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Chapter Text

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Before the first prayer, there was only silence. Before silence, there were gods.

They were not born of love, nor of light, but of chaos — a living pulse that beat before time had a name. It stirred in the dark, dreaming of itself, and from that dream rose two titans: All Might, the Bringer of Light, and All For One, the Devourer of Souls.

All Might was the spark — radiant, selfless, believing that life must be shared, that the void could be filled with warmth. All For One was the shadow — insatiable, covetous, believing that what existed was meant to be consumed. Between them bloomed the first heartbeat of creation, and with it came war.

Their clash was not fought with swords or flame, but with will itself. Stars were born as sparks from their strikes; oceans formed where their blood fell. Mountains rose from their rage, and the sky was carved open to make room for their fury. For a thousand eternities, they fought — not to win, but simply to exist, for neither could imagine a world where the other was gone.

When at last their strength waned, the battlefield they left behind was a shattered world — raw and trembling, soaked in divine blood. From that broken ground, new gods emerged: their children, fragments of light and shadow made flesh. They were fire and sea, storm and stone, hope and ruin. Each carried a shard of their parents’ nature — the drive to create, and the hunger to destroy.

They rose from the dust, unbound by law or mercy, and looked upon the wounded world. What they saw was potential — a place that could be theirs, if only they gave it form.

So they began to build.

The god of the forge carved mountains from the bones of titans. The goddess of the sea filled the hollows with her tears. The god of wind breathed motion into the still air, and life began to stir. The youngest among them — a boy of fire and defiance — struck his hands together and split the sky open, setting the first sun ablaze.

From their combined will, the mortal world was born.

They called it Thelowera, the Living Earth, and upon it they molded humanity — fragile things of clay and ash, destined to worship and die. The mortals were meant as witnesses, living offerings who would look up at the heavens and remember the gods’ names with reverence and fear.

And for an age, they did.

From their golden thrones high above, the gods ruled in splendor. They built Elythra, the City of the Divine — a kingdom of marble and sunfire, suspended above the mortal sky like a second dawn. Its towers were made of starlight, its rivers of molten gold. There was no night in Elythra; the gods did not need rest. They danced through endless days, their laughter the thunder, their tears the rain.

Below, mortals flourished beneath their gaze. Cities rose around sacred temples. Kings wore the blessings of their chosen deities as crowns. War was waged not for conquest but for divine favor — every battle a prayer, every victory a hymn.

The gods, for a time, were content.

But divinity is a hunger that cannot be satisfied. The more mortals adored them, the more the gods desired. They demanded monuments taller than mountains, offerings richer than blood. They granted miracles only to those who pleased them and destroyed entire kingdoms that dared to question their will.

And the mortals, once awestruck, began to whisper among themselves.

They asked why their gods demanded so much but gave so little. Why prayers went unanswered while storms ravaged the fields. Why children died beneath temples built in divine names. They began to worship less, to trust less, to turn away.

The gods, proud and vain, could not comprehend this betrayal. They believed themselves eternal — but their power was born from the voices of those below. When mortals stopped praying, the divine flame began to dim.

It started as a whisper of weakness — a spark that faltered, a wind that would not obey. One god fell, then another. Temples crumbled; faith turned to dust.

And so began the Fading.

The unraveling of the old world, the slow extinguishing of divine light. The gods who had built mountains now struggled to lift their hands. The songs that once moved the stars were forgotten. The divine city of Elythra grew quiet, its halls echoing with memory instead of music.

In that silence, something darker stirred.

All For One, long thought devoured by time, began to whisper once more — a low, patient murmur in the void between worlds. His voice called to the hearts of desperate gods, promising power in exchange for obedience, dominion in exchange for faith. And the first to listen would be the first to fall.

Mortals, oblivious to the war above, kept fighting their own small wars. They crowned themselves kings and called their victories destiny. They built their own gods from stories and superstition. They thought the heavens were watching over them.

They were wrong.

The gods had turned away.

Until, in the dying heart of a forgotten city, a single mortal boy knelt before a crumbling altar — and prayed.

Izuku knelt before a cracked statue in a ruined temple. The once-grand chamber was open to the sky, the roof long since collapsed under the weight of storms and centuries. Pillars that had once been smooth and white were now blackened by fire, carved with the names of kings who no longer had thrones. Weeds clawed through the marble floor, roots splitting stone as if nature itself had turned against the divine. Rainwater gathered in the offering bowls, thick with dirt and fallen leaves, reflecting what little light filtered through the gray clouds above.

The air smelled of smoke and salt — the remnants of burned offerings mixed with the scent of the sea that bordered Elaris. It was a weary scent, the smell of a city that had forgotten how to sing. The temple was silent except for the occasional groan of stone, the sigh of wind through the broken arches, and the faint, rhythmic drip of rain that seemed to count the seconds of a dying age.

Before him stood the god’s image, or what was left of it — black marble veined with gold, its surface dull with dust. Time had eaten half its face, but the remaining half still burned with an echo of its maker’s pride. Even shattered, the statue seemed alive, the lips carved into a defiant snarl as though the god himself refused to yield to decay. Beneath the streaks of rain, the faintest traces of red paint clung to the armor at the statue’s chest — the last color of devotion from a world that had long since gone gray.

Izuku reached out, brushing his fingertips along the statue’s base. The stone was cold, but it felt like touching a heartbeat that had forgotten how to beat. He bowed his head.

“Lord Bakugou,” he whispered, voice hoarse from sleepless nights, “please… hear me.”

His words vanished into the damp air. Only the soft patter of rain answered him, steady and indifferent.

He swallowed hard. His throat ached from praying, from speaking into emptiness, from believing when no one else did. He had prayed for days — ever since the crops had failed and the fields turned to dust. Ever since the rivers dried to shallow, bitter trickles. Ever since the soldiers of the northern kingdoms crossed the mountains and began their march toward Elaris, taking village after village, leaving only smoke in their wake.

He had prayed when the priests fled, abandoning their holy robes for common clothes. He had prayed when the king abandoned his people, sealing himself in his golden fortress and declaring that the gods had forsaken them. He had prayed when the children cried for bread that no one could give them. And still, no answer came.

The altars had gone cold weeks ago, the sacred flames extinguished by neglect. The holy bells no longer rang at dawn. The grand processions that once filled these streets with song and color were memories told only by the old, who still remembered the days when Elaris had been the heart of faith. Now, even they had fallen silent.

Izuku was alone. The last acolyte of a forgotten temple, the last believer in a god who had long stopped listening.

And yet, he couldn’t stop. Not because he was brave, but because he didn’t know how to live without believing. He had grown up beneath this statue, had spent his childhood sweeping the temple floors, polishing offerings, and reciting prayers to a name that made the torches burn brighter. Bakugou, they used to say, the Flame of Heaven, the Defender of Mankind.The god who taught mortals how to wield fire, how to stand tall, how to survive.

But that was before the silence. Before the Fading.

Now, Izuku’s faith felt like madness. He could see it in the eyes of the few who still lingered in the city — the way they looked at him with pity when he carried food to the temple steps, when he knelt at dawn whispering names that meant nothing to them anymore. But what else could he do? If he gave up praying, then there would be nothing left.

He pressed his forehead to the cracked stone and let the rain soak into his robes, washing away the ash and dust. His voice broke as he spoke again, softer this time, as if afraid the silence might shatter if he was too loud.

“If you still remember us…” His breath hitched. “If you ever cared for this kingdom, for the people who built your altars, for the ones who died with your name on their lips—please. Save them. Save us.”

The wind stirred through the hollow temple, carrying his words upward into the broken dome. He imagined them rising beyond the clouds, searching for a god who might still be listening.

“I’ll give you everything I have left,” he whispered. “My strength, my breath, my faith — take it all if you must. Just… don’t let them die believing you were never real.”

His hands tightened, fingernails digging into his palms until they drew blood. The droplets fell onto the wet marble, spreading like red petals. He kept his eyes closed, whispering the same prayer over and over, until his voice was nothing more than a rasp in the storm.

Above him, thunder rolled — deep and far away, like the slow turning of some ancient thing.

Izuku didn’t notice. He only knelt lower, shaking, whispering a god’s name into the dark.

“Please,” he murmured. “Just once. Let me know you hear me.”

And in the silence that followed, he thought he felt the faintest tremor beneath his knees — a pulse in the stone, as if the temple itself had taken a breath.

The wind outside shifted.

It began as the faintest whisper — the kind that slips through cracks in temple walls, gentle enough to stir the ash on the altar but not yet strong enough to scatter it. Then it grew, gathering in the corners like breath drawn before a scream. The sound deepened, turning from a murmur to a shudder that rippled through the stones beneath Izuku’s knees.

He lifted his head.

The candles that lined the temple walls flickered wildly and died, one by one, their smoke rising in fragile spirals. The air thickened. In the distance, thunder rolled — low, heavy, ancient, as though something vast and sleeping had begun to stir beneath the skin of the world.

He stood, unsteady. His pulse hammered in his throat.

Outside, the storm broke. Lightning flashed — quick and merciless — carving through the sky in veins of white fire. For an instant, the cracks in the statue of Bakugou glowed gold, light bleeding through as if the god’s own blood had begun to flow again. The temple floor trembled.

Izuku’s breath caught.

Another flash. This one did not fade. The heavens tore themselves open in a single blinding scream of light, and the clouds ignited.

And then came the fire.

It poured down like rain, molten and endless, lighting the storm clouds from within. The people of Elaris screamed in the streets below, scattering like insects beneath a torch. The air filled with the smell of iron and salt, with heat so thick it pressed against the lungs. The great spires of the temple groaned and split; stone turned to steam. Izuku stumbled backward, his hands raised against the wave of light that rolled through the sanctuary.

The statue cracked down its center, a sound sharp and clean as the tearing of cloth. The head fell first, shattering on the marble floor in a spray of dust and golden shards.

From within the broken stone stepped a figure.

He was tall — taller than any mortal man — and his presence filled the ruin like a second heartbeat. Shoulders broad, skin the color of sunlight seen through smoke, every movement carrying the weight of something that had existed too long. His hair caught the firelight and turned white at the tips, and his eyes—those eyes—were molten amber, furious and alive, burning with an old pain that had never healed.

Flames licked at the edges of his armor, yet he did not burn. The air around him wavered, bending under his heat. He was beautiful in a way that hurt to look at, terrible in a way that felt like truth.

Izuku could not speak. His mouth was dry, his heart stumbling against his ribs. His mind whispered names he had grown up hearing — The Warbringer. The Flame of the Heavens. The One Who Never Kneels. Words from children’s prayers and old battle songs. Words he had never truly believed he would say aloud.

Bakugou Katsuki, god of war, had answered.

He stepped forward, through the remnants of his own image. Each stride left a line of scorched marble, and each footfall cracked the floor like brittle bone. The last remnants of the temple’s light bent toward him, as if drawn by gravity. He moved like a storm given shape.

His gaze swept across the ruins — the shattered altars, the dying fires, the boy who knelt before him. His jaw clenched. The sound of the rain outside vanished; only the hiss of cooling stone remained.

“This,” he said at last, his voice low and burning, “is what’s left of my city?”

The words carried through the air like the toll of a bell, heavy and final.

Izuku’s lips parted. He tried to speak, but the heat pressed down on his lungs until every breath hurt. “My… my lord—”

“Who dares call my name after all this time?” Bakugou’s eyes blazed brighter. The walls of the temple trembled, dust falling in soft curtains from the ceiling. “Who prayed when all others turned away?”

“I did,” Izuku whispered. The sound was small, almost lost to the roar of the fire. “I prayed.”

For a moment, the god’s expression faltered. His fury dimmed — not gone, but cracked. He looked down at the boy: rain-soaked, shaking, yet unbroken. Green eyes wide with a faith the world had long forgotten. Something old stirred behind Bakugou’s ribs — not pity, not quite. Recognition, perhaps. The memory of what it meant to be believed in.

He turned away, the motion sharp. “You should not have done that.”

“Why?” Izuku asked, his voice raw.

“Because now they’ll hear it too.”

Lightning split the sky again. Outside, the storm convulsed. In the clouds above Elaris, shapes began to form — vast and indistinct, too enormous to be human. The outlines of wings, the suggestion of faces watching through the lightning.

Bakugou clenched his fists. Fire flared in the seams of his armor, veins of light crawling across his forearms. The scent of ozone grew sharper. He shouldn’t have come. It was forbidden for any god to walk among mortals since the War of Creation. The last time they had done so, mountains had fallen and seas had boiled dry. But he had heard that voice. Soft. Desperate. Human. It had cut through the silence that had blanketed the heavens for an age.

He looked at Izuku again and saw not just a priest, but a spark of something he had not seen since the dawn of the world: hope. And hope, in the hands of mortals, could burn down heavens.

Bakugou exhaled, and the flames around him wavered, dimming to a slow, steady glow. “Listen to me, mortal,” he said, his voice quieter now but no less fierce. “You’ve called down a storm you don’t understand. Go home. Forget this ever happened.”

Izuku shook his head. “I can’t. My people—”

“Your people are already dead,” Bakugou snapped. The words hit like a slap, and the air rippled from the force of them. “You don’t save what’s already gone.”

Izuku flinched but didn’t look away. “Then save what’s left. Save me.”

Silence fell. Even the storm seemed to hesitate.

Bakugou stared at him for a long time — at the defiance trembling in his shoulders, the stubborn faith shining in his eyes. He should have turned away. He should have left this dying city to rot. But instead he found himself smiling, a thin, dangerous curl of lips that held no joy.

“You’re a fool,” he said softly, almost fondly. “But fine. You asked for salvation. You’ll get it.”

The fire around him exploded outward. It wasn’t heat anymore — it was presence, divine and blinding. Izuku threw up his arms, the blast scalding the air, searing the edge of his robe. The marble beneath his feet melted and re-hardened in the same breath.

When the light faded enough for him to see, the god stood with wings of fire spreading from his back — vast and radiant, feathers made of molten light. Each beat of them sent sparks spiraling into the air like falling stars. The sight was terrible and beautiful enough to make Izuku forget to breathe.

Bakugou looked down at him, eyes unreadable behind the glow. “Remember this, mortal,” he said. “When the gods bleed, the world burns.”

He turned toward the storm. The wings moved once, twice — and the god of war rose, tearing through the clouds, thunder curling in his wake like a living thing.

The flames vanished with him.

In their absence, the rain stopped. The air cooled into something thin and sharp. Ash drifted down like snow, coating the ruins of the temple in a soft gray blanket. The statue was gone, reduced to rubble and gold dust.

Izuku stood among the wreckage, chest heaving. His skin stung where the fire had kissed it, but he barely noticed. Above him, lightning still crawled across the clouds, faint and gold, tracing the path of the god who had just left.

He sank to his knees. The sound of the wind returned — soft again, almost gentle now, as if the storm itself were exhausted. He bowed his head, tears falling to the scorched floor.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

The word hung in the air, unanswered, fading into the smell of smoke.

No voice replied.

But far above the mortal sky, in the city of Elythra, where the halls of the gods glowed with dying light, a dozen pairs of eyes turned downward.

They had felt the flare of warfire on the surface of the world. They had heard the forbidden sound of a mortal prayer answered.

The silence that followed was heavy enough to crush stars.

The first sin of the new age had been committed.

Chapter Text

⋆༺𓆩⚔𓆪༻⋆

The storm did not end with his descent. It lingered like a wound torn into the heavens, bleeding thunder and light across the world. The skies above Elaris burned without rest for three days, and for three nights the earth shuddered beneath the fury of a god returned to the mortal realm. Lightning split the horizon into veins of white fire; rain hissed as it struck the molten scars left upon the mountains. The sea beyond the city glowed faintly red, reflecting the glow of the divine tempest that refused to die.

The people of Elaris hid from the sight. Doors were barred, windows shuttered, temples sealed. Families huddled together in darkness, whispering old prayers in voices they barely remembered how to form. Some prayed for mercy, others for ignorance — that the god might pass them by unseen. In the markets and taverns where once laughter had lived, silence took root. Every crash of thunder made them flinch. Every gust of wind felt like a judgment.

They spoke his names in half-breath and fear. Katsuki, the Flameborn. Katsuki, the Stormbringer. The Scorched Sun. The One Who Does Not Kneel. Some said he had come to cleanse the land of the faithless. Others said he had come to reclaim what mortals had stolen. None dared look directly at the sky, for it was said that to meet the god’s eyes when he walked the earth was to see your own sins reflected in flame.

Only Izuku looked.

He had not slept since the night the heavens opened. His body ached with exhaustion, yet his mind refused to rest. Each time he closed his eyes, he saw the statue shatter, saw that impossible light pouring through the cracks. It haunted him — that glimpse of divinity raw and unfiltered, too bright for mortal sight.

Now he stood alone in the ruins of the temple, barefoot on scorched marble. The air was still thick with the scent of burned incense and ozone. The rain had stopped hours ago, but thin trails of steam rose from the blackened floor, curling around his ankles. The broken pillars glimmered faintly where the fire had melted them to glass.

The statue that had once dominated the altar was gone, reduced to fragments of obsidian and ash. Where it had stood, a hollow depression smoked gently, filled with a faint golden glow that refused to fade. Izuku knelt beside it, tracing the edge of the crater with trembling fingers. The stone was warm, almost alive, pulsing with a heartbeat that wasn’t his own.

He should have been afraid. Instead, he felt a strange calm, a reverent stillness that spread through his chest like dawn. Whatever this was — miracle, curse, or punishment — it was proof. The gods were not gone. Not entirely.

He tilted his face upward. The roof had collapsed centuries ago, leaving the temple open to the sky. Clouds churned in endless motion, crimson and silver, the colors of fire trapped beneath storm. The air shimmered faintly, as though the world itself were holding its breath.

He whispered the god’s name once, barely more than a breath. “Katsuki.”

The sound vanished into the vastness above, but the moment it left his lips, the wind shifted. A low hum vibrated through the ground — faint at first, then stronger, until the glass beneath his knees began to sing. The temperature rose. The gold light in the crater flared brighter, licking the edges like liquid fire.

Izuku’s pulse quickened. He spoke the name again, louder this time, as though daring the silence to answer. “Katsuki.”

The air trembled. Far away, thunder responded — not the wild crack of a storm, but a single deep sound, measured and deliberate, as though the sky itself had drawn breath to listen.

He pressed a hand to his chest. His heart was pounding so hard it hurt.

Around him, the ruined temple seemed to wake. The murals along the remaining walls — depictions of battles and coronations long forgotten — caught the faint light and flickered to life. The painted warriors moved, blades flashing, flames unfurling from their hands. The faces of the divine gazed down with hollow, painted eyes.

And there, among them, was the same figure he had seen in his childhood: the god of war, standing amidst fire, haloed in smoke, his expression caught between fury and grief.

Izuku stepped closer until his shadow touched the painted feet. He reached up, fingertips brushing the cool surface of the wall. “You were real,” he murmured. “You answered.”

The mural’s colors brightened for an instant — red deepening, gold burning brighter — and then dulled again. The vision ended, leaving him standing in quiet ruin.

Outside, a new rumble spread across the city. The horizon blazed, a line of gold cutting through the darkness like an opening eye. The citizens of Elaris cried out in terror, believing the end had come. But Izuku’s heart lifted, fragile and wild. He knew what it was. He knew who it was.

Somewhere beyond the storm, the god was awake.

He sank to his knees amid the wreckage, breathing hard, sweat and rain mixing on his skin. “You’re here,” he whispered. “You really came.”

And though there was no voice in return, no divine figure descending through the clouds, he could feel it — the heat, the pulse, the awareness — as though the entire sky had turned its gaze upon him.

The warmth on his palms intensified, spreading up his arms until it felt like sunlight was flowing through his veins. It hurt, but he did not pull away. The pain felt sacred, a mark of something greater than himself.

“Katsuki,” he said once more, voice shaking. “Please… don’t leave us again.”

The storm answered with another roll of thunder, closer this time, as if the heavens themselves hesitated before speaking.

Then silence.

Izuku bowed his head, chest tight with awe and fear. He did not know whether the god heard him, or whether the god cared. But for the first time in years, he felt something other than despair.

Above the smoking ruins, the clouds continued to burn.

And somewhere in the mountains beyond sight, a god opened his eyes.

The wind stirred.

Far above, in the mountains that bordered Elaris, lightning split the peaks. The god of war had landed there, carving a crater into the rock. The forest surrounding it had burned to ash; whole ridges smoked and bled molten seams where the heat of his arrival had kissed the stone. The trees stood blackened and skeletal, their shadows long and brittle in the orange haze. Even the rivers fled him — streams turned to steam and fled skyward in desperate clouds.

Katsuki knelt amid the wreckage, one hand pressed to the cracked earth, the other curled loosely against his knee. The ground pulsed faintly under his palm, the way a wounded thing trembles around its hurt. His breath came in harsh pulls that fogged the air with sparks. For a long moment, he didn’t recognize what he was looking at. The world felt smaller than memory allowed — its horizon too near, its air too thin. Even the gravity of it dragged strangely at him.

“Pathetic,” he muttered, though the word trembled at the edges. He hated that. Hated the tremor, hated the raw, human sound of it. The divine fire inside him stuttered and flared unevenly, like a forge left too long untended. His chest ached with the emptiness between beats of that power.

He shut his eyes, searching for the furnace at his core — the endless, devouring blaze that had once sung beneath his skin. It came sluggishly now, flickering like a candle about to die. The loss hit him harder than he expected. The Fading had not just dimmed him; it had hollowed him out.

When he opened his eyes again, the mountains below were burning.

Fire crawled across the ridges, lazy and luminous, licking the underbellies of the storm clouds. Sparks rose in slow spirals, painting the sky with their brief lives. The mortals would see this, he knew. They would call it a curse, a punishment, a reckoning from the heavens. They would tell one another that the god of war had come back to destroy them.

And perhaps they would be right.

The memory of that mortal voice cut through the hiss of the rain: soft, trembling, painfully sincere. Please, save them. Save us.

He clenched his jaw. He had not meant to hear it. The High Laws were absolute — no interference, no descent, no mercy. The world of men was to live and die by its own will now. Yet he had listened anyway. The sound had reached him through the centuries like a spark dropped into dry grass. He had felt the boy’s desperation, the way it clawed upward toward the heavens, refusing to be ignored.

And something ancient inside him — something furious, something almost tender — had answered.

Katsuki rose, the movement scattering a cascade of glowing embers from his shoulders. Flames coiled lazily around his arms, sheathing them in light. He turned toward the lowlands. In the distance, beyond the curling fog and smoke, the faint outline of a city quivered — Elaris, his city. Once, it had glittered with banners the colour of his fire. Once, it had sung his name. Now its towers were ghosts.

He had been worshiped there. Loved there. Children had been named for his victories, kings had painted their armor red in his honor. His festivals had lasted seven days and seven nights. But the songs had gone quiet, the banners long since bleached to white. Mortals forgot quickly.

Only one had remembered.

A single mortal’s prayer had pierced the silence of centuries, and because of it, the sky now burned.

The thought twisted in his chest until it felt like pain. “You idiot,” he said softly, half curse, half confession. “You don’t even know what you’ve done.”

Above him, the storm stirred as if alive. Clouds churned into vast spirals, their undersides bruised with violet fire. The wind carried a low hum — a vibration that was not sound but presence. The other gods were watching. He felt their attention like weight on his shoulders: cold, distant, and disdainful.

They had always watched him this way, as if waiting for him to fail again.

“Let them watch,” he whispered. “Let them remember who I am.”

He lifted his hand. The air thickened. Power answered, slow at first, then rising, gathering in the hollow of his palm. Gold light bled through the cracks of his skin, burning brighter until the shape of his fingers disappeared within it. Fire condensed there, molten and white-hot, forming a sphere that pulsed with his heartbeat.

He inhaled, steadying it, shaping it into a spear of pure flame. The weapon hummed with restrained fury.

When he hurled it skyward, the mountains screamed.

The spear tore through cloud and thunder alike, splitting the storm open from root to crown. Light exploded outward, washing the world in blinding gold. For a heartbeat, all of creation glowed — mountains, rivers, seas — all lit by the reflection of his power. The forests blazed like torches; even the shadows seemed to burn.

He stood within that radiance, unblinking. The roar of the fire drowned every other sound, and for that single instant, it was as if the world had remembered him.

And then, silence.

The light collapsed in on itself, leaving behind a sky of charred silver and a smell of rain turning to steam. The mountains lay scorched and smoking, their stone weeping molten tears down the slopes. The forest was gone. The rivers hissed as they cooled.

Katsuki lowered his arm. Ash drifted around him, glowing faintly like snow in the dark. He listened to the crackle of dying fire, to the far-off rumble of collapsing cliffs. The gods’ gaze faded from the air, leaving only the echo of judgment in its wake.

He was alone again.

The wind sighed through the ruin, tasting of burnt pine and salt from the faraway sea. For a moment, he thought of the boy — of green eyes turned upward, of a voice that had not known when to stop pleading. He wondered if the mortal was afraid now, seeing the mountains burn.

He wondered why he cared.

Katsuki closed his fists, the heat dimming under his skin. “You wanted saving,” he murmured. “This is what salvation looks like.”

He tilted his head back, watching the smoke curl toward the stars, and beneath the exhaustion and anger there flickered something almost like regret — brief, unacknowledged, gone as soon as it formed.

The flames guttered out. The night returned, heavy and cold. The god stood among the ashes of his own making, and the mountains bowed in silence around him.

In the heavens, the council stirred.

Elythra, the city of the divine, awoke to chaos. Bells of pure crystal rang from the towers, their sound a chorus that shook the sky. The air itself shimmered with power as gods emerged from their sanctuaries, cloaks of starlight and flame trailing behind them. The great square before the High Hall blazed with the color of their gathered auras — gold, silver, crimson, blue.

Inside the hall, where pillars of light stretched higher than mountains, the gods took their seats in a circle of thrones carved from the bones of stars. At its center burned the High Throne of Light, where All Might, the First Flame, presided. His radiance had dimmed with age, but the gravity of his presence still bent the air.

At the foot of that throne stood Todoroki Shouto, god of balance and frostfire. His calm voice cut through the whispers. “He broke the law,” he said. “Again.”

A ripple of voices rose immediately.

“Of course he did,” said a sharp, wind-like voice from the eastern dais. Yaoyorozu Momo, goddess of craft and law, leaned forward, her black hair spilling like ink across her robes. “Katsuki has never respected the laws of creation. The question is not if he will break them, but how much destruction he will leave behind this time.”

Across from her, Kirishima Eijirou, god of stone and guardianship, slammed a fist against his granite throne. “He wouldn’t descend without reason. Maybe he saw something we didn’t.”

“Reason?” Momo’s tone sharpened. “Reason does not justify sacrilege. He crossed the Veil.”

From the shadowed edge of the chamber, Uraraka Ochako, goddess of stars and gravity, folded her arms, voice soft but firm. “You speak as though you’ve forgotten the silence below. Mortals are starving, dying, and we watch. Perhaps Katsuki remembered what it means to be seen.”

“That’s not our purpose anymore,” said Aizawa, god of dusk and judgment, his eyes half-lidded as if weary of eternity itself. “The mortal realm chose its independence. Their faith was the price of freedom. To interfere now only unravels what little order remains.”

A flash of blue lightning arced through the upper gallery. Denki Kaminari, minor god of storms, lounged on the railing, smirking. “Come on, Sensei, you make it sound boring. A god of war back on earth? Sounds fun.”

“Fun?” barked Iida Tenya, god of oaths and motion, his armor gleaming with divine runes. “You think this is sport? His descent has already shattered the boundary! The mortal sky burns!”

Kaminari raised his hands in mock surrender. “Just saying, it’s not every century we get some excitement.”

“Enough.” Todoroki’s voice froze the air, frost spreading across the marble. “This isn’t a game. A mortal’s prayer reached him. That should be impossible.”

A murmur swept the circle — Tsuyu, goddess of rivers, whispered to Jirou, muse of echoes; Tokoyami, god of night, tilted his head toward the ceiling as if listening for distant thunder. Even the twin spirits Mina and Sero, keepers of laughter and song, had fallen silent.

At last, All Might spoke, his voice filling every corner of the hall. “The laws were forged after the Titan Wars for good reason. Each time one of us crosses the Veil, creation trembles. If one god breaks the boundary, others will follow.”

Uraraka met his gaze. “And yet a mortal has already found a way to be heard.”

The words hung in the air, heavy as prophecy.

Momo’s eyes widened. “You mean to say the barrier itself is weakening?”

Todoroki’s gaze shifted toward the storm raging far below. “The god of war has always been reckless. But if he is truly listening again…”

All Might finished the thought, his light dimming. “Then the Fading is no longer stable.”

For a long moment, no one spoke. The realization passed through them like a shadow.

Finally, from the farthest seat—a throne carved of charred metal — Endeavor, lord of flame and might, father of the balance god, leaned forward, his voice a growl. “Then someone must remind him of the law. If Katsuki will not remain bound to the heavens, he will be forced to.”

Aizawa’s eyes narrowed. “And you’d start another divine war? We barely survived the last one.”

Endeavor’s flames flared brighter. “If the world burns, it will be by his hand, not mine.”

Uraraka looked up through the open ceiling, where lightning still tore across the horizon. “You’re both wrong. If the world burns, it will be because we let it. Because none of us remembered mercy when one mortal still dared to pray.”

The hall fell into silence once more. Even the light seemed to hesitate.

All Might rose slowly, his form towering over them all. “We will not act in haste,” he said. “The council will observe. But should the mortal realm break further, should faith or fury breach the Veil again — then even gods will bleed.”

No one dared answer him.

Outside the hall, the bells of Elythra tolled again, echoing down the golden streets. The sound reached the edges of the clouds and drifted toward the burning world below, where a lone mortal still knelt amid the ashes of a ruined temple.

And far away, on the mountain scorched by his fall, Katsuki felt that sound in his chest — a distant vibration, like a heartbeat that wasn’t his own.

The heavens were restless. The gods were watching. And the war god smiled, knowing they would soon have reason to fear him again.

Below, in the mortal city, Izuku walked through the rain. It fell heavy and cold, streaking down from a sky still burning faintly gold from divine fire. The streets were empty — not even the stray dogs wandered tonight. Doors were barred, shutters sealed, and behind them, the whispers of frightened families rose like a prayer that dared not speak a name.

The air carried the scent of ash and thunder. It clung to Izuku’s throat, metallic and dry, like the breath before lightning strikes. He could feel the storm above him not as weather, but as a presence — vast, living, aware. Every rumble of thunder felt like a heartbeat; every flash of lightning was an eye opening in the dark.

He didn’t need to see where the god had gone. He could feel it — a pull deep beneath his ribs, something magnetic and impossible to ignore. It drew him toward the mountains, where the horizon burned faintly red, like the edge of the world had caught fire. His footsteps splashed through shallow puddles that glowed faintly with reflected lightning.

He stopped at the edge of the city, where cracked stone gave way to wild grass and open land. The storm sat heavy over the mountains, thick with gold and black, the clouds twisting like serpents. He thought of the old songs he had learned as a child — songs of gods descending wrapped in flame, their anger shaking the earth. Those had always felt like fairy tales.

But now he knew better.

He wrapped his arms around himself, shivering. He should have been afraid. Every part of him should have wanted to hide — to run, to pray for forgiveness for daring to call a god down to earth. But fear had left him somewhere between the lightning and the silence that followed.

What he felt instead was a strange calm. A quiet, painful certainty that the world had shifted. That something vast and irreversible had woken from its long sleep.

He didn’t know what it meant. He only knew he had changed something that could never be undone.

When exhaustion finally found him, he returned to the temple — or what was left of it. He laid down beneath the broken arch, where once a roof had sheltered priests and offerings. Rain leaked through the gaps, soaking his robes, and the night wind curled around him like a ghost’s breath.

He dreamed almost immediately.

The world of the dream was not the world he knew. The sky there was endless and burning, filled with stars like embers. The ground beneath him was glass, reflecting the fire above, and from the horizon rose shadows — thousands of them — whispering like the wind through dead trees.

At the center of that battlefield stood a figure.

He was wreathed in gold and flame, his body gleaming like a weapon forged by creation itself. Every breath he took shimmered the air; every flicker of light around him obeyed his pulse. His expression was carved in fury, but beneath it was something heavier, something sad and human that had been buried deep.

Katsuki.

Izuku tried to speak, but no sound came. His voice burned away before it reached his throat. The heat was suffocating, and yet he couldn’t look away.

The god’s eyes found him — molten gold, endless and sharp enough to cut the sky.

“Why did you call me?” Katsuki’s voice rolled across the burning plain, quieter than thunder but heavier than silence.

Izuku couldn’t answer. The smoke filled his lungs. He wanted to fall to his knees, but his body wouldn’t move.

“You don’t understand what you’ve done,” Katsuki said again. His tone was colder now, quieter, as if the words themselves hurt. “You think you wanted salvation.” The light around him flared, bright enough to sear Izuku’s vision. “What you called,” he said, “was war.”

The shadows behind him collapsed inward, drawn to the fire like ash to wind. The sound was deafening — a thousand whispers dying at once.

Izuku reached out a hand, but before he could speak, the world shattered.

He woke gasping.

The rain had stopped. The air was still heavy with smoke, though no fire burned nearby. The faint taste of ash lingered on his tongue, bitter and metallic. When he sat up, the sky over Elaris glowed faintly — a dull orange light pulsing where the mountains met the horizon.

He pressed a shaking hand to his chest, feeling the steady thrum of his heart. For a moment, he wasn’t sure it was truly his own heartbeat he was hearing.

Somewhere in the distance, thunder growled again — not natural, but alive

Far beyond the city, in the mountain scar left by divine descent, Katsuki stood on a cliff edge and looked down at the valley below. The wind raked through his hair, carrying with it the faint scent of burnt cedar and salt. His armor was cracked where divine flame had met mortal air, and the light within him pulsed unevenly.

He hated this feeling. The weakness. The weight of gravity. The taste of mortality clinging to his lungs.

But more than that, he hated the sound that still echoed in his mind — the voice of the mortal who had called to him. Small, trembling, unbearably alive.

He had ignored the prayers of thousands, entire armies begging for his favor, kings screaming his name into the sky — and he had never answered. But this voice, this single, desperate prayer, had cut through the silence as though it had been made for him alone.

He clenched his fists, sparks flickering between his fingers. “Damn it.”

The mountains answered with a distant rumble. His fire rose in reply, flaring gold around his arms, but even the flames felt restless, uncertain.

He looked toward the horizon, toward the faint glimmer of the city below. He could see it from here — the ruins, the temple, the narrow streets slick with rain. Somewhere among them was that boy, that priest who had spoken his name as though it were still sacred.

He could almost hear him again.

The sound was not a prayer this time, but a memory — a soft voice asking for mercy that didn’t exist. It made something in Katsuki’s chest twist in a way that felt too much like pain.

He took a slow breath and let it out as smoke.

“You should have kept your silence,” he said to the night. His voice was quiet, but the words carried, riding the wind down into the valleys like a warning. “You should never have called me.”

The wind didn’t answer.

He turned his gaze skyward, to where the faint outlines of Elythra’s towers shimmered behind the clouds. He could feel the weight of their eyes on him — the other gods, watching, whispering, waiting to see what he would do next.

“Don’t pray again, mortal,” he said softly. “Once was enough.”

But the words felt hollow the moment he spoke them. He knew he would hear that voice again, even if he tried not to. The connection was made. It pulsed between them like a wound that refused to close.

Katsuki lowered his hand, letting the last of his flames die. The night settled heavy around him, thick and silent, save for the faint hiss of cooling stone beneath his feet.

And though he would never admit it aloud, a single thought lingered in the quiet — a thought he despised for existing at all.

For the first time in a thousand years, I am not alone.

High above, the heavens trembled. The stars flickered as if holding their breath. In Elythra, the gods watched and whispered among themselves.

The second sin of the new age had just begun.

Chapter Text

⋆༺𓆩⚔𓆪༻⋆

Morning never came easily after the storm. It tried. The sun pushed a thin, colorless glow over the horizon, but the light seemed afraid to enter the city. It lingered beyond the walls like a hesitant guest, touching only the highest rooftops before retreating behind the bruised grey sky. Elaris looked as though it had aged a century overnight. Ash blanketed the streets in a soft, uneven layer, turning the familiar cobblestones into a muted landscape of white and charcoal. Roof tiles were dusted in pale powder, and the gutters overflowed with rainwater thickened by soot. The storm had passed, yet its memory remained in every corner — clinging to windowsills, drifting from cracks in walls, settling in the creases of abandoned market stalls. The air itself felt altered. Hushed. Listening. Even the city’s usual morning sounds seemed wrong. The fishmongers who normally shouted near the harbor were silent. The bells of the southern district, which were rung every dawn, hung motionless, their ropes swaying gently in the wind. The only noises that dared break the stillness were small ones: the faint creak of shutters cautiously opening; the frightened rustle of skirts as people peeked into the streets; the soft, hurried footsteps of someone retreating back inside after seeing too much sky.

Everyone felt it — an echo of something vast and furious that had torn through the world.

And somewhere in the ruins of the temple district, a boy knelt alone.

Izuku’s clothes were still damp from rain, caked in grey dust that clung to the folds of his robes. Ash streaked his arms up to the elbows, and his fingers trembled slightly from exhaustion, though he didn’t seem to notice. He sat amidst the fallen stone of the once-grand sanctuary, carefully brushing fragments of the god’s statue into a pile as though gathering the remains of something sacred. The statue had shattered completely. Marble lay in sharp, jagged pieces, its once-polished surface scorched in places where divine fire had kissed it. The head was split clean through the middle. The chest plate, once carved with intricate sun motifs, was cracked into a dozen pieces like broken pottery. Only one fragment remained intact — a hand, sculpted in perfect detail, fingers curled as though ready to grasp something. Izuku touched it gently, brushing away the ash. The stone was warm. Not from the morning or the fading embers around him — no, this warmth felt deeper, alive. When he pressed his fingers more firmly against the marble, something pulsed through the stone, a faint rhythm like a heartbeat.

He froze.

His breath caught.

He leaned closer, palm flat against the broken hand.

There it was again — a subtle thrum of warmth, as though the remnants of a god’s presence still clung to the world like a fading breath.

“Is this normal…?” he whispered to the empty temple, though he already knew the answer. His voice echoed softly in the silence, swallowed immediately by the heavy air. Gods were not meant to leave traces. Not anymore. And yet here he was, kneeling amid ruins that still felt alive. Izuku closed his eyes and let his fingers rest against the warm stone. “Thank you,” he murmured, barely audible. “For hearing me. For coming.”

The wind rustled through the roofless sanctuary, scattering a few flakes of ash across the floor. It felt almost like a response — gentle, uncertain, too small for a storm god, too soft for a god of war.

His throat tightened.

Maybe he was imagining it. Maybe exhaustion had finally blurred reality past the point of reason.

But then—

Somewhere high above the city, a distant rumble rolled across the sky, so faint it might have been mistaken for a shifting mountain. Izuku’s head snapped up, eyes instinctively drawn toward the northern peaks. The mountains were still smoking. Their dark silhouettes rose sharply against the pale morning light, their slopes veiled in thin tendrils of steam that curled upward like ghostly fingers. The highest peak flickered faintly with residual light — the afterglow of divine fire refusing to be swallowed by the dawn.

A shiver crawled up Izuku’s spine.

He remembered the way the sky had erupted the night before.

The fire.

The roar.

The figure descending in a storm of light and fury.

He remembered the eyes — molten, divine, impossible. And now, even with the storm gone, even with the dawn trying to reclaim the world, the mountains still burned.

Izuku swallowed, fingers slowly falling away from the last fragment of the statue. “Yes,” he whispered to himself. “It was real.” Every instinct in his body urged him to run — away from the city, away from the ruins, away from the storm-scarred mountains where the god still lingered. But he stayed. His knees ached from kneeling too long; his throat burned from ash and cold air; his heart felt too big for his chest.

Still, he stayed.

Because dawn might have been slow to return, hesitant and thin, but Katsuki’s arrival had carved a truth into the world that even the sun couldn’t erase. The god of war had answered a mortal.

And nothing would ever be the same.

In the mountains above, Katsuki had not moved since the night before.

Dawn had threatened the horizon hours ago, but it never fully arrived — not here. The crater where he knelt still glowed faintly, its edges rimmed with molten stone that sizzled whenever the faint drizzle touched it. A thin column of smoke rose from the trees he had burned through, twisting into the sky like a new, unwilling mountain. His armor, once forged from celestial metal, looked nearly mortal now — scorched, cracked in places, smeared with ash that clung to the seams like a reminder of how far he had fallen. His hair, normally a blaze of its own, was flattened with soot, the pale strands sticking to his temples where sweat and smoke had mixed. Around him, the forest smoldered like a dying beast. Every now and then, a tree collapsed inward with a brittle crack, sending sparks whirling up into the dull morning light. Birds had fled hours ago. Small creatures hid under roots and stones, too afraid to tremble.

He didn’t notice any of it. The fire inside him was louder — too loud, restless, impatient. It crawled beneath his skin, coiling like an animal pacing its cage. And beneath that fire, softer but far more dangerous, was the echo of a mortal voice. He could still feel it humming in his veins, warm where it should have been cold, steady where it should have been fading. A single prayer. One whisper. One human plea that had split a god open.

It should have been nothing.

It had always been nothing before.

Mortal voices were like sparks striking a flood. They never lasted long enough to matter.

But this one… Every time he closed his eyes, he saw that face again — that mortal boy standing in the ruin of a temple, dust on his hair, eyes wide but unflinching, speaking his name as though it were less a request and more a command from fate itself.

The fire in Katsuki’s chest throbbed, painful and irritating. “You shouldn’t matter,” he muttered to the empty air, his voice hoarse from flame and fury. His shoulders trembled with the effort to contain the heat rising through him. “You’re supposed to burn away like everything else.” His fists clenched so hard the bones creaked. Sparks burst from the gaps between his fingers — sharp, volatile, like fragments of a sun trying to escape.

The mountains answered with silence.

Only the wind dared approach him, curling around his form with cautious fingers. It carried the scent of rain from the valley far below, cool and gentle, vanishing almost immediately against the heat of his skin. But that brief, delicate touch made him inhale sharply. As though someone — something — had called to him again. He cursed under his breath, stood, and dusted off the ash that clung to him like old regrets. Against his better judgment, against the will of the heavens, against centuries of enforced distance… he began the long walk down the mountainside.

The path was treacherous, winding between jagged cliffs and rivers still steaming from where his fire had touched them. Pools of water boiled as he passed. Trees leaned away from him, leaves curling from the heat that radiated off his body.

Wherever his feet stepped, the rock softened briefly to a glowing orange before cooling to black glass. It left a trail — a scar — marking his descent.

By the time he reached the lower slopes, birds had resumed their distant calls, but even they quieted as he passed.

Closer to the city walls, he found signs of mortal life: a farming cart overturned in haste, a scarf caught on a fence, footprints in the ash leading away from a half-collapsed watchtower. The air here tasted of fear — sharp and metallic.

The stone archway that guarded Elaris stood cracked from age and panic. When Katsuki walked beneath it, one of the outer stones shifted, loosening dust that drifted down like grey snow. The guards who should have been posted there were gone — or hiding where even gods could not easily look.

Only silence greeted him.

The streets beyond were a mosaic of shadow and ash, the faint morning light filtering through broken rooftops and torn banners. Mortals watched from behind cracked doors and shuttered windows, their breaths caught in their throats. Eyes wide, reverent, terrified. Some made old signs of warding; others sank to their knees, trembling.

He ignored them.

Their fear had nothing to do with him — not really. Mortals feared storms without understanding them. They feared gods without knowing the first thing about what a god was.

He walked deeper still, into the heart of the city, the burned-scented wind parting around him like a tide.

He had come for one reason.

A reason he refused to name.

A reason that pulsed quietly in his chest with every step, warm as a heartbeat not his own.

He stopped before the ruined temple — the place where he had been called, the place where his statue had shattered, the place where a mortal boy had spoken his name with a voice that refused to fade.

And for the first time since his fall, Katsuki allowed himself to breathe.

At the heart of the city stood the ruined temple. Once, its pillars had gleamed with carved suns and hammered gold; once, braziers had burned day and night with offerings carried from every corner of Elaris. Now the marble lay in broken ribs across the floor, and the three great braziers sat empty, their metal warped from the heat of the divine explosion. The roof had caved inward, letting a long crack of grey morning light fall through dust and drifting embers.

A single figure moved within the ruin.

Izuku knelt near what remained of the altar, carefully scraping ash into a small clay bowl. His hands shook, not from fear but from exhaustion. He had been awake for nearly two days, driven by something he could not name. Every piece of broken stone he touched seemed to pulse with faint warmth, as if it remembered the fire from the night before.

He did not know why he was rebuilding the altar. Perhaps he wanted something to hold onto — something solid, something sacred — in a world that had suddenly become too big, too loud, too fragile. Perhaps he simply needed to keep moving, to keep breathing, to keep himself from falling apart.

He lifted the bowl to the light, watching the ash drift and swirl like smoke captured inside a shell.

Then the air shifted.

It wasn’t wind. It wasn’t temperature. It was pressure — a low, deep thrum that seemed to echo beneath the ribs of the earth. The braziers, cold for hours, flared with a sudden pulse of fire, gold at the center and red at the edges. The flames rose without fuel, without sound, like a held breath catching in the throat.

Izuku froze.

The bowl slipped from his fingers and fell to the floor, clay cracking, ash scattering in a soft grey cloud.

Slowly, fearfully, he turned.

The god of war stood in the doorway.

Katsuki filled the entrance like a storm trapped in human form. Light gathered around the edges of his silhouette, bending against him as though unwilling to touch his skin. His armor was dented, streaked with soot. Embers clung to his hair like dying stars. Heat radiated from him in slow waves, warping the air around his shoulders.

His eyes—

Gods above, his eyes.

They were molten gold, the color of metal heated past reason, past safety, past anything mortals should ever see. They glowed, dimly at first, then brighter as he stepped beneath the crack of sunlight.

For a moment neither of them spoke. The world seemed to hold still.

“You,” Katsuki said at last. His voice was low, rough, the kind of voice that could announce the breaking of a kingdom or the start of a war. Yet there was something beneath it, something strained. “You’re the one who prayed.”

Izuku tried to breathe. Air refused. Terror and awe warred inside him — the instinct to kneel battling the instinct to run. “Yes,” he whispered.

Katsuki took a single step forward. Stone hissed beneath his boots. The heat of him rolled across the room like the breath of a furnace. “Do you know what that prayer cost?”

Izuku’s lips parted, but no words came. At last, he managed, “I… the city still stands. If it cost only me, then—”

“It cost more than you.” Katsuki’s voice cracked like thunder. The braziers flared again in response. “The sky doesn’t burn for free. The other gods have seen it. They felt the rift open. They’ll come down eventually. And when they do, they won’t ask who meant well.”

Izuku forced himself to meet his gaze. Up close, Katsuki looked… different. Not like a monster or a legend, not like an untouchable deity stepping from a story. He looked exhausted. He looked furious. And beneath that fury lay something hollow, something grief-shaped. “I didn’t mean to bring ruin,” Izuku said quietly. “I just wanted someone to hear us.”

“No one hears mortals anymore,” Katsuki said — and for the first time, there was no anger in the words. Only a terrible, bone-deep sadness. “That’s the point.”

Izuku swallowed. “Then why did you?”

The question landed between them like a falling star.

Katsuki’s jaw tightened. His golden eyes flickered, dimming as though a wind had passed through him. For a long moment he said nothing, chest rising and falling with slow, controlled breaths.

Finally—

“I don’t know,” he said. The words sounded torn from him. “Maybe I was tired of silence.” Something in him broke loose after he said it. His gaze slipped away; he dragged a hand through his hair. Sparks leapt from his fingers and fell lifelessly to the floor. “You shouldn’t have seen me,” he muttered. “I shouldn’t be here. Every second I stay, the laws crack a little more.” His voice trembled — barely, but Izuku heard it.

“Then go,” Izuku said, though his voice shook. “If it keeps you safe.”

Katsuki turned his head, only halfway, just enough to see Izuku from the corner of his eye. “Safe?” he echoed, the word tasting strange. “I’m not afraid of punishment.” He stepped closer — so close Izuku could feel heat radiating from his skin, warm enough to sting. “I’m afraid of what happens next.”

Izuku’s breath caught.

Katsuki’s voice dropped to something quieter, almost intimate in its harshness. “The Fading has eaten at the gods for too long. A prayer strong enough to reach me means the barrier’s breaking. You woke more than just me, priest.”

Izuku felt his pulse stutter. “What do you mean?”

“It means the Titans will stir again. The old war will start over. And the world will tear itself apart.” His hands curled into fists. Flames crackled at his knuckles, barely contained. “All because one mortal couldn’t accept silence.”

Izuku’s fear evaporated, replaced by something fierce. “If silence means letting everything die,” he said, “then yes. I couldn’t.”

The temple held its breath.

Something in Katsuki’s expression shifted — a flicker, a crack across armor. Recognition. Pain. Something dangerously close to respect. “You’ve got no idea what it means to stand against gods,” he said quietly.

“Then teach me,” Izuku said before he could stop himself. The words were soft, but they struck like lightning.

Katsuki stared at him. And stared.

And stared.

The gold in his eyes deepened, molten and sharp, like a blade heating in a forge. He looked as though he could not decide whether Izuku was a fool or something else entirely.

Outside, the wind howled through the broken doors, carrying the scent of rain, smoke, and the faint copper tang of coming danger. Thunder rolled across the hills — not the natural kind, but the kind that came from gods arguing behind closed skies.

Katsuki exhaled sharply, a sound halfway between irritation and reluctant acceptance. “You really don’t know when to shut up, do you?”

Izuku’s lips twitched. “No, my lord.”

“Don’t call me that,” Katsuki snapped — but his voice had softened. “Names have power. If the others hear mine on mortal lips again, they’ll come for both of us.” He turned toward the shattered doorway, shoulders tensing as he looked at the ominous sky beyond. “They’ll come soon anyway.”

Izuku stepped closer, drawn by something he didn’t understand. “What will you do?”

Katsuki flexed his hands; flames licked around his fingers, whispering like hungry spirits. “What I always do,” he said. “Fight until something breaks.” He looked sidelong at Izuku, a small, incredulous smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “You’d better pray I’m still on your side when it happens.”

“I already did,” Izuku whispered.

Katsuki froze. The world went still around him. His fire dimmed.

Something heavy, unspoken, passed between them — not tenderness, not kindness, but a recognition too old and too deep for the mortal language. Then Katsuki nodded once. A motion so small and so rare it felt like a crack in the universe. He turned and stepped out into the storm.

As he walked away, the clouds began to churn. Lightning flashed — soft, golden, almost mournful — as though the sky itself inhaled in dread.

Izuku watched until the last flicker of divine fire disappeared into the rain. Only then did he kneel beside the ruined altar, pressing his palms to the warm stone Katsuki had touched. “Katsuki,” he breathed into the quiet. “Whatever comes next… I’ll face it.”

High above the mortal world, in the crystal streets of Elythra, the bells of the divine city began to toll — slow, heavy, catastrophic.

The gods had heard enough.

The third sin of the new age had begun.