Aetheric Chronicles: Reborn As An Extra

The world slowed to a crawl as Adrian desperately tried to twist away from death's approach. His muscles screamed in protest, but he knew it wouldn't be enough—

A blur of white.

One moment he was staring into the Arkot's killing intent, the next his body jerked sideways as if pulled by invisible strings. Pain lanced through his side from the force, but that was nothing compared to what happened next.

White claws erupted from below, a pristine arc of deadly precision.

Azura—Lloyd's tamed beast—moved like living lightning, its strike so fast it left afterimages in the air. The Arkot beast never saw it coming.

Claws met flesh with a thunderous impact, and Abby's lethal lunge transformed into an uncontrolled flight. The dark beast shot backward like a bullet from a gun, its body carving a trench through the domain's floor.

Adrian hit the ground hard, rolling to absorb the impact. Pain flared across his ribs, but he couldn't help the smile that crossed his face. Even as he winced, a familiar presence touched his mind:

We are joining.

His head snapped toward Kalin, heart racing—

Something erupted from the shadows beneath Evangeline's possessed form. Adrian's enhanced senses couldn't even track the movement—just a flash of familiar power, then impact.

Lloyd materialized as if born from darkness itself, his strike landing with devastating force. Kalin's eyes widened in genuine surprise as Evangeline's body reeled backward.

Dark flames exploded outward, pushing Lloyd away, but Kalin's victory was short-lived. Another presence emerged from the shadows behind the possessed body—this one radiating pure light instead of darkness.

Aurelius, his sword blazing like a captured star, burst from the void Lloyd had created. The blade sang through the air, its edge promising purification.

"What—" Kalin started to snarl, but the word cut off as Aurelius's sword carved through the space where Evangeline's body had been a heartbeat before. Even as the possessed form tried to dodge, the blade's light caught Evangeline's back, drawing first blood in what felt like hours of combat.

"Kekeke!"

The night filled with Kalin's laughter—but this time, there was an edge to it that hadn't been there before.

"Kah!"

A burst of dark aura erupted from Evangeline's body as Kalin's laughter echoed across the domain. The energy pulsed like a living thing, each wave darker than the last. Aurelius was thrown backward by its force, though he managed to flip mid-air and land in a crouch, his sword still gleaming defiantly.

"Ok," Kalin's voice dripped with cold amusement through Evangeline's lips. "I've had enough."

The dark aura surrounding Evangeline's possessed form suddenly pulsed, then began to spread. It moved like a living shadow, racing across the domain's surface faster than anyone could react. The darkness devoured everything in its path, not destroying but... changing.

Adrian's heart clenched as wrongness crawled up his spine. Beside him, he heard Elara's sharp intake of breath, saw Ceil's stance shift into something more defensive. Even Lloyd's usual confidence seemed to waver.

'What is he doing?' Adrian's tactical mind raced, trying to understand the purpose behind this display. The power signature was unlike anything he'd encountered before—not just darkness, but something that seemed to distort reality itself.

Time began to slow.

Adrian blinked as his surroundings became increasingly unstable. The world around him started to blur, switching between crystal clarity and complete distortion in a nauseating dance. Fast, then slow, then fast again—as if reality itself couldn't decide what speed to move at.

Then... darkness.

The next moment, Adrian found himself lying face-down. Half his face pressed against the ground — somehow both burning hot and deathly cold at the same time. His vision swam, refusing to focus. The usual cacophony of battle had been replaced by an absolute, suffocating silence. Not even his own heartbeat seemed to make a sound.

'Others...' The thought came sluggishly as he forced his head to turn. 'Where are...'

The movement felt like it took years, his muscles responding as if they'd forgotten how to work. Finally, his vision cleared enough to see beyond his immediate surroundings.

His heart stopped.

Bodies lay scattered across the domain like broken dolls. Ceil sprawled face-up, her usually alert eyes staring vacantly at nothing. Cedric had fallen across his own weapon, the light in his hands forever extinguished. Elara lay crumpled beside the lifeless form of Azuris, her hand still reaching toward her beloved beast.

Even Lloyd and Seraphelis—two of the Awakeners fighters present—lay motionless, their final expressions frozen in surprise. Aurelius's sword of light had dimmed to nothing more than mundane steel.

'No...' Adrian tried to speak, but no sound emerged. 'This isn't...'n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Adrian's blurred vision slowly expanded beyond his immediate surroundings, and the true scale of devastation revealed itself. Where the majestic Valerian Hall once stood, there was now only an immense crater of darkness—a void that seemed to consume even shadows themselves. The sacred grounds that had witnessed countless battles and ceremonies over centuries had been erased in mere moments.

Bodies lay everywhere. Not just his companions, but dozens—no, hundreds of others. Students, teachers, guards... all scattered across the dark pit like discarded puppets. Some had fallen trying to flee, others in fighting stances, their final moments frozen in eternal defiance.

The air hung thick with the remnants of shattered barriers and broken spells, the last desperate attempts to shield against the inevitable.

In the center of this apocalyptic scene, Evangeline's possessed form hovered, but something was changing. Her body began to lose cohesion, starting from the fingertips. Dark particles peeled away like petals in a storm, each one seeming to absorb what little light remained in the area. The process was eerily beautiful in its horror—her form dissolving into a galaxy of nightmare fragments.

The disintegration continued, slow and deliberate. Her hair scattered first, strands of darkness joining the swirling mass of particles. Then her limbs began to fade, crumbling like ancient parchment touched by flame. Throughout it all, the black eye remained, watching, waiting, amused.

Everyone died except the one who started it all.