With the Kraken's death cry still echoing across the mountains, the world began to shift.
At first, it was a whisper—tendrils of green curling out from between the cracks of the scorched earth. Then it was a murmur—flowers blooming in an instant, grasses spreading like wildfire. Within minutes, the Wastelands were reborn. Once-dead soil turned supple and dark, as though the land itself had been waiting for this very moment to breathe again.
It was as if time spun backwards.
Trees erupted skyward, laden with fruits glistening in sunlight that had never before shone so brightly. The air cooled into a tender breeze, laced with moisture, sweet and unfamiliar. A hush fell over the crowd gathered at the edge of ruin.
For ten minutes, not a soul spoke.
They stood frozen—watching, absorbing, remembering.
Josh, standing alone on the collapsed skull of the fallen Kraken, after retrieving the Kraken crystal, was a silhouette of defiance and destiny.
The golden-grade sword still gleamed in his hand, humming faintly with sealed magic, blood, and purpose. The system had gifted this reward in the nick of time, exactly when he needed it.
The wind tousled his hair as if nature itself bowed in reverence. And the way he stood—tall, calm, impossibly whole—he looked less like a man and more like the ghost of a god returned to finish what the world could not.
The people of the Wastelands had always whispered of the statue in their makeshift abode—the unnamed figure whose eyes seemed to follow you, whose likeness stirred something ancient in their blood. Josh bore that same face. But they had doubted.
They thought he would try. They thought he would die. Then they'd mourn, drink, and pick another fool to follow. Nobody expected him to last long against the Kraken, just a source of hope to hang on a while longer.
But now…
Now they saw.
He didn't just defeat the Kraken.
He unmade the magic that been sapped from the land and restored everything to a healthier state.
A voice broke the silence, cracking with emotion and awe.
"ARIAMATA!"
It was a whisper at first—then a storm.
"ARIAMATA! ARIAMATA! ARIAMATA!"
The chant surged like a tidal wave, rising from throats starved not just of food, but of hope. They roared his name until it cracked stone and scattered birds into the sky. With their last bits of strength, they shouted as if this was their only way to exist—as if this was their rebirth, too.
And it was.
Magic surged back into the land like a tide of resurrection. Streams formed where there had been dust. Hills turned green before their eyes. The wind danced between trees bearing fruits no one could name but everyone hungered for.
Men and women rushed to the trees, climbing with reckless joy. They bit into juicy flesh, hands filthy, faces wet with tears and pulp. No one cared. Children rolled in the grass. The dying sat up. The hopeless sang.
Josh walked down from the Kraken's corpse, eyes scanning a world he had remade.
Ralia Amia ran first, her arms flung wide. She crashed into him with a sobbing laugh, hugging him tightly. "You did it again," she whispered into his chest. "You raised the bar so high this time. You brought down a Kraken."
Lola followed, her face a mixture of disbelief and pride, and then Conrad Stan came up behind, his voice gruff with unspoken emotion. "Welcome back, boss."
Ralia grinned fiercely, her eyes never leaving Josh's face. "I can finally say it without shame—my master brought down a Kraken. Not with an army. Not with luck. Alone."
In the distance, Erale Arst stood like a man waking from a fever dream. He hadn't expected this. He had brought Josh here ready to die. He'd even accepted it. It was meant to be his shield for Aubrey, a desperate act to keep her safe.
But what he had witnessed took him beyond any expectation…
What was supposed to be a sure death sentence, and was looking that way suddenly turned to hope and then victory. He couldn't still wrap his head around this reality that had him lost.
The sand, the movement, the blade in the skull of a god.
"What kind of man…?" he muttered, trailing after the group like a ghost. His eyes never left Josh's back. Not even once.
As they returned to the encampment, the roads were crowded with scenes both heartbreaking and beautiful. People ate like animals—raw fruit, muddy roots, leaves, anything. Hunger didn't care for manners. But there was laughter now. Real laughter.
Children with skinny limbs ran barefoot through the reborn fields, yelling "ARIAMATA!" with sticky mouths. Even those chewing, mid-bite, would raise a fist and cry the name.
Josh smiled faintly but said nothing. He wasn't their god.
But he had given them a beginning.
They would turn this wasteland into a city. Not because someone gave them permission—but because they earned it. The Kraken was gone. The soil had returned. The minerals beneath had awakened. There would be no more begging for help from the cities that had turned their backs on them.
They would build.
And one day, when travelers passed through this land and asked how such a paradise came to be, the people would only smile and point to the statue they'd raise.
A man with a sword.
A legend that appeared in their land with nothing more than his courage, his wits, the sacred sand of Aphrota and a sword that answered only to destiny.
And beneath it, one word:
ARIAMATA.
After Josh got to where the horses were kept and met up with the other generals, he saw them looking confused and with puzzled gazes.
They had been bracing for the worst — for tremors in the earth, for the thunderous collapse of mountains, for news that their commander had barely made it out alive, if at all. But instead…suddenly life had returned to the earth. Plants sprang forth. The dead soil bloomed, the wind carried sweetness again, and the trees whispered songs of rebirth.
It could only mean one thing:
The Kraken was dead!
And then, they saw their master, the black dragon himself, Josh Aratat return and this further confirmed their suspicion.
This raised further questions, was the Kraken such a small fry or was the black dragon actually that monstrous?
The generals barely had time to ponder before Erale Arst burst forward like a man who had touched the divine.
"I saw it!" he breathed, eyes wide, heart racing. "With nothing but the cursed sand of Aphrota, stealth in his soul, and a blade kissed by the heavens… he brought down a Kraken the size of three lands. I swear it — with courage that scraped the stars and a fire that burned through fate itself!"
His voice trembled with reverence. The generals listened, stunned — each one trying to reconcile the impossible tale with the man they served.
In that moment, something shifted.
Their respect for Josh wasn't just loyalty now — it was awe.
Silent, weighty awe.
The kind that made men bow lower and speak softer.
Because deep down, they all understood:
Their master was becoming something else entirely.
Something not quite mortal.