Path of Death: Awakening
Chapter 30: One Who Came Back

Chapter 30: One Who Came Back

When Kaela’s eyes fixed on the void, she no longer saw data.

Zeyna’s breath was caught in her chest. The air tasted off—metallic, heavy, unreal. Her throat burned, her lungs protested. Every muscle in her body was clenched, yet none responded. The battle to stay on her knees was silent.

Darin’s legs trembled. He no longer had the strength to lift his shield. His throat was dry, his thoughts scattered. "If it ends... it ends here."

Arven’s jaw was locked, blood seeping from between clenched teeth. His body held him up, but his mind had already begun to fall. He’d been struck from all sides. A scream surged within him—but it never made it out. "Where are you, Fade?"

And the creatures... they didn’t stop.

They didn’t slow.

They didn’t show mercy.

The last one before Zeyna stepped closer, and she couldn’t lift her head.

Everything... was too much.

She had nothing left.

Her eyes began to close—

Then pressure descended.Not a strike.Not a light.Not a name.

A weight.

The air itself collapsed.The sky felt like a swamp.The earth like lead.Time, a chain.

No living or lifeless thing dared to move or make a sound.

Zeyna’s pupils trembled. Her body spasmed. Darin’s shield slipped from his hand but didn’t make a sound as it hit the ground—because even sound had fled. Arven’s eyes rolled back, mind teetering at the edge.

The creatures stopped.

All of them.

At once.

Not as if receiving a command—but as if something struck their soul.

No one moved.

No one spoke.

Only heartbeats were heard—but not their own.

Someone else’s.

And then... it began to descend.

First came a warmth, seeping into the ground—but not heat. It felt like internal pressure. Spiderweb cracks appeared in the earth. No dust rose. Nothing stirred in the air.

Shadows began to swirl. But not around themselves—toward a center. Toward an invisible gravity that wasn’t gravity at all.

In the center... a form twisted.First smoke.Then shape.Then silence.

The sky dulled.Color vanished.Only the approach remained.

This wasn’t a summoning.Nor a rebirth.It was a long-overdue reckoning.

And that shape... carried a name.It had not been called.But the world owed it a debt.And now... it came to collect.

Fade.

His form didn’t fully take shape until the first step.

A single footprint marked the dust.Then a breath—barely a sound, but one that scattered the data particles in the air.

His eyes appeared before his body.They weren’t black.They were infinity.

Fade took a single step.

The ground cracked.The sky recoiled—colors withdrew, data strings collapsed on themselves.

One of the creatures instinctively leapt back. It tried to run.

But its legs gave out.Its muscles disobeyed.Its body... would not comply.

Another tried to scream.But the sound was drowned—like vocal cords had been overwritten. The air refused to carry it.

And one... knelt.

Not out of fear.Not out of submission.But understanding.

It realized the being before it was not an enemy.

It was an ending.

His eyes weren’t born of shadow.

They were born of void.

And when those eyes landed on them, they felt something inside them missing.

Fade saw no monsters.

No enemies.

Only obstacles.

And he passed them without a word.

Most of the creatures hadn’t even understood what happened yet.

One lunged—perhaps from instinct, perhaps from arrogance.

First Strike: [Phantom Rend]

Fade didn’t move.

He merely raised his arm.

Shifted his wrist.

That was enough.

The creature froze midair—suspended, as if the system itself couldn’t decide what had happened.

[Warning: Undefined Force Detected – Attempting Classification...]

It wasn’t split in two.

It wasn’t destroyed.

It ceased.

[SYSTEM ERROR – Target Object Cannot Be Tracked][System Log: Phantom Rend effect exceeds current tier limit. No data to display.]

Fade walked forward.

Each step unraveled another.

Some dissolved on their own—removed from system existence.

[Entity ’Phase Hound Beta’ – Target Integrity: 3%... 0%][Status: Erased]

No strikes were made.

Only un-being.

Fade took one more step—but it wasn’t needed.

The remaining creatures still existed physically—but their minds were already gone.

They had been unwritten.

His presence alone had erased the "exist" condition from their code.

Two staggered back. One tried to flee—but its step unraveled mid-air.

No blood.

No dust.

Just a single symbol left behind:

[-]

Then... silence.

Fade stopped walking.

He didn’t strain to remain standing.Gravity recognized him.Data lines suspended in the air bent around him—code itself bowed.

No enemies remained.

But no one could say it was over.

Because his eyes... were still watching.

Kaela dropped to her knees and reached for her wristpad, trying to re-sync the system.

Screens pulsed.Data wavered.Definitions collapsed.

[Scanning: Proximity Entity...][Error: Signal Interference – Classification Tier: Undefined][Warning: Signature Incompatible – No Match Found]

"This... this is impossible," she whispered.The system didn’t recognize Fade as a data entity.His power... could not be measured.

Just as her head began to fall—Fade caught her.

His hand steadied her data flow.

The pulse at his fingertips... wasn’t system echo.It was something else.

[System Alert: Entity Designation Conflict Detected][Evaluating Classification...][Dybbuk Lineage Signature – Confirmed][Override Status: Pending...]

Code stopped flowing.

The display froze.

The system was waiting—undecided.

Zeyna watched his hand rest on Kaela’s shoulder. Watched her breathing stabilize. Something sharp twisted in her chest.

Jealousy—not fully defined, but real.

"What are you doing?" she thought—but said nothing.

No one could speak to Fade right now.

Zeyna remained on her knees, eyes squinting—no tears, but close.

She couldn’t look at him.Not the same way as before.

And the worst part?Some part of her... wanted to accept him like this.

Maybe even wanted him more like this.

But seeing him touch Kaela... a splinter lodged deep.

"Even like this... if he turned back to me... would I still accept him?"

Darin stepped back.

"This... isn’t the same person," he whispered.

Yet he wasn’t afraid.A strange trust began to bloom inside him.

As if a god walked among them.

Arven looked at the shadows hanging from Fade’s shoulders.

"This isn’t our Fade..."

But he continued silently:

"...but he came back for us."

Fade looked at each of them.

No familiarity in his eyes—but what remained was stronger.

Before he spoke, everyone held their breath.

A voice echoed in his mind:

"I found this world like this. But I won’t leave it this way."

And then, aloud:

"I’ve returned."

"But not as the same man."