered in and out of existence.

"Do you feel that?" Varis hissed, circling Eryn with slow, deliberate steps. "This is what you’ve done—splintered time into a thousand broken pieces."

Eryn chuckled, though the sound was hollow. "I thought it was like this before I got here."

Varis didn’t laugh. The halberd whistled through the air, slicing at the distorted fabric of reality as he lunged at Eryn. The weapon glowed with temporal magic, designed to sever the threads of time and cut through any anomaly—including Eryn himself.

Eryn didn’t move. Instead, he bent time around himself, the attack sliding harmlessly past as if the halberd had struck water. Varis's eyes narrowed in frustration, realizing that brute force wouldn’t be enough.

"You won’t be able to dodge forever," Varis muttered, shifting his stance. "Time always catches up to those who defy it."

Eryn shrugged. "I’m not dodging. I’m just... not there when you strike." His tone was calm, detached, as though the battle unfolding around them was merely an inconvenience.

The Weight of a Keeper's Duty

Varis growled in frustration and shifted the flow of time around him, accelerating his movements to the point where he became a blur. He struck again and again, faster than human eyes could follow, his halberd humming with power. Each swing tore open rifts in the air, revealing glimpses of fragmented realities—empires rising and falling, moons shattering, lovers meeting and parting in an endless cycle.

Eryn twisted his wrist, and space folded around him, redirecting each blow into the empty void. "You don’t get it, do you?" Eryn’s voice was soft, as if speaking to a child. "You keep trying to fight me like I follow the same rules as you."

Varis snarled and struck again, this time throwing his full strength behind the attack. The halberd glowed blindingly bright, and the ground beneath them cracked under the weight of the blow.

But just as the weapon was about to connect, Eryn snapped his fingers.

In an instant, time froze.

Varis’s halberd hung in the air, suspended mid-strike, as though the world had forgotten to move forward. Eryn stepped leisurely around the frozen hunter, examining him with a mixture of amusement and pity.

"You really think this will end the way you want it to?" Eryn whispered, leaning closer to Varis’s motionless form. "You can’t fight someone who doesn’t play by your rules."

With another flick of his hand, time resumed, and Varis stumbled forward, his attack swinging wide.

The Rift in Reality Widens

Varis regained his balance quickly, but he could feel it now—the fabric of the timeline slipping through his grasp. Eryn wasn’t just an anomaly; he was a walking paradox, and every moment he existed pushed the timeline closer to breaking.

"You don’t understand what you’re doing," Varis growled, gripping his halberd tighter. "If you keep using your powers like this, everything will fall apart. There won’t be anything left—not you, not me, not even the memory of this fight."

"Good," Eryn muttered, his eyes darkening. "Maybe it’s time for everything to fall apart."

The words sent a chill down Varis’s spine. For a moment, he saw something in Eryn’s gaze that terrified him more than any enemy he had ever faced. It wasn’t anger, or hatred—it was apathy. A deep, hollow emptiness that stretched across every moment Eryn had lived.

But Varis couldn’t afford to feel pity. His duty was clear.

He slammed his halberd into the ground once more, and the world around them bent—fractured timelines snapping into place like shards of glass. A massive clockwork mechanism appeared in the sky above them, gears grinding as they rotated through the remains of lost eras.

"I am the Keeper of Fractured Time," Varis intoned, his voice heavy with authority. "And I will restore order."

The gears above began to spin faster, pulling the broken pieces of reality toward them, forcing time back into a singular flow. The weight of all existence crashed down on Eryn, trying to pin him in place.

Eryn smiled—a sad, knowing smile. "You think you can put this back together?"

Varis gritted his teeth. "I have to try."

The Breaking Point

Eryn felt the weight of the timeline pressing down on him, but he didn’t resist. Instead, he closed his eyes and let the pressure build. His power simmered just beneath the surface, a storm waiting to be unleashed.

"You can’t fix this," Eryn whispered, his voice barely audible. "Because time isn’t broken. It’s just... done."

And with that, he released his power.

In an instant, everything shattered.

The gears in the sky exploded into fragments, raining down as sparks of light. The cracks in the timeline widened, and reality twisted into chaos—moments colliding, memories bleeding into one another, until nothing made sense anymore.

Varis stumbled, disoriented by the collapse. His halberd flickered in and out of existence, and for the first time, he looked afraid.

Eryn stood calmly in the center of the storm, untouched by the destruction. He was no longer bound by time, by space, or by meaning. He simply was.

"Let it go, Varis," Eryn whispered. "There’s nothing left to save."

Varis stared at him, breathing heavily. His duty demanded that he fight. But in that moment, he knew the truth: Eryn Noctis was beyond his reach.

And the timeline was beyond repair.

The End of Time

As the storm of shattered moments swirled around them, Eilea’s voice cut through the chaos.

"Eryn!" she shouted, grabbing his arm. "Come back!"

For a moment, Eryn hesitated. The void called to him, offering peace, silence, an end to everything. But Eilea’s grip was firm—a reminder that something still mattered.

With a sigh, Eryn turned away from the swirling chaos and let Eilea pull him back toward the crumbling edge of reality.

Varis watched them go, his halberd slipping from his grasp. He had failed.

And for the first time in centuries, he wasn’t sure if it even mattered.

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