"That," he said slowly, "is not a simple question to answer." He looked past me briefly, his gaze drifting across the endless ocean as though the answer existed somewhere within memory rather than words.
"But if you wish to stop the Eternal invasion," he continued, "then you will have to defeat him."
I stared at him.
"He is connected to the Eternals?"
Amun nodded.
He did not elaborate immediately.
The confirmation alone was enough to send a ripple through my thoughts. Every Eternal I had faced, every fragment of their existence I had consumed, every anomaly that had surrounded their presence, all of it suddenly pointed toward a single origin.
Not a race but a person.
"Why did he say he killed all the Ironharts?" I asked. "And how was he able to affect my blood?" I asked the question that was bugging me from the beginning.
Amun paused.
The sweet hovered halfway between his hand and his mouth. For the first time since we had begun speaking, his expression lost its casual ease. He exhaled quietly and set the sweet back onto the plate without eating it.
His blue eyes returned to mine, and when he spoke again, his voice carried none of its earlier amusement.
"In the war to claim the Empty Throne, the Ironharts stood against him," Amun said calmly. "And so he hunted them down."
He did not dramatize it. He did not soften the truth. He stated it the same way one would describe the fall of an empire or the collapse of a star, as something inevitable once the path had been chosen.
"But since you are sitting here," he continued, his gaze steady on mine, "you already know the outcome was not absolute. Some survived. Not just the Ironharts. Many of the lineages that exist today in the Prime Universe trace their origin back to my home world."
He leaned back slightly, folding his arms loosely across his chest.
"The Ironharts were not a minor force," he added. "Your ancestors did not merely exist. They ruled. Entire galaxies bent under their authority. Their influence extended across regions most civilizations never even learned existed."
His eyes narrowed faintly.
"I would place your lineage within the top five of that era in terms of achievement and influence. That alone would have made them targets."
He paused briefly.
"And the fact that you are sitting here now, carrying that blood, having reached this far... that is not a small achievement."
I processed his words carefully. The Ironharts had not originated in the Prime Universe. They had come from somewhere else.
From his world.
A world that predated everything I had known.
"Are the Eternals from your home world?" I asked.
He nodded without hesitation.
"Yes."
The confirmation settled into place immediately, aligning with everything I had observed so far.
"How was he able to control my blood?" I asked.
Amun did not answer immediately.
Instead, he picked up another sweet and studied it thoughtfully before speaking.
"Because he understood it," he said. "He had fought it before."
He looked at me again.
"Tell me," he said. "How many visions have you seen from the book?"
"Two."
He nodded faintly.
"Good. In the third vision, you will see his talent."
His tone shifted slightly, becoming more serious.
"And when you do, you will understand why your blood responded to him."
"Why are you both enemies?" I asked again.
He smiled.
"I am not telling you."
The simplicity of the refusal was almost insulting.
I resisted the immediate urge to reach across the table and punch that calm expression off his face.
"Why did he say you are planning to give me your position?" I asked instead.
Amun shrugged lightly, as though the question carried no particular importance.
"How would I know why he said that?" he replied. "You should ask him."
He picked up another sweet and took a bite, completely unconcerned.
I stared at him in silence. Somehow, despite everything Theras had done and everything he represented, I found him easier to deal with than Amun. Theras was direct. Violent. Honest in his hostility. Amun, on the other hand, hid everything behind calm smiles and casual words, as though nothing in existence truly burdened him.
He chuckled softly, clearly reading my thoughts from my expression alone.
"Billion," he said, "do you remember when I told you that I know where your parents’ souls are?"
My expression hardened instantly.
I remembered.
Back in the chained realm, when I had stood before him without understanding who he truly was, he had said those exact words.
"You see," he continued, his tone calm, "the Eternals cannot capture Ironhart souls. They can destroy bodies. They can kill them. But souls like yours... they cannot be contained by them. Your parents’ souls are safe. They exist somewhere beyond his reach."
He paused briefly.
"And the day you reach Saint," he said, "I will tell you where."
He stood up from his chair and walked a few steps toward the endless ocean, his hands resting loosely behind his back as he looked out across the still surface.
"The Theras you saw here was not the real one," he said. "It was merely an avatar formed from a single drop of his blood. And yet even in that limited state, he was able to overwhelm you so completely."
There was no accusation in his voice.
Only truth.
"You should understand what that means," he continued quietly. "What you will face in the future is not that fragment. It is the original. And he is far more powerful than what you witnessed."
He remained silent for a moment before continuing.
"He is my enemy because I stopped him from achieving something he believed was his right. I made a choice based on what I believed was necessary. I did what I believed was right. But he does not see it that way."
His voice softened slightly.
"He is my brother," he said. "But he hates me with every part of his existence."
He turned back toward me.
"And he will come."
There was no uncertainty in his words.
"He will come for the Prime Universe. He will come for revenge. He will come for me."
His gaze locked onto mine.
"And he will come for you."
I did not look away.
"You carry the Executor authority now," he said. "And you carry Ironhart blood. To him, you represent both the past he tried to erase and the future he cannot control."
The weight of those words settled heavily within me.
"The System is not powerful enough to stop him," Amun continued. "Not when he arrives in his true form."
"So when that day comes," he said, "it will be on you."
Silence stretched between us.
I studied his face carefully.
"Will you not fight him?" I asked.
He did not answer immediately.
Instead, he turned his gaze back toward the endless ocean, his posture calm, his expression unreadable.
"I wish," he said quietly.
And in those two words, I heard something I had not expected.
Regret.