(Meanwhile, The Eternal Garden, Raymond's POV)

Raymond wandered casually through the Eternal Garden, his mind drifting in quiet thought as he followed the winding paths, when a sharp whistling sound sliced through the tranquility of the realm.

*Swoosh*

*Swoosh*

*Swoosh*

The sound was far too crisp and far too lethal to belong in a place reserved for eternal stillness, as each repeating rush of air resembled high speed blade strikes cutting through space.

'Blade strikes, and here?'

He wondered, his brows knitting in confusion as he turned toward the source of the noise, his steps quickening as the whistling grew louder, until he reached the far corner of the sacred domain where the Garden's crystal tiles trembled faintly under a pressure he could not immediately comprehend.

There, illuminated beneath the soft radiance of the floating sky-lanterns, stood Kaelith, his body drenched in sweat as it streamed down the sides of his face, his usually immaculate appearance undone completely while his lips tightened in effort, as his arm repeated the same stabbing motion with a simple dagger clutched in his grip.

'Are my eyes betraying me, or is father actually training?'

He wondered, as he felt a jolt of disbelief tear through him.

Before today, not once in his entire life had he ever witnessed Kaelith practice combat, nor had he ever seen him sweat.

However, the true shock did not come from the sight of Kaelith moving a dagger.

But rather from what Raymond naturally perceived beneath it, because as a Demi-God whose senses had already stepped into the fourth dimension, he could not help but see the real technique hidden behind those deceptively simple motions.

To a mortal, Kaelith looked like a tired man thrusting a blade.

His jabs no different from a simple stab.

However, to Raymond, each jab detonated into a terrifying bloom of temporal distortion, as the dagger's path fractured into countless spectral afterimages that stretched across past, present, and immediate future, creating layered silhouettes of Kaelith's arm in dozens of micro-timelines overlapping the real one with absolute synchronicity.

'What the fuck even is that move?'

He wondered, as he saw every thrust piercing the temporal membrane as though stabbing into a sheet of vibrating glass, causing thin silver cracks to flash around the blade before sealing instantly, while faint echoes of yesterday's light and tomorrow's shadow rippled across the garden floor in a disorienting cascade of temporal noise.

*Gasp*

Raymond's breath tightened because the strikes before him did not simply move fast….

But rather moved in multiple time-states at once, as if Kaelith's body existed in more than one frame of reality during each attack, the dagger splitting into a constellation of overlapping trajectories that converged at the exact same spatial point with flawless precision.

'These are time-piercing slashes… direct violations of continuity…'

He thought, feeling an involuntary shiver race down his spine, because this was not training meant to hone strength or speed, this was training meant to reawaken a divine instinct that had been dormant for a couple thousand years.

Kaelith's movements were not grand.

They were not dramatic.

They were not theatrical.

They were perfectly aligned with the rhythm of existence, each strike landing on the thinnest point of the temporal flow, slipping through weaknesses only Gods or half-Gods could perceive, as though Kaelith had memorized the microscopic pulses of time and was now carving straight through it with clinical brutality.

'If father is truly training for a fight after all these years, then it can only mean one thing… he is genuinely afraid of facing uncle.

There is no other explanation for it, because father would never dirty his hands with drills unless the opponent demanded nothing less than perfection.

He is sharpening himself again because of uncle….'

Raymond concluded as he bit the bottom of his lip, his thoughts swirling in an uncontrollable haze, as he found himself torn between admiration and helplessness, unable to stop marveling at his father's terrifying mastery while also wondering, with a quiet ache in his chest, whether he would ever reach such heights himself or whether the gap between them would forever remain a chasm he could only stare across from a distance.

"It's rude to stare at another man while he's training.

Did your father never teach you such basic etiquette?"

Kaelith asked mid drill, his voice deep and powerful, as Raymond instantly lowered his head in shame.

"He did….. I'm sorry, father."

Raymond said, as Kaelith completed the last portion of his drill, before turning to meet his eye.

"Yes I did…. Which is why you must never repeat this offence again.

Next time if you hear training sounds coming from this portion of the Garden, go the other way."

Kaelith warned, as Raymond sheepishly nodded in understanding.

"If I may, father…"

Raymond asked, his voice quiet as he kept his head low, unsure whether he was even allowed to speak at this moment.

As Kaelith tilted his head slightly, the dagger still held loosely in his grip as thin wisps of killing intent rose around it.

"Speak,"

He said, his tone neither warm nor cold, simply absolute, as Raymond swallowed once, gathering the courage he needed, because the question perched on his tongue felt dangerous, yet necessary.

"Are you… training because you're nervous about facing uncle Soron?"

He asked, as the moment the name left his lips the entire garden seemed to fall still, as though time itself paused to listen, while Kaelith slowly lowered the dagger to his side.

"Nervous?"

He repeated the word calmly, almost tasting it before dismissing it altogether.

"No."

Kaelith's gaze sharpened with a clarity that cut through the air like a blade, his sweat-soaked hair clinging to his forehead as he stood tall, straightening his spine with quiet resolve.

"I am training because I must be at my best when I face my brother," he said, his voice steady, unshaken, carrying no trace of pride or false humility.

"For anything less… and I will be dead."

He claimed, as Raymond's eyes widened in disbelief, his breath catching in his throat as he lifted his head without meaning to, because not once in his life had he heard his father speak with such directness, such certainty, such stark honesty.

There was no sarcasm in Kaelith's voice.

No jest.

No exaggeration.

Just a simple statement of reality, delivered as casually as recounting the weather.

He spoke of Soron not as an enemy

Not as a rival

But as a force of nature

A calamity

A truth of the universe

As he knew very well that Soron was not someone who could not be challenged lightly without paying the price in blood.

'Just how strong is Uncle?'

Raymond wondered, for if Kaelith, the Eternal Sovereign, one of the most feared beings in all creation, needed to sharpen himself to perfection just to survive a confrontation with Soron…

Then what exactly was Soron?

And what was about to happen when these two brothers finally met after two thousand years?

Raymond felt the weight of that future pressing against his chest as Kaelith turned away, raising his dagger once more, as he prepared to continue the terrifying time-piercing drills as if the conversation had never happened.

"Do not mistake my honesty for fear," Kaelith added quietly, stabbing forward as another temporal fracture split open around the blade.

"I am not scared of my brother.

I simply respect the fact that he can kill me."

He said, as the words echoed through the Eternal Garden like a prophecy, while Raymond stood frozen in place, realizing for the first time in his life that even Gods had someone they feared losing to.

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