?【超字?jǐn)?shù)了，，，分三期了，，，】

Wilbur placed the necklace into his pocket. “Sure,” he said. “Let’s lie to ourselves. It should be easy; we’ve been doing it for years, haven’t we?”

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Father blinked, and looked as if he were about to say something else. But then the earth trembled again, a harsh laugh cut through the cold air.

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The three of them turned to see that the Green God had finally caught sight of them. He stood at the edge of the belltower, balanced on the balls of his feet as if the dizzying height was of no consequence to him. Even from so far below, Wilbur could see the jagged line of his smile carved into his face.

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“Hello!” he called out. “Didn’t expect you back so soon, I admit.” He spread his arms to take in the chaos all around them. “But I guess destruction is more fun when there are witnesses.”

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Wilbur closed his hand around the hilt of his rapier.

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Despite the ache in his soul, he was ready. With Techno on one side and his father on the other, there was little else he needed. The northern winds whistled past them, and if Wilbur listened carefully, he could almost hear the song they were trying to sing.

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There were no words left to be said.

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They had done this a thousand times before.

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They took off, Phil to the skies and Techno and Wilbur rushing across the ruined ground.

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Phil would get to the tower first, but the other two would not be far behind.

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They leapt over chasm after chasm, skidding on snow and falling to their knees but still moving forwards, heading towards the church. Every jump rattled Techno’s bones and made him want to cry out, but he pushed it all down. The world was being torn apart by an all-powerful, bored little shit; Techno had no right to complain about something as inconsequential as a potentially sprained ankle.

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And then, suddenly, it wasn’t inconsequential.

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It was an easy jump. He could have made it, should have made it.

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But instead, he came up short. An inch shy of safety.

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Technoblade fell quietly.

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There was a sharp tug, and his shoulder almost popped out of its socket as his plunge was abruptly halted. He looked up, legs dangling in open air, and found Wilbur leaning over the edge with his hands around Techno’s wrist. His only lifeline.

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“Gods,” Wilbur cursed, struggling with Techno’s weight. “Pull yourself up, Techno!”

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Techno’s boots scrambled for purchase against the chasm’s face. He could feel Wilbur’s hands slipping, but Techno knew Wilbur would more readily let both of them fall than let go.

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That was how Techno knew he’d already found family again.

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Finally, after what felt like an eternity, his left foot found a steady spot to carry most of his weight. With some awkward maneuvering, Techno managed to haul himself over the edge, breathing heavily with his hands on his knees, but on solid ground once more.

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“What the hell?” Wilbur demanded. “You and your grand speeches about never losing me again, but did you ever stop and ask if I could afford to lose you? Get a fucking grip!”

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Techno pushed hair out his eyes and blinked slowly at the furious king. “Okay,” Techno said quietly. “I’m sorry.”

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“Are you alright, then?” Wilbur asked, anger quickly evaporating into concern. “We have to go help father.”

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I don’t think he needs our help, Techno thought, squinting up at the belltower. From this angle, he couldn’t see much, but he could hear it all: the clash of steel on steel and the distant thuds of two godly beings absolutely trying their best to kill the other.

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“I’m alright,” assured Techno.

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And even if Wilbur didn’t seem to believe him, they had no other choice but to soldier on. They were off again, leaping from one broken chunk of earth to another, albeit a bit more cautiously, constantly looking over their shoulders to make sure the other had made it safely. When they finally made it to the foot of the belltower, the pain in Techno’s ankle had reached a boiling point, and only intensified when Wilbur pushed the tower door open, and they were met with a staircase spiraling into the sky.

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“I hate this,” Techno declared. “I hate every aspect of this, and I would like to quit and be a humble farmer far from here.”

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Wilbur stared at him, giving him two seconds to follow through on his words. “Are you done?” Wilbur said. “Because in case you haven’t noticed, the end of all things is currently being orchestrated right above our heads.”

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“I regret ever meeting you.”

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Wilbur snorted as he started up the stairs. “You say that as if it isn’t your dry humor that rubbed off on me.”

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They took the steps two at a time, round and round until Techno couldn’t remember life before the climb.

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It wasn’t until they were halfway there when Techno’s knees finally gave up and he slumped against the brick wall, panting and biting back a scream of frustration. He was holding them back. It was the most important battle of his damned life, and he was holding them back.

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Wilbur, standing a few steps up from Techno, looked back with furrowed brows. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “You look—You look pale. This isn’t like you.” He took in the sweat dripping down Techno’s face, the exhaustion evident in his trembling shoulders and liquid limbs. “Techno?”

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“You’re right,” Techno murmured, too tired to care about what he was saying. “I’m not myself. I’m not even a fraction what I used to be. I hate this fragile body and all its whining and all its petty demands.” He looked up, met Wilbur’s eyes, willing him to understand, because there was no way in hell he could ever speak the words himself. He didn’t have the vocabulary for it. “I hate being this weak, Wilbur.”

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Wilbur’s mouth fell open in a silent oh as realization finally hit him.

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Before, all this would have been effortless: the leaping, the running, the climbing. Something as small as a sprained ankle or a healing stab wound would have been no hindrance at all, just little details to shake off like bothersome bugs.

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But that was before. This was now.

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“Techno,” Wilbur whispered, “you’re mortal?”

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It had been written in an ancient script, in a book that looked exactly like all the others in the forgotten library: heavy-bound and dust-covered. Philza had flipped gingerly through it, afraid that one wrong move could turn the fragile paper into ash, and had found the words on the last pages.

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You seek power, reader, it had said, but all things come with a price. Power for power. Divinity for divinity.

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If you wish to be a god among gods, one must be the vessel, the other the sacrifice.

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Philza had promised it would be their last resort. Only until push came to shove, Techno had said.

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And the Green God had definitely shoved.

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And so Philza had pulled Techno back, and the two of them had talked: one god to another, for the last time. They had both known it was time, just as they had known, that first day on that battlefield of ice and snow, arrows flying overhead and both of them lit from within by divine fire, that their roads had crossed, and there was no going back.

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Technoblade, blood god and emperor, had offered his scarred hand to Philza, Angel of Death and god of freedom, and they had clasped each other’s fingers like old friends did after a long separation. For a moment, there was only the two of them in that forest of dreams, and when Philza whispered the ancient words, it almost sounded like a solemn prayer. A prayer to the god Techno used to be, and to the god Philza was becoming.

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Towards the end, Techno’s hand had betrayed his pain. It shook, just a bit, as his veins burned gold, turning him into gilded patchwork—half-mortal, half-god—his very soul caught in the crossfire between mortality and divinity. His breaths came quick and labored, and still Philza murmured, slipping silent apologies between the primordial spell. When the final word was said, Techno had fallen to his knees before Philza, a wicked reversal of fortunes, but he did not let go.

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Technoblade forsook his godhood without protest. There was barely a struggle, barely a scream of agony. It had been his sacrifice to make, and he would be damned if he’d let himself regret it. He had wrestled with martyrdom, and won.

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When Techno stood again, he was human—simple and breakable, with numbered years and numb hands. Inside him, there was a hollow pit where his godhood used to rest. He was going to make a landfill out of it.

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And Philza was awake.

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Now, he stood in a belltower overlooking a ruined city. Fires raged until the horizon, burning away homes and streets that once teemed with easy life. Families and friends gathered in bunches like sweet-smelling bouquets. But like flowers unaware of the gardener’s plucking hands, they had existed in the shadow of a being too large to comprehend, their lives already decided for them—all their tragedies and loves, their hopes and their secrets, laid into predetermined places on the Green God’s mosaic.

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But that would end today.

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Because Philza was his antithesis, and he was going to set everybody free.

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The bell tolled as he and Dream continued their deadly danced around the tower, swords meeting and then unmeeting.

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Dream must have sensed the change. He must have seen it in the way Philza moved, taking each step with utmost confidence that the ground would meet him and not the other way around. He must have felt it in the renewed strength behind Philza’s blows. He must have known Philza was still holding back.

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For the first time since their encounter, the Green God had the wits to finally be unnerved.

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One mistake was all it took. A misstep in their eons-old waltz. The Green God swung to early, his sword cutting through air as Philza simply ducked out of the way. The bell shuddered as Dream’s blade bit into the bronze and stuck there. As Dream tried to pull it free, Philza kicked at his knees and sent him spinning against one of the pillars holding up the tower’s roof, unarmed.

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Dream stumbled against the pillar, nearly toppling over the edge of the tower, and before he could regain his balance, Philza swung at him. Dream managed to duck just in time, but Philza’s sword cut through the pillar behind him as easily as a hot knife through butter. The pillar buckled and fell apart, and the roof of the tower began leaning, almost halfway to caving in on itself.

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The Green God whistled as he jumped back from Philza’s advance. “Listen, Philza—”

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“I’m done listening to you.” Philza swung again, this time managing to nick Dream’s forearm. Brilliant red blood ran from the cut. It did not heal.

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Dream looked down at his wounded arm, his brows furrowed with confusion. “Why did that hurt?” he asked no one in particular. He raised his eyes to Phil, and his confusion turned to fury. “What have you done?”

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“The very thing you tried to keep me from doing,” said Philza, raising his sword above his head. “Now, hold still, Dream. Let me take everything away from you as you took everything from me.”

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The Green God made to raise his hand, perhaps to conjure himself a new sword or attempt to throw Philza into another dream. Philza’s hand shot out, gripping Dream’s wrist and twisting. He leaned in to watch the other god’s discomfort turn to pain, turn to panic, as he struggled to free himself from Philza’s crushing hold.

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“Little spider,” Philza whispered, “caught in your own web.”

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“You think this fazes me?” Dream demanded, still trying to pull his wrist away. “Do you think I’m afraid of you?”

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The Angel of Death looked at the Green God with the eyes of a son taken too soon. “Yes,” he said. “I think you are.”

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Dream snarled. An animal cornered. “You forget you’ve tried this before. You’ve always failed. Always.”

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“Ah, but that was before I came to realize what you were.” Philza made sure Dream could see every inch of his expression, every depleted line, every mark the long years had etched into his skin. “You would have us think that you’re doing all this—the rewrites, this infinite loop—just for the fun of it, but you don’t really have the luxury of indulging yourself, do you? Because you’re afraid. Every second of every day of every life, you are afraid. You have known me since you were made. You have known since your first breath that I was the only creature capable of breaking you. And before I could even try, before you gave me any reason to, you ran. You pretended it was all some silly little game to keep your heart from exploding out of your chest with fear, and you ran. You sculpted worlds, rewrote histories, just to keep me from seeing you squirm. Because you’re a coward. That’s what you are, Dream. You’re a godsdamned coward.”

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“Take that back,” the Green God whispered. “Take that back right now.”

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“Make me,” challenged Philza. “Oh, wait, you can’t.”

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They were equal forces, once upon a time. The Spider and the Songbird, Control and freedom, the two oldest powers in the universe, the first of the gods—maintaining a delicate balance until one tipped the scale.

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Philza was merely tipping it back.?

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“You bought yourself some time,” said Philza. “Eons of it. But the clock is ticking, and there’s nowhere else to run. The game is over.”

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Dream was breathing heavily, his emerald eyes wide. “You can hurt me,” he said, “but you can’t kill me. You can’t. That’s not—That’s not how we do this. We’ll always be hunting each other. You have the upper hand now, but not forever.”

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“You’re right.” Philza loosened his hold on Dream, allowing him to step away. The Green God gave him a look of mistrustful confusion as he rubbed his wrist where Philza’s hand had left scorch marks. “I can’t kill you. If I did, you’ll simply be reborn, and the chase will continue. I know that now. And I also know what I have to do.”

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He glanced over Dream’s shoulder, and the other god turned on his heel to follow Philza’s line of sight. When he finally saw what Philza meant, he whirled around with an incredulous, almost fearful expression. “You can’t be serious,” Dream said, voice trembling. “You’re can’t be.” Then, regaining a bit of confidence, he said, “No, you really can’t be, because I’d just break out. I can carve my way out, little by little.”

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“Not if you have someone watching you,” Philza said simply.

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What little hope the Green God still had died in his eyes. “You’re an idiot,” he declared, with equal parts disbelief and alarm. He moved towards Philza, grabbing fistfuls of his tunic and shaking him. It would be the closest to begging he would stoop to.?“Do you have any idea what I would lose? What you would lose?”

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“All things come with a price,” Philza said, surprised by the sudden burn of tears in his eyes. “And I pay it, so they don’t have to. I’m done running away from my problems. I’m done begging the stars for answers. I’ve brought the stars low, Dream, and they will do my bidding for me.”

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Why does it feel like you’re saying goodbye? Wilbur had asked. Because he was. He’d said his farewells, even if he was the only one who would truly know it. He’d pressed one last gift into his son’s hands, but his eyes had been on Techno as he’d spoken of never letting go—so Techno might understand, in hindsight, ten days or ten years from now, that Philza was leaving Wilbur to him, and him to Wilbur.

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Behind the Green God, far below in the middle of the broken earth, was a cut in the universe, a jagged gate to a place of unmaking. It stood waiting, waiting for a green-eyed god and his keeper. A prison of infinite void for the two loneliest gods on earth.

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Philza grabbed Dream’s wrists once more, manacles of flesh and blood.

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“It’s been you and me since the beginning, Dream,” Philza said solemnly. “And it’ll be me and you in the end.”

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“Father?”

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Philza froze.

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“What are you doing?”

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“What are you doing?” Wilbur repeated.

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Philza turned slowly towards the tower’s threshold, where Wilbur stood with one hand on the jamb and the other around Techno’s shoulders. Wilbur was the only force keeping Techno upright at the moment; by the look on Philza’s face, he must have expected Techno to weigh Wilbur down more with the novelty of his mortality, ignorant to the fact that Techno’s sheer stubbornness was more than enough fuel to get him up that torturous flight of stairs. Sure, Techno felt as if each step had been hewn into this damned tower with every intent to antagonize him and him specifically, but he was here now, witnessing Philza about to make another undoubtedly big mistake, and that was all that mattered.

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“Yes,” Dream said, all former smugness wiped clean from his face. “Tell him exactly what you’re doing, Philza, where you’re about to go—”

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“Shut up,” Wilbur snapped, his eyes never wavering from his father. “This doesn’t concern you, you nosy piece of shit. Father.” Philza, a god among gods among men, flinched at the harshness in Wilbur’s tone. “What did he mean? Where are you going?”

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When Philza didn’t respond, a look of horrified fury dawned on Wilbur’s face.

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“You’re leaving,” Wilbur said, as if the act of saying it might make it false. “You’re actually leaving me again.”

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“Wil—” Philza began, loosening his grip on Dream for just one second.

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Techno knew a thing or two about stupid mistakes. That was one of them.

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The moment Philza’s hands slackened, Dream pulled free and was gone, taking to the skies on his invisible wings. It was almost comical, really, to think that the god that had stood over them so arrogantly just hours before would now scramble to escape the second everyone’s backs were turned. If it was Philza’s ascension had been the cause of the shift, then Techno would gladly sacrifice his immortality ten times over just to see the green bastard scared shitless.

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“fuck,” Philza cursed under his breath as he spread his own wings, about to give chase, but before he could even lift one foot off the tower floor, Wilbur and Techno had already taken their positions.

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It took four seconds.

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One. Wilbur nocked an obsidian-fletched arrow into his bow, drawing his arm back as he aimed towards the lone figure in the burning sky.

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Two. The linked iron chains of Techno’s whip rattled as it unfurled from his hand like a metal ribbon. He took one end of it and spun it in a vicious circle, the wind whirling around him, lifting his hair from his face. He was almost delirious with pain, and he did not have a fraction of the strength he used to have, but if Wilbur was still standing, then Techno would be right beside him.?

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Three. Wilbur breathed in, out. His hands were steady and sure.

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He was a king, and he would surrender to no god.

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Four. Wilbur let the arrow fly.

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It sang through the air, sang past the Green God’s head, not close enough to make him bleed, but close enough to make him pause. It was all they needed. In that moment of his foolish hesitation, Technoblade swung his whip out like a fisherman casting a hook into the deep dark. It blazed like a comet in reverse, arching up into the shattered sky instead of towards the burning ground, justice made metal. It caught around the heel of a god and made him mortal in his fear.

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And Techno had any godliness left in himself, he used it all in one last act of retribution.

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He had known, of course, that even the weakest human was able to do impossible things, godly things, in moments of panic. He had heard stories of fathers lifting whole trees off their children, of people standing between their lovers and wild wolves. He had witnessed soldiers fighting to their bitter ends, all for a king that did not love them and a kingdom that would forget their names the moment a new battle begun.

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A young boy had stood before him in a wisteria-covered pavilion and asked to be taught the art of war to keep his brother safe.

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Humans, Techno thought, we’re a stubborn bunch, aren’t we? And he drew the Spider down from the stars.

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Dream hurtled back towards them, an angel fallen and falling still, and Techno swung him straight towards the bell. There was a cacophony as the bell’s bindings snapped and it crashed into the floor, still ringing, still singing. In its dented surface laid a god in repose, blood staining his golden hair.

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Unconscious. Defeated, at last.

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Techno let out a shaky breath.

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“Well,” he said, “that was easy,” and promptly passed out.

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Wilbur let his bow clatter to the ground and caught Techno before he could follow it.

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Laughter exploded out of Wilbur as he pulled Techno’s limp body against him. “We did it,” he exhaled against Techno’s hair, looking down at the god lying broken in dented bronze. “We actually fucking did it—Techno?” He shook Techno. “Techno, hey, we did it!”

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There was no response. Wilbur looked up in panic and found his father’s weary eyes on him.

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No. The frenzied euphoria of an unexpected victory died swiftly on Wilbur’s lips as he pulled Techno closer to him, tucking his warm, fragile, mortal body into the cradle of his arms, Techno’s chin digging painfully into Wilbur’s shoulder. Wilbur was suddenly very aware of the extent of the damage on him. Wounded shoulders and a knife to the back, courtesy of Wilbur himself.

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A killing blow for you would be a scratch for me, Techno had said, but he’d said it when he was immortal and untouchable.

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“Techno?” Wilbur asked again, shaking him lightly, unable to think of a world without his best friend. His newfound mortality should have given them years, at least, together. Not minutes. Not seconds. “Techno, this isn’t funny anymore.” He looked up at his father. “Tell him it isn’t funny anymore!”

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The silence was thunderous.

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And then, in its wake, there was a muffled groan.

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“Ugh. Five minutes. Just five godsdamned minutes.”

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Wilbur pulled back to see that Techno’s eyes were wide open.

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“If I weren’t so sure you were halfway to hell already,” Wilbur said slowly, “I would expedite the process right now.”

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“Does hell offer a hot meal and a warm bed?” asked Techno. “If so, please, send me there. I deserve it.”

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Wilbur shoved Techno off him, unsure whether to laugh or cry or scream. When he turned to his father, he looked just as lost.

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“That was,” Father said as Techno righted himself, “a very shit thing to do, you little bastard.”

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“Oh.” The wry mirth fled instantly from Techno’s face, chased by unbridled anger as he whirled on Father. “You want to speak to me of doing very shit things?”

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Father flinched, but looked as if he had already expected the outburst. His blue eyes slid to Wilbur, and they looked so much like Tommy’s in his final moments that Wilbur did not know whether to look away or memorize them.

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Father’s hands around Dream’s wrists. Dream’s panicked flight.

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The dark doorway into a realm between realms still standing open far below in the shadow of the belltower.

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You’re actually leaving me again, Wilbur had accused him before they were swept up in the dramatics of Dream’s escape and their presumed triumph. What triumph was there to celebrate when Father had not proven him wrong?

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The cold settled back into Wilbur’s bones.

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“Where are you going?” Wilbur demanded.

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“Wil,” Father began, running a shaking hand through his hair. “You were not supposed to be here for this.” He met Techno’s glare. “Neither of you were.”

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Techno crossed his arms. The mortal who had chained a god. If he had given anyone else the look he was giving Father, they would have withered away into dust.

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“And what exactly is this, Phil?” Techno asked, his voice hoarse.

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The Angel of Death did not frown or make excuses. He simply told them what Wilbur had always wanted from him.

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The truth.

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“I’m going away.”

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“Far, far away,” Philza continued, unable to stop now that he had started. Maybe it was the way that Wilbur was looking at him—open and undefended, as if he no longer feared but instead expected this betrayal. Maybe it was the way Techno stood protectively in front of him, as if Philza was someone Wilbur needed protection from. Maybe it was that despite their earlier tearless farewell, deep down, Philza knew it would come down to this. No subterfuge. No vague remarks. Just honesty this time, no matter how harsh and painful. “I’ll take Dream to a place where he can’t hurt you, can’t hurt anyone, ever again. And I’m going to lock the door behind me and throw away the key. It’s the only way to make sure he can’t come back.”

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“The only way?” Wilbur asked. “The only way to end the reign of an all-powerful deity just so happens to involve you leaving me in the dust for… how many times is it now, Philza? How many times are you going to leave me before you even say a proper fucking goodbye?”

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“We already—”

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“Don’t give me that shit!” Wilbur snapped, his brown eyes furious. He’d gotten his eyes from his mother, the fury from his father. “A few words of wisdom and a piece of fucking jewelry does not count as a goodbye in any godsdamned universe. I asked you. I fucking asked you if it was goodbye.”

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“Goodbye, then,” said Philza. “Is that what you wanted? Did you want me to say the words? Did you want me to tell you that I would give up air and life and open skies if it meant I got to stay with you? But if you want honesty, Wilbur, here it is: you know the face of sacrifice well. You have already made the calculations in your head, and you already know this is the right call. The only call. You already know this will hurt like hell, but it will be a necessary hurt. This is my Blue Valley, Wilbur.”

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He saw the words land, felt it as if he’d taken a dagger to his own heart.

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Wilbur had the look of a man standing at the gallows, but it was not his execution. And that tortured sorrow in his eyes—torn between grieving and refusing to believe there was anything to grieve at all—that was from Philza, too.

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Through it all, Techno had stood in his stoic silence, content on making Philza feel the weight of his anger without having to say a word. But now he opened his mouth to speak, but it wasn’t a demand or a dry remark or a sharp reproach that fell out in quiet, hesitant syllables.

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It was a question.

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“Wilbur, can I see that necklace?”

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His anguish momentarily clouded by confusion, Wilbur reached into his pocket and pulled out Philza’s last gift, the only remnant that would remain of him.

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Sitting on Wilbur’s palm, dangling from an iron chain, was a single bright-green emerald.

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“I’m sorry,” Philza began. “I’m sorry that leaving you is the only way I can save you. I’m sorry that you both fought so hard, so long, just to say goodbye again. I’m sorry that I can’t be here for the aftermath. I’m sorry that there’s too much left unsaid between us. I’m sorry I was too much of a coward to say all this before, but I hope I can make it up to you now.” He tried for a smile, even as tears blurred his vision, turning everything into hazy smudges. “Wil, Techno, I—”

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And then arms were going around him, pulling him into a warm embrace. For a moment, there was only a tangle of limbs and three beating, broken hearts, indiscriminate from one another. Clarity came in bittersweet waves. It was Wilbur’s face buried in his left shoulder, Techno’s arms around them both. It was Techno’s foot on his toes and the pommel of Wilbur’s rapier digging into his gut. It was tragic and it was clumsy.

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It was goodbye.

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“It won’t be for forever,” Philza promised through his sobs. “I swear on you both, I will find a way back to you. Someday, there will be nothing to fear anymore, and I’ll find you again, even if it takes me eons.”

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None of them said what they were all thinking. Wilbur didn’t have eons, and neither did Techno now. But they knew what he meant anyway, and they believed him. Someday. They would hang onto that promise. They would take it to their graves.

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“If there’s one thing,” Wilbur said, pulling back to look Philza in the eyes, “that I want you to know… I forgive you.” His face fractured into a million different emotions. “I forgive you, Dad.”

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“Thank you,” Phil whispered. “Thank you, my boy.”

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And Techno only had his silence, but it said more than Philza could in a thousand years.

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He stepped back from them, his oldest son and his oldest friend.

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When Techno began swaying on his feet, Wilbur wordlessly wrapped his arm around the former god’s, and they stood there together, leaning on each other.

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Philza’s heart was free.

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He gave them a nod. Techno looked away to wipe furiously at his eyes. Philza had to stifle a laugh. Stubborn, until the very end, aren’t you, my friend?

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It was time.

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The god of freedom turned towards the boy sleeping on the broken bell. Sleeping, or waiting, or dreaming—whichever explanation would hurt least for him. Philza gathered the Green God into his arms, as he had once borne the body of his youngest son at his deathbed, as he had once carried Wilbur to bed when he was smaller and the world was only the hallway from the library to his childhood bedroom.

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He walked to the very edge of the tower with only a young king and a new mortal to mourn him.

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He spread his wings, obsidian feathers gleaming in the dying fires of the last city he would ever fail to protect. And then he flew.

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He did not look back.

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The wind was at his face, cold and cutting, but he had never tasted anything sweeter. When he began his descent, straight towards the gate to his final fate, he felt the Green God stir slightly in his arms, a child disturbed from a beautiful dream. He might have whispered a name, but it was lost to the air.

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God. Such a big word for such a small thing.

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They were the beginning, and they would be the end. Prologue and epilogue.

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The void rushed towards them. Philza closed his eyes. It was better this way. He would get to control the darkness. It was his call. His terms. His sacrifice.

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I’m sorry, Tommy, he thought, one last tear slipping down his ancient face, but I’ll be seeing you soon.

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They entered the void together. The gate closed behind them.

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And the universe shifted.

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The shift was felt by every soul.

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It was felt by every rock and every blade of grass, every flowing river and every tree looking over a lonely house at the end of a long road, its chimney overgrown with ivy. It was felt by every beast in the forest and every fish in the sea and every bird now grieving a fellow wanderer of the skies. It was felt by those awake and those hunting and those deep in hibernation and those spinning their webs from branch to branch, creating connections where once there was only open air. It was felt by the deer caught between the wolf’s jaw, its final moments extended into eternity as the entire world—the entire universe—held its breath.

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It was felt by every warrior in combat, every monarch on their gilded thrones, every smith with their cheeks warm from the fire of their forges, every child stumbling through their mother’s gardens, every painter seated at their easel, every sailor at sea, every traveler on their way home.

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It was felt by an old neighbor looking after the shop of the kind girl who always had been so kind to him. A sign stood at the door. Closed indefinitely, it said, but the neighbor knew it would be closed forever. And still he’d come, day after day. His wife was gone and so was the kind girl. But the flowers, oh, they still needed watering.

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It was felt by a god in a valley. Beside him was a freshly-dug grave with only a sword of pure obsidian to mark its place among the dead. The god had always known that he would one day stand alone; once there were three, and now there was one. He’d lost one of them to love and the other to fear, and some days, he wondered if there was any difference. When pain always came in the wake of love, when every devotion led to a burial ground, when every dream was a nightmare sleeping, would it be worth loving at all? Yes, said the dirt underneath his fingernails, testimony to his lonely gravedigging. Yes, said the wind coming in from the north. Yes, said first drop of rain striking his cheek, like a cold reminder to seek shelter, like a gentle kiss from two lost friends. Yes, it would.

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It was felt by a soldier knocking on the door of a home he could no longer recognize. When his sister opened the door, he swore she didn’t recognize him, either. But then she threw her arms around him, sobbing into his dirty shirt, and they fell onto the wooden floors that carried the weight of their shared childhoods in its scratches and dents. He held her and cried and was known.

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It was felt by a young king standing on a belltower at the heart of a city of snow and ashes. A green stone gleamed at his throat, heavy with a history he would someday be told when its last storyteller was ready.

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It was felt by the storyteller.

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The wheel was broken at their feet.

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They were free. They were free. They were free.

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Wilbur leaned his weary head against Techno’s shoulder.

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“Let’s go home,” he whispered.

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Techno nodded. “Home,” he repeated, as if the word as a new discovery.

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And as he watched, an aurora blazed to life above them, a symphony of reds and golds and greens twisting through the heavens, an impossibility of color, nothing short of divine magic.

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The sky was singing.

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Techno turned to the king, but his face was upturned and aglow. A child, truly, captivated by the pretty lights, the heaviness of his own heart momentarily forgotten as he looked up at the brilliance of their world. The world his father had saved.

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The curtains fell on two brothers illuminated.

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They buried him under the weeping willow, and they replanted the garden around him, one rosebush at a time.

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Wilbur leaned against the simple gravestone as he tuned his guitar. It bore a name and the only titles that had ever mattered to him: Brother and Son.

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“I’m not nervous,” said Wilbur as he continued tinkering with the instrument on his lap. He flinched as a rather discordant note played before continuing, “I mean, I shouldn’t be. Whatever happens today, I would deserve it. That’s how justice works, right?”?Finally satisfied with his strings, Wilbur strummed a few notes before he settled back against the grass. “But I didn’t come here to talk about that. I wanted to play you a song.” He grinned at the sunlight streaming through the branches. “I finally finished it. It took a while—”

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“A full year,” drawled an all-too-familiar voice, “of banging around the music room and threatening to suffocate me in my sleep if I interfered with his artistic process.”

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Wilbur glared good-naturedly at the man coming towards him, a violin case in hand.

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Techno had grown into mortality better than Wilbur had expected. There were still times that Techno forgot he had human needs and human limitations, but Wilbur was there—as he always had been and always would be—to remind him. Other than the times he forgot to eat on a regular schedule or thought to spar with royal guards that would no longer be easy targets for him, he had thrived. He’d begun filling in his tunics, and his wounds from that final confrontation were now just a part of his tapestry of scars.

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Settling on the other side of the gravestone, anyone looking out from the windows of the castle would only see the head advisor and right-hand of the king, with his old-fashioned poofy sleeves and pink hair braided down his back, silently plucking at his violin.

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“I was just saying,” Wilbur said, “that whatever the verdict…”

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“We’d accept it,” Techno finished, brows scrunched in serious contemplation at his instrument. “That doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to be scared. That’s why we’re here, aren’t we?” He threw a grin at Wilbur across the strings. “We’re getting you a distraction.”

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“I’m not scared,” Wilbur said, and it was the truth. “I know there’s a chance that the past two years of atoning might not be enough. And I know it will never be enough…”

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“Then it’s a good thing you’re not the one voting,” Techno said simply. “It’s the people’s call, Wilbur. We don’t have any say in the matter, for better or for worse.” He tapped the end of his bow against the gravestone, almost absently, before raising it to his violin. “At the end of the day, you’re either king or you aren’t, and if they decide the latter, then we’ll go off into exile together and be twin fishermen in some little coast town somewhere.”

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“Or traveling bards. We could see the world together, you and I.”

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“I’ve already seen it,” said Techno, “but I suppose I wouldn’t mind getting a second look.”

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Wilbur laughed lightly. “If that’s our worst-case scenario, then there’s really nothing to fear, is there?”

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In response, Techno began playing the first notes of a familiar melody. Soon, the lilting sound of his violin filled the garden, joined by distant birdsong and the rustle of the wind through the creeping branches. It floated through the air, sharp and sweet, Techno’s scarred fingers dancing across the fingerboard with an expertise that cost him long nights and strings snapping against his skin. His bow wrung magic from the delicate instrument, so potent Wilbur almost missed his own cue.

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Wilbur began playing his guitar, an accompaniment and an addition, the undercurrent to the keening sound of Techno’s violin. One note after another, an orchestra of two performing for an audience of ghosts, following a score they wrote themselves.

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It was a sad song. It was a happy song. It was a song of a summer day from years ago, tucked between faded memories like a flower pressed between the pages of a heavy book, now dusted off and clean. It was a song of an artist mother and a warrior father, and sons that were both. It was a song about the grass beneath Wilbur’s feet and the sweet scent of flowers in his lungs. It was a song about war and ruin, and grief and loss, and the nightmares that still managed to take him by surprise even when he was awake, and living anyway. It was a song about love and all the ways to say it: sacrifice and a cup of hot tea waiting at his desk, chess during the lazy days and music during the hard ones, leaving and staying, remembering and forgetting. It was a song about family, born or made or found or rediscovered.

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It was Tommy’s grave at his back. Mother’s unfinished painting. Father’s necklace around his neck.

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And when the final note echoed off into silence, there was no standing ovation, no raucous applause.

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Just like the voices for the past two years, six months and three days, there was only silence.

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It was the most beautiful sound.

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Wilbur quietly placed his guitar against Tommy’s gravestone and turned to see Techno wordlessly returning his violin into its case. Everything had already been said.

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In the distance, the bells began to toll. It was time.

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Techno offered Wilbur a hand and pulled him to his feet. Together, they walked towards their judgment.

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Two years ago, Wilbur had stood on a balcony and faced an army ready to die for him. I promised you peace on my father’s crown, he’d said, and now I call you to war. This is nothing less than treason. Rest assured, I will be facing consequences for it. And the soldiers had called instead for their enemies’ heads. More than half of them were dead now, leaving family and friends behind—alive and safe, but mourning, and if there was anyone who understood the need to find some place to put down blame, it was Techno.

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There were no enemies left to defeat, no smiling gods to imprison, no hostile armies crossing the valley, and that was why Techno and Wilbur were standing in the hazy sunlight pouring in from the high windows of the very room where Wilbur had once been crowned, the room where he might have that crown taken from him for good. In front of them, seated in pews and on the floor, or leaning against the marble columns, or watching from the balconies, were the people that would determine their fates. A hundred blinking eyes, all unreadable, settled on the king and the general that had won both battle and war, at the cost of the very people they’d sworn to protect. Never mind that they’d saved them from a worse fate. Never mind that they’d ensured the safety of the kingdom for generations to come, or that they’d spent the past two years working on pulling the threads of their nation back together. Those were excuses that neither Wilbur nor Techno would ever use against their people.

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Before them were four jars, each towering over the, one for each quadrant—west and east, south and north. For the past few months, those jars had combed through every inch and corner of the kingdom, from the highest mountains to the smallest villages tucked into the deepest forests to the cold, snow-covered tundra towns. Messengers had knocked on the door of each house, presenting each person within—be they child or adult—a decision.

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They would take a rock, any rock, be it from their own gardens or from the riverbed or chipped from the threshold of their houses, and place it in the jar if they believed the king and the general had not done enough in service to the kingdom.

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A representative stood behind each jar, ready to tip it over, ready to count.

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Enough votes, and Wilbur would step down from the throne, and Techno would go with him, and they’d live the rest of their mortal lives in exile, far from the kingdom they had bled and fought and lost their brother for.

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Techno glanced at Wilbur. Despite his earlier posturing, Techno could tell Wilbur was one tug away from unravelling. He stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Techno, trying to look as calm and stoic for his people, spine straight and eyes ahead. Only Techno could see the apprehension behind them.

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He loved this kingdom. He loved its people. It wasn’t just his father’s kingdom, or his mother’s, or Tommy’s. He’d given everything of himself into it. It was his own flesh and blood. It was no longer a chore, or something he had to succeed in to earn a distant father’s approval. It was the soldiers that had fought beside him in the valley. It was the half a hundred people that had been willing to bring down a mountain on their foes and on themselves. It was the scars on his skin and his sleepless nights and his pride and his home and his responsibility.

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He was born for this, stones and all.

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A judge draped in white robes called for attention, as if the room had not been mind-numbingly quiet for the past half hour.

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“Citizens of our fair kingdom,” the judge said, “we gather today to bear witness to the conclusion of the trial of King Wilbur, Protector of the Realm, Ruler of the Kingdom, and Technoblade, former general of the Royal Army. The people have spoken, now all there is left to do is listen.” He turned to Wilbur, his gray eyebrows rising in question. “Would you like one last thing to say, Your Majesty, before we tip the jars?”

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Wilbur opened his mouth, closed it, began shaking his head.

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Techno stepped forward. “The king,” he begun, “as well as I, thank you all for coming here today. I see familiar faces in the crowd. I fought next to you, have seen your bravery firsthand, and I know what it cost all of you to come here today.” He took a deep breath, met every eye on the floor and mezzanine. It felt like standing before the dead. It felt like a reckoning long overdue. “Everybody here lost someone to the war. A friend. A parent. A neighbor. And you know what your king lost, too. Though we are united in our loss, that does not excuse the lapse in my and Wilbur’s judgments. We made mistakes. Deadly ones. We believed ourselves invincible and were too late to act against the encroaching enemy, and you all paid for a price that should have been ours alone. Whatever you have all decided today, we will call it justice. That is all.”

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When Techno stepped back, Wilbur caught at his sleeve. He anticipated a dry remark about his unexpected diplomacy, and was surprised when Wilbur simply mouthed, Thank you. Techno nodded hesitantly at him, confused as to what there was to be thankful for. After all, he was only doing his job.

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The judge read out more legal jargon that Techno had already heard a hundred times before, and then—with the very hands he’d used to put a crown on Wilbur’s head—he gestured for the jars to be overturned. They looked like vases. They gleamed like urns.

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Wilbur’s hand slipped into Techno’s, his bitten-down nails digging into Techno’s knuckles.

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Techno closed his eyes. He did not know which gods would still listen to him, so he prayed to them all. The war god. Dream. Philza.

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Exile or exoneration. It was out of his hands. He would be ready for both.

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Techno waited for the clatter of stones on marble.

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It never came.

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The boy who had come of age in blood and fire stood before a lake with his fist curled gently around a stone. The surface of the lake was calm and still, a mirror of the sky above it, and Tubbo wondered what it would feel like to float in it, to swim in sunlight.

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By this time, in a city far from here, the king and the general Tubbo had followed into war would be counting the votes of those who wanted them gone. Tubbo ran his thumb along the smooth edge of the stone in his hand, turning it idly between his fingers as he looked out at the lake. It would freeze over soon, when winter came. Tubbo would be ready, then.

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He pulled his hand back and threw, with all his might. The stone skipped once, twice, thrice, across the surface before sinking into the blue sky, leaving ripples that disappeared in a blink of an eye, and the lake was still once more.

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Tubbo grabbed the axe that hung from his hip. It was starting to rust, and constant use had worn away the handle, but it would hold for just a bit more. It was a familiar, reliable weight in his hand, and he swung it beside him as he walked towards the forest.

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He needed more firewood to keep his sister warm.

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Time unfurled like a ribbon.

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They filled their days with mundane problems: untuned instruments, tea turning cold and weeds needing plucking. The dutiful, benevolent king and his right-hand who struggled to stay awake during half of the political meetings and spent the other half actively antagonizing sycophants he deemed too irksome. Wilbur had publicly proclaimed that there was nothing amusing about Techno threatening to burn the pompous wig of a merchant trying to lobby trade routes away from local vendors, but his eyes had gleamed with the promise of later laughter.

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In the spring, the two of them went down to the orchards and spent their days in friendly rivalry over who picked the most fruit. Most years, Techno won, if only because Wilbur was often distracted by a woman with long, curling hair as red as the apples in her basket.

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It took him two years to ask her name, another two to ask her to marry him. Her name was Sally, and she said yes.

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When their first child was born—a baby boy with hair the color of Tommy’s last sunset—Wilbur took him into his arms without hesitation. He pressed his tearstained cheek against his son’s warm skin and whispered, “I will love you forever,” over and over until he was sure his son knew it. And the son would grow up under no one’s shadow, calling Wilbur “Dad,” and Techno “Uncle,” in a kingdom of hard-won peace. In time, he would know the story of the Blue Valley and the story of his other uncle and the story of his grandparents, but until then, he would think all gods were kind and his father never cried. His uncle would carve his height into the marble column of the ivy-covered pavilion where he learned how to paint, and he would wonder why his father’s brother would turn away whenever he passed the almost-faded marks of the boy that had stood there before him.

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The heir of the Angel of Death's kingdom—and all the heirs after him—would not have gilded hair or eyes like a frozen tundra. They would have gentle hands and would forgive easily. They would be raised on honey and apple pies and stories about frogs in the rain, and the wheel would never break them. And on the night before an ancient crown would be placed upon their brow, those that came before them would press a gift into their hand, and it would be their inheritance.

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So when a winged man would appear from the north, days or years or eons from now, he would find a familiar stone around the neck of a child that he would recognize right away by the familiar shape of their smile, and he would know he was home.?

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He had a life before this. A mother, a father, a home. Sisters, and brothers. But what he had now was alright, too.

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He stood alone in front of his bedroom mirror, combing his hair back from his face to braid it for the day, tucking it behind an ear where a sapphire earring hung, catching the sunlight. He paused when he saw it, leaned in close just to make sure it wasn’t a trick of the light, or the lingering traces of a dream. He blinked, once, twice, his mortal heart catching in his throat. There, nestled among the pink strands, delicate as a bird’s wing, was a single gray hair. If he listened carefully, he could hear his brother coming down the hallway, looking for him, but this moment was his alone.

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Half-sobbing, half-laughing, he fell against his chair and closed his eyes against the sudden sting of tears. He could see, in his mind, a field of flowers under an open sky—a place made for waiting, where all the finished stories went, where he would go someday, too.

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A knock came at his door.

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Technoblade began to smile.

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哈哈哈鳥雀這文好好哭哈哈哈它完了哈哈哈（后面還有作者大大的話，還是超字?jǐn)?shù)了，單獨(dú)發(fā)了一期。）

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