The battlefield froze for half a breath. The Core’s descent halted mid-motion, its countless glass wings refracting shards of collapsing sky. Cael’s fists, mid-swing, hovered in blood-streaked air.And then, The Null Father’s tendrils wrapped through reality like barbed wire, weaving around both combatants. He smiled faintly, as though merely correcting a child’s mistake.“You mistake this for your story,” he whispered, voice carrying across the shattered world. “It is not yours. It was never yours.”The tendrils tightened. Cael roared, tearing at the black cords now coiling around his chest and limbs. They weren’t flesh. They weren’t even shadow.They were absence itself, cutting through his aura as if it were smoke. Blood streamed down his arms as he resisted. “Get out of my way, old man!”The Null Father’s silver eyes burned. “I am no man.”The Core reacted violently. A million voices screamed in chorus, vibrating through every living skull: “PARASITE. INTERLOPER. YOU ARE NOT WRITT