After saying that, he turned around, walked back into the study, and sat down in the high-backed chair.
He picked up the cup of tea that had already gone cold and took a sip.
His eyes looked out the window, at the lawn bathed in sunlight.
Tifa stood beside him, her hand resting on his shoulder.
"They'll win."
"I know."
Twenty-four hours later.
High above Earth, the sky split open.
A massive silver-white rift tore through the heavens from beyond the atmosphere.
The edges of the rift were dark red, glowing with lava-like energy, while its center was pitch-black.
Not the darkness of night, but the darkness of the universe—the void without stars, light, or any matter.
A colossal figure stepped out from the rift.
It was the Celestials' Judge.
When its head emerged from the rift, everyone in the Northern Hemisphere saw that featureless face.
Smooth and silver-gray, like an enormous mirror.
Its two eyes radiated white light, illuminating half the planet and turning night into day.
Its shoulders squeezed out of the rift, tearing apart the atmosphere. Hurricanes poured from the opening, blowing buildings on the ground askew.
Its fingers swept across the sky above Earth, dragging trails of dark-red light through the atmosphere.
It was as though five colossal blades had carved five wounds across the sky.
In New York's Times Square, people stopped in their tracks and looked up at the sky.
There was no fear on their faces—not because they weren't afraid.
It was because their fear had surpassed what they could bear, leaving them numb, blank, unable to feel anything.
Some fell to their knees and cried that God had revealed Himself. Some clung to the people beside them. Some took out their phones to snap pictures. Some closed their eyes and waited for