I opened my eyes to chaos.

 Slobber caked my lower jaw. My head rested against the stone bench of the Amphitheater where Brother Augur had once sat next to me. To my left, Mara wept, tears mixing in with the blood trickling from deep gouges in her face. Like claw marks. She stared down at her broken fingernails, eyes empty. I felt nothing at the sight of her. Only a cold, curious emptiness.

 Memories trickled back in. Disjointed glimpses.

 That golden demon performing some manner of ceremony. Lost Moment. That was its name. A General of the Goetia.

 Brother Augur speaking nonsense, taking my magical sword and claiming it was his.

 Felix…my friend plunging a blade into his own chest.

 And finally, the impossibly large angel descending from the tranquil blue sky, coming to conquer the world.

 No, not an angel. A demon. Astaroth.

 Mixed in with these memories were the lingering shadows of that bizarre dream. Ascending to an impossible palace in the heavens, encountering Brother Augur and some great being formed from rotating rings. The more I considered it, the less I recalled.

I heaved myself into a sitting position, rubbed the dried saliva from my chin. The end of the world did not look as expected. The pinks and oranges of the rising sun peeked through the clouds. Ever-present snowflakes drifted down. That was impossible, wasn’t it? Night had just fallen inside the tesseract.

Few demons remained in the audience. Only a few, standing rigidly as if in disbelief. A humanoid figure with a scarab’s head stared down at its hands as they disintegrated into gray particles. Where once the demons had been the only color in a drab world, the surroundings had regained their vibrancy.

Howling, a titan with an upside down face charged across the seats, striking whatever pathetic humans were unfortunate to be in its path; it too began to disintegrate until nothing remained.

The arena below contained a scene frozen in time. The people within looked like insects trapped within amber. The bodies of the priests who had sacrificed themselves. A golden figure that looked vaguely like a hybrid between Felix and Lost Moment. Brother Augur meditated beside it in the lotus position, my white sword, Dasein, resting across his lap. The sight reminded me of the curious tableau of one looking into a tesseract, where time either looped or progressed at an infinitely slow pace.

I began to piece together some of what had occurred here. The oppressive feeling of being within a tesseract was gone. Brother Augur had revealed himself as the source of that four-dimensional construct encompassing the City of Music. Now, for whatever reason, he had shrunk it down to contain only the sands of the arena.

The process of the Physical Realm merging with Odena was reversed afterwards. The demonic spectators within the Amphitheater had not entered my world entirely, and so they returned to Desolada. Perhaps all of Astaroth’s forces had disappeared, including the vanguard that had rampaged throughout the city, though I wondered if everything would resolve so simply. At least the spider-demons had appeared before the merging of realms became obvious.

Soon only mortals remained. I stood, taking a moment to steady my shaking knees. Though I felt no emotion, only a blank void as my mind logically parsed through the situation. The Karystan disciples Lisara and Johan still held hands to my left, chins resting on their chest, eyes squeezed shut. They looked healthy besides the expressions of terror contorting their faces, like children battling through a nightmare. So young. Not that I was any older, but damn, we were just children, weren’t we?

I needed to get out of here as soon as possible. Far away from this accursed place.

My hand fumbled at my side, seeking the steel blade I usually kept there. Gone. Had I brought the Bakkel with me? The fugue clouding my thoughts had not yet dissipated. A familiar migraine pounded behind my temples. A cursory glance at the white and silver orbs representing my void and time magic showed they were half-full, though unstable, discharging errant strands like solar flares.

As I turned to make my escape, every shadow within the Amphitheater elongated, began pooling together. Halfway across the Amphitheater, a feminine figure grew upward from a lake of congealed shadow. First came her head, masked in cloth, a sheet of white hair spilling behind her. Her slender body followed, cloaked in tight-fitting garments. Wicked long-knives gleamed darkly in her hands.

Her presence resonated with the world. The feeling reminded me of Archon Vasely when he exerted his power, but instead of ambient music, a sense of fear accompanied her. Despite my deadened emotions, I felt the primal dread of one confronting an apex predator.

The Huntress glanced about. A young man in her vicinity pushed himself backwards, frantic to escape, until he collided with a slumped corpse.

Unconcerned, she stared down at the arena. In my mind’s eyes she was a stain of darkness, the shrunk tesseract a network of vivid silver.

From the heavens came a blinding brightness. I shielded my eyes. Numbness spread through my body. A strange, burnt smell suffused everything.

Thunder boomed a moment later. Bright stars danced in my vision, faded after a few seconds of rapid blinking.

Next to the Huntress stood a muscular man clad in a light purple vest and loose trousers. He was hairless, fractal scars branching along his exposed skin. A blue-white spear shaped like a lightning bolt rested across his shoulders, both wrists draped over the shaft. The man’s presence set my heart racing, fingers twitching, as if every nerve was being stimulated.

Karys, the Archon of Storms.

The two demi-gods conversed with one another, too far to make anything out over the occasional forlorn noises from the mortal crowd. Then the Huntress pointed my way.

Not good. Standing around in a crowd of semi-conscious humans made me far too obvious. Calling my time magic to the forefront, I waited to see what came next.

Safer to reverse time and blend in with the crowd, but a strange sense of curiosity filled in the void left behind from my missing emotions. Either of them could kill me faster than I could react, but I should have died almost a year ago in the first place. If an infinite number of parallel universes existed like Brother Augur claimed, then some facsimile of myself would live on to see the edge of fate.

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The Huntress disappeared. Hairs raised on the nape of my neck. I turned to see her sitting in the stands behind me, presumably appearing from Johan’s shadow.

“Leones Ansteri, is it?” Her voice was soft, almost seductive. Entirely black eyes regarded me, devoid of any warmth. The tip of one of her obsidian long-knives rested against her lower lip. “Almost forgotten, but someone told the Magistrate you were hiding here. The lowest possible level of threat, until someone picked off Magister Oros and his guards with a crossbow. Still a trivial matter compared to the events that transpired here. But I never forget a target.”

A streak of blue-white from across the arena. Karys appeared at my side, looming head and shoulders over me, disgust written clearly across his face. His gaze drifted over to Johan and Lisara before settling back on me.

“What is this offensive presence?” he said. “So much demonic taint is about that I almost did not notice.”

The Huntress let out a small laugh, more of a derisive snort than anything. “One of Paimon’s creatures. I’ve not seen the Lord of the Void’s mark for centuries, and never on a human. There’s something else even I can’t identify. I don’t like it, whatever it is.”

“Capture or kill?” The Archon of Storm’s bulk shifted ever so slightly.

The Huntress’ eyes narrowed.

I reversed time. An easy enough choice to guess.

I intended to return a few seconds before they arrived and escape their notice. The magic did not work as intended. Instead my mind hovered in darkness for an interminable period, aware of mysterious energies swirling about in the periphery. My magic had been unstable; it must have taken me back to the time I was unconscious immediately following Astaroth’s descent from the heavens.

I would wake up eventually, right? As time stretched on, panic began to chip away at the frozen core of my emotions. Had I returned to the period before the tesseract shrank, my mind trapped in Desolada forever?

Forcing those useless worries away, I attempted to settle into a trance. Dark thoughts kept interrupting. Instead of seeking the tranquility of nothingness, I instead focused on the mystery of Brother Augur. How he claimed that Dasein, the sword intimately linked to my existence, actually belonged to him. That alone meant little, but the knowledge made me consider something else he had mentioned.

Throughout the Physical Realm, there are infinite versions of us, but there is only one Astaroth.

He could have meant there were countless Brother Augurs and Leones’ throughout existence, but something about the way he phrased it…the way he said everything…that made me think he meant we were one and the same. He also possessed control over time, what he referred to as a prime magic. No records existed of any others displaying this ability. At least, not any records I could possibly access.

Had Brother Augur traveled decades back in time? If so, would he not have just manifested within my body and taken control? Whenever I reversed time, there were not multiple versions of myself walking around. I did not see how we could possibly be the same person.

Though Brother Augur had been a recluse, he did interact with the other philosophers on occasion. None had remarked on any particular similarity between us. Still, he was renowned as a master of the staccato. Stage performers and women of distinction knew how to manipulate their appearance through powders and dyes. It was not entirely impossible.

But had the man truly maintained his illusory appearance for years before I ever stepped foot in Odena?

I conjured up a mental image of Brother Augur’s face next to my own. After erasing the scattering of inflamed redness along my cheeks and the thin swirls of scar along his skin, I noticed a passing resemblance His hair was distinctly lighter than mine, his cheekbones more sunken, but we both had the aquiline nose and strong jaw typical of Avancheans. The same dark eyes, though his were always wide and intense--almost predatory. Long hours in the sun could explain the difference between the tones of our hair and skin.

No matter how unlikely it seemed, with a sufficient amount of willpower, he could have maintained the charade indefinitely. According to Brother Augur, he had created a time loop in which he relived the events in Odena over and over again. He had claimed, with some amusement, that Felix and I kept finding new and exciting ways to die.

My mind rebelled at the thought of my friend, sacrificed on the cursed sands of the Amphitheater. I pushed the thought away, refocusing on the mystery of Brother Augur.

How many times had Jokul killed me that night I accused him of plotting with the Goetia at Amelie in Yellow? Had the Magister and his soldiers sent to capture me in the Gardens found me and executed me in my sleep? Every brush with death, every fortunate escape----in how many timelines had Leones Ansteri’s corpse cooled in the snow, before Brother Augur sighed and brought me back to some subtly different past?

While I was limited to reversing time up to an hour, he must have discovered a method to loop back much further. That offered some solace, some possibility that I could succeed in averting my father’s death.

Incandescent rage soon eclipsed that pretty thought.

Brother Augur could loop as often as he wanted, and this was the fate he settled on? One of the Great Cities eviscerated, my friend sacrificed, my sanity eroding at the seams? With a snap of his fingers he could have stopped the Magisters from burning down my family manor. He could have explained himself, took me under his wing and taught me secrets far beyond meditation and memory palaces.

A more reasonable voice in the back of my head considered the implication of that. If the bastard was capable of re-living these moments over and over again, what did it mean that he chose this fate? In some realities he must have taken me under his direct tutelage, saved my family and friends, revealed his purpose to the people of Savra, fought the Goetia every step of the way. How many years, decades, centuries had he devoted to this mission, failing over and over again until discovering this one twisted path to victory?

No, there was no evidence of that. Perhaps he never did exceed the one-hour barrier on time reversal. Perhaps he was always watching me from the shadows, resurrecting me after each failure.

But I had witnessed the sheer power and complexity of the tesseract he enacted over Odena, millions of strands of time magic converging on him as he revealed he was the nexus of that impossible construct. If even he was not capable of traveling back any further in time, then my goal of saving my family was nothing more than a child’s silly fantasy. And what, then, was my purpose? Destruction followed in my wake everywhere I went. Those I cared for betrayed me and died. What was I supposed to do---move on to the next city, the next group of smiling liars who held knives behind their backs, always a fugitive, stumbling my way through life?

My fists clenched. My eyes burned. Not with tears, of course; I no longer felt capable of such a useless thing. But anger---yes, I could still feel anger.

My fingernails drew blood from my palms. And that’s when I realized I was back in the real world, once more laying on my side, dried saliva coating my chin. Opening my eyes a crack reassured me that all was as it had been before.

Thirty seconds later, the Huntress and Karys reappeared. Forcing myself to remain still, I observed them. Fleeing may have been the safer option, but they would have noticed anyone attempting to escape the Amphitheater. With how unreliable my powers were at the moment, I had no desire to throw myself into a situation where I would have to use them again any time soon.

The two Archons talked amongst themselves for a minute, seemingly unconcerned with the suffering around them. Johan stirred at my side, though I had no focus to spare on him.

With one hand Karys seized a nearby woman in the throes of a seizure by the throat. For a moment he regarded the thrashing figure with a look of disdain before tossing her toward the sands of the arena.

The woman’s body collided with an invisible barrier extending some ten feet around the sand. Caught on the apex of the forcefield, she appeared to levitate midair, twitching pathetically. Within seconds her skin began to wrinkle, hair graying and falling out in clumps. The fits ceased as all signs of vitality faded away. A purple-blue tint spread across her body as it began to bloat. I squeezed my eyes shut to avoid watching the grisly spectacle of her putrefaction.

A few moments later, the smell of burning air returned. Opening my eyes a fraction revealed the Archon of Storms’ looming presence only a few feet away. This time, his focus was on the two unconscious Karystans, disciples from his Great City.

With care he slung Lisara over one shoulder, casting one last disdainful look toward Johan. Slowly, a smile stretched across his face.

“Worry not, boy,” he said. “My daughter will be taken care of. You, however, can die here with the rest.”