Yohan took the bow, clutching it to his chest as though it were Solaria herself. His aura shimmered not feral, not broken, but focused. For the first time in centuries, his madness gave way to resolve.
Azrael's mind drifted as he looked at the broken figure before him now. The bow in his palm pulsed, and with it came the memory the day he had first stumbled into her domain. As he finally started to calm down the young man collapsed from a mixture of relief and exhaustion.
"Gods, the things I do for this job." Az sighed as he threw Yohan over his shoulder before opening a rift and stepping through it.
It had been four hundred years ago, when the cracks in the Assiah still echoed like thunder across the higher realms. His office, usually silent and sterile, had shuddered and then she appeared.
Solaria.
She collapsed across the polished marble floor, her golden blood pooling beneath her, glimmering like molten sunlight. Azrael's calm, detached mask had faltered for the first time in eons. He had seen many souls, gods and mortals alike, pass through his halls, but the second he saw that blood, he knew. A goddess.
Her breaths were shallow, ragged, her aura flickering dark violet and cold, edged with black. She was clutching her side, where the wound still smoldered with the mark of a primordial god.
And then her eyes wide, desperate, burning with a love that refused to die.
"Yohan…" she rasped, the name dripping with pain and devotion.
Azrael had knelt beside her, his voice steady, professional, but softer than usual. "You are Solaria…mother of Gladius, I recognize you from the broadcast, heh she really did it huh."
Her head jerked up, confusion etched through her suffering. "Broadcast…? You saw it?"
"I did," Azrael said simply. "Your husband's story reached further than he knew. Gods don't weep for mortals, nor do they fight for them the way he did. But Aurelius.... Yohan, he did. And it compelled me."
Solaria's lips trembled. "He… he'll come. He has to."
Azrael examined the wound, the mark burning into her soul like chains. He pressed his palm against it, channeling deathly energy into the fracture, slowing its decay. But even he could not erase the damage.
"Your soul is too fractured to hold indefinitely. You need rest and I would normally suggest reincarnation, but…" His tone dipped slightly, uncharacteristically hesitant. " with your soul as damaged as it is…you may lose your memories or worse..."
She shook her head violently, tears streaking down her pale cheeks. "I'll wait. I'll wait until he comes."
And she did. Days bled into weeks, weeks into years, and still she lingered in Azrael's office, refusing the call of the cycle. She would sit by the window of the realm of Death, staring out into the silver currents of the Assiah, waiting.
When the pain became too much, when the mark burned her nearly to nothing, Azrael had been the one to speak. "You can't wait forever, Solaria. He… is lost in the cycle. If you linger too long, there may be nothing left of you for him to find."
She turned her gaze to him, her violet aura dimming but her will unbroken. "Then tell him. If he ever reaches you, give him this."
She unclipped the bow from her hair, pressing it into his hands. The jewel embedded at its center pulsed faintly unmistakably carved of Yohan's own energy, a piece of him she had carried always.
"He'll know it's me. And if I lose everything… if I forget, I have no doubt he'll make me fall in love with him again."
Azrael, the Archangel of Death, rarely allowed himself emotion. But in that moment, for the first time in countless millennia, he almost smiled.
He had bowed his head slightly, not as a superior, but as one soul acknowledging another's strength. "Then I will hold it until he comes. That, I promise my lady."
And with a final, pained smile, Solaria let herself fade, her body unraveling into wisps of shadow and violet light, carried into the cycle.
Azrael had stood in silence long after, clutching the bow, watching the currents of the Assiah carry her away.
"First the Ash Lord, then I need to find Gladius."
For centuries, Azrael had chased shadows. Yohan burned through worlds and lives faster than any god, faster than even the death note could record.
By the time Azrael arrived at a broken husk of a planet, he was already gone, reborn, leaving nothing but ash and drifting stone. It was like chasing smoke across eternity and quite honestly annoyed him to no end, especially with the vast amount of souls entering the Assiah.
Yohan sat slumped in a black recliner, its shape conforming almost too comfortably to his worn body. Across from him, Azrael worked with quiet precision at a desk carved from obsidian and light. The Archangel's quill scratched neatly over reams of parchment, each page carrying the weight of stars and worlds.
Every document was damage control the aftermath of centuries of destruction. Whole planets Yohan had shattered, timelines he had broken, even after four whole centuries, the paperwork kept piling up.
Azrael's steady hand filed them away, correcting temporal energy, restoring the broken worlds, reallocating souls back to their original bodies, setting the flow of time straight as though patching holes in the skin of creation.
At last, Azrael set aside one final page, its seal glowing faintly. He looked up, gaze cool, steady the same businesslike tone he had carried even when clashing with Yohan.
"Your reincarnation is ready," he said simply. "Planet Erathos, Solaria has already been reborn there one year by their time, three days in ours. You'll enter under a random name, something that shields you from Ventris and Korva's reach. Your power will be suppressed through rune-bindings. Enough to keep you alive. Enough to stop you from tearing your next body apart like the others."
Yohan's hands clenched faintly on the chair arms. He knew the truth of it. Every time he was reborn, the sheer force of his essence burned the vessel out. Many of his suicides had been less about despair than inevitability. His hosts couldn't contain him.
"This time," Azrael continued, sliding the parchment across the desk, "you'll have balance. You'll live long enough to build strength again to fight, yes, but also to live. To find her. To see your child. And…" he tapped the page once, "to finish what you started against Ventris."
Yohan's head lifted at the name.
"She's clever," Azrael said grimly. "Clever enough to hide her face. We have good reason to believe she's on Erathos, the planet you'll be headed to, along with your wife. Their High God is dead, slain in silence, replaced by another, they were able to get the others to submit and now they have a new ruler, Ceravell. There is no proof it's her, but everything points to it. Her manner. Her ambition. Her rot. If you go there, you'll see it for yourself."
Yohan's aura stirred faintly, though the suppressing runes Azrael had already laid on his spirit kept it low, simmering just above the surface.
"So I can still get revenge," Yohan murmured.
"This is about more than just revenge, we have reason to believe that Ventris might be working with some other entities, powerful creatures that would even make you look like cannon fodder."
You will serve tasks for me and for those I answer to gods who've watched your broadcast, gods who see in you something worth salvaging. Some wish to help you. Others… will test you. But if you accept, you will be allowed to reincarnate properly. And perhaps, this time, have an actual life."
The black recliner groaned as Yohan leaned forward, his eyes glinting faintly red through exhaustion and resolve.
"Fine. I'll play along with your gods, Az-"
"Don't call me that, we're not close enough." Azrael interrupted.
Yohan looked at the angel for a moment, a hint of mischief on his face appearing and disappearing in a moment.
"Whats that planet like? Where is Solaria in that world?"
"I can't tell you that, but with someone with power of your caliber, you should be able to sense her once you're close enough to each other."
Azrael slid him the page, its runes shimmering, waiting for Yohan's touch.
"If that's all the questions you have, then sign, and your next life begins, we'll contact you when the time comes."
Yohan reached out across the desk, his hand steady despite the storm in his chest. His fingertips brushed the parchment and instantly the runes flared to life. The symbols writhed off the page like living fire, searing into his skin. They branded themselves into his flesh, winding up his arms, etching across his chest and shoulders until they pulsed faintly like tattoos of starlight.
Yohan grit his teeth, refusing to cry out. He had been burned, broken, and gutted across lifetimes, this was nothing. Still, the weight of the bindings pressed heavy against him, forcing his power down, locking away the chaos inside.
Then the world went black. His form dissolved in an instant, the chair empty.
Azrael's office was silent, save for the faint crackle of dissipating energy. The Archangel stared at the vacant recliner for a moment before the shrill ring of his office phone broke the stillness. With a calm sigh, he reached for the receiver, already knowing what bureaucracy demanded next.
"Yes sir, he's on his way now as we speak…. no sir, all effort to contact lord Asura has yielded no results, he may be roaming the outer sectors….yes sir….yes sir I've made sure he touched the-…what do you mean they didn't work?
Azrael looked out his window as the whisps of starlight headed towards its destination and for the first time in his eons of existence he swore.
"Ahh, fuck…"
Just then his halo flashed red as a voice rang from it.
"Current head of reincarnation Azrael Voltegrace has violated section 8 paragraph 3 of angelic law, the 'keep why words holy' clause, subsequent punishment is as follows: full revocation of acquired vacation day and a .3% decrease in quarterly quality metrics, your score is now 10% lower than the required metrics to secure full bonus payout, this payment period, additional offenses will take off an additional 20%". Now issuing punishment sticker.
His eyes became bloodshot as a frown face stamp manifested on his right cheek, the brand was made to last until the next pay cycle when his metrics would reset, in the next 300 years.
"MOTHERFUCKER!!" The halls of his office vibrating as his voice rang out like thunder.
Another frowny face appearing on his forehead.
"20% quality points deduced, additional 500 years added to brand longevity, have a nice day!"
Aurelius sighed as he kissed his vacation plans and bonus payout goodbye, using illusion magic to mask the stickers while he poured himself a drink.
Meanwhile, Yohan's consciousness surged forward through the void. As Yohan's soul drifted through the current of light toward its destined vessel, a rare quiet fell upon his mind. For centuries, his journey had been nothing but rage, grief, and the endless cycle of birth and death. But now, suspended in the endless flow, he felt the weight of all that he had destroyed worlds shattered, lives snuffed out, entire histories rewritten because of his desperation.
He closed his eyes and whispered into the void, not words but intent an apology to the countless innocents who had suffered in his search, and a vow that this time he would not falter.
The starlight within him surged, and with deliberate care he tore fragments of his power away. Each fragment burned like a piece of his own soul, shaped and refined until they formed colossal swords of radiant starlight. He hurled them outward into the surrounding stars, embedding them deep into the soil of nearby worlds, and one upon a barren moon.
The blades were titanic, as tall as buildings, their edges humming with restrained violence. Yet their presence did not scar the land. Instead, they exhaled vitality. Trees sprouted fuller, rivers ran clearer, skies seemed sharper and more alive.
The worlds that received them flourished under their radiance, though each sword carried a dual weight: the unmistakable aura of bloodlust, warning any would-be invader that Yohan's shadow lingered near, and the protective embrace of a guardian who had once lost everything.
To the mortals, they were miracles. To the gods, they were a sign. Already, stories spread across villages and cities of the 'Starlight Blades,' heavenly weapons too vast to be wielded by man.
In higher realms, scrolls arrived messengers whispering of Yohan's forced transfer into their domain. The gods of those territories received the news with quiet anticipation.
Yohan had weakened himself deliberately, splitting away portions of his overwhelming might to keep his new form from burning out. But even fractured, even bound by runes, he was still Yohan. The swords would stand as both his apology and his promise: he was here, waiting, hiding among the living, and this time he would not stop until he found his family.
His body reformed, fragile and new, lungs pulling in air for the first time. The cries of a newborn rang out his own voice, high and raw. His eyes opened to unfamiliar faces hovering above him. His new life had begun.