Even at their limits, Skyler and his friends could not withstand Fergo. His power drowned them—sufficient to crush every flicker of hope and bury it within a universe of shadow.

And then…something shifted.

A fragile sprout unfurled at the root of the Tree of Life. Its radiance spread outward, a pulse every soul could feel. The shoot grew, coiled upward, and bound two figures together—Fergo and Skyler—locking them in the center of the battlefield. Neither could move, not even a finger.

The world blacked out, a curtain falling on the final act of a play.

—

Skyler opened himself. Here, there was no edge, no origin, no end. Only a brightness that resembled noon sunlight across a boundless cloud plain.

“I guess we’re dead…” he whispered. The words echoed louder than he had spoken them.

“Not yet, boy.” Another sound came from behind.

He spun around.

A middle-aged man stood there, lab coat draped on narrow shoulders, a contradiction made flesh: glacial yet tender with compassion—unchanged from memory.

Skyler smiled, breath catching on the name—a prayer etched into his soul. “Professor Valentine.” His tone rushed, afraid the vision would dissolve. “Why are you here? And…what is this place?”

“This is your own subconscious,” Valentine said. “Or, in the language you prefer—it’s you hacking into the biometrics of your own soul.”

Skyler nodded once. Surreal was no longer foreign to him.

Valentine gestured toward a pale horizon. “Look.”

Mist parted to reveal an image: Fergo bound in luminous vines, a blaze of hatred staring back.

“How is he here—in my head?”

“Because you are linked to him more deeply than you realize.”

“How could that be?”

“What is your power, Skyler?”

“…The Fifth Dimension.”

“And do you know how to wield it?”

Silence stretched, then Skyler’s answer rang sharper than an oath. “Yes. But I will never use it again.”

Valentine’s smile bent with sorrow. “Knowledge rejected remains a live charge. Even unused, it remains dangerous—especially in a demon’s grasp.”

Skyler’s thoughts raced, then halted on the question that froze him. “Professor…you mean Fergo—he also has the Fifth Dimension!?”

Valentine did not answer. He simply lifted his hand. The image shifted. Fergo’s form merged with the silhouette of a man with blue hair, their bodies bleeding into one another until light and shadow fused with no line between.

Skyler stood frozen, his mind scrambling to process information that his heart refused to accept.

“Yes,” Valentine’s voice was calm, unwavering. “Fergo holds the same power you do. Or to be more precise… you hold the same power as him. Right now, we are inside your own subconscious. Which means—for a fleeting moment—Fergo is inhabiting your body.”

Skyler opened his mouth, but no sound escaped.

“I am only a fragment of soul,” Valentine continued. “Drawn into the Quanigma that Trinity once consumed… until Fergo seized that power. That is what allowed me to appear here.”

He turned toward Skyler fully, gaze solemn, void of smile, weighted with pity. “And… Fergo hard-coded a bug into the SeC system from the very beginning—to ensure no one else could ever know, or uncover, that someone else might share his ability. Because Fergo wanted to be God in the world he rewrote for himself.”

“But… I found it!” Skyler’s protest cracked the silence.

“Exactly. Which is why your fate converges with his. Three hundred years into the future, when Fergo hides that pink-haired girl, he discovers the perfect vessel. That’s how he seizes you—without effort, without resistance.”

“Wait…” Skyler blurted. “How could that even happen? Three hundred years in the future—how am I still alive?”

Valentine exhaled, weary, the sound of a man who had asked himself the same question countless times.

“I wish I had an answer for you,” he said softly, meeting Skyler’s eyes. “What I do know is this: the body Fergo commands now… is yours.”

“Then why could he change my face, yet when he possessed Trinity and Lan, their appearances stayed the same?”

“Two simple reasons.” Valentine paused, inhaled once, then spoke as if chiseling truth into stone. “One, he left their faces intact to sow discord—classic puppet-master tactics. Two, with you, he gained complete dominion. Not a loan. Not a shell. Total possession.”

Every word was a hammer, driving into Skyler’s chest. The harder he tried to reason his way out, the sharper reality cut back in.

“He doesn’t just share your power,” Valentine said, delivery heavy. “He is you—in a timeline where you chose the shadow. A path where you placed faith in control… not in hope.”

The statement made Skyler stumble back as though consciousness itself were slipping from him.

“Then how can I stop him,” he whispered, trembling despite his fight for composure, “if he is me?”

Valentine stepped closer, resting a hand on his shoulder—just enough to remind Skyler his teacher hadn’t left.

“That question,” Valentine said, lids falling shut, tenderness and sorrow threading every word, “is the answer.”

He released his hand. His expression softened into the smile of a man who had already endured too many losses. “And this will be the last time we speak. I can’t teach you anymore. Because the only lesson left for you to learn is…”

His final words carried the weight of eternity:

“Sacrifice.”

Then Professor Valentine slowly dissolved—vanishing, morning mist undone. Only white motes of radiance remained, spiraling around Skyler, circling him in silent orbit.

—

The figure before him was no longer his mentor. It was Fergo. Savage eyes, body thrashing violently, straining to break free from Gaia’s bindings.

The branches of the World Tree that once held firm now cracked under the pressure, splintering with brittle snaps that rang in Skyler’s ears. Every heartbeat spilled faster than leaking sand through an hourglass. Two worlds drew closer to their fracture point.

“If he is me…” Skyler whispered, the words lighter than breath.

And suddenly—the unicorn’s voice echoed back into him:

‘You must face a sacrifice of immeasurable weight, carried only by the noblest of hearts.

His gaze flicked to Fergo, watching the man rip branches apart one by one, a ravenous fire consuming him, his body splitting as surges of darkness tore loose, flooding the void.

Then it became clear. Clearer than any truth he had ever known.

If Fergo is my future self, then without me now… there will be no Fergo.

Silence detonated inside his mind.
Skyler stood unmoving, battered by waves of truth hammering his skull.

Roxy’s world would not be destroyed.
Zoe’s eyes would never shed another tear.
As long as he—and only he—was gone.

Memories unraveled backward—film running in reverse.
Bare feet racing through grass behind the house.
His mother’s laughter.
The scent of toasted bread in the morning.
A sky brimming with life above a newborn planet.

At last… he understood.

He did not need power. He did not need greatness. He did not need to be the hero. All he ever wanted… was for the world to have a tomorrow.

“…What are you doing!?” Fergo roared, frothing shadows erupting, dark energy bursting outward in madness.

But it was too late.

Skyler drew in one final breath—heavy with clarity, filled with his last will. He summoned the Fifth Dimension, not as a weapon of ruin, but as the essence of acceptance itself.

Particles streamed from fingertip to bone, weaving into every strand of his consciousness. This was not the power to destroy. It was the power of surrender. The strength of one who finally understood that the future could be stopped… only by stepping out of it.

“I may not defeat you,” he whispered, steady as stone, “but I can end you. And that… is what I’ll do.”

He embraced the void.

Energy burst forth—brighter than creation, a tide swallowing all.

Fergo screamed, his roar torn apart as his form dissolved into air, into nothing.

Skyler’s body fractured into stardust, scattering into the infinite: Fifth-Dimensional fragments drifting as an eternal constellation that never sleeps.

And all that remained… was stillness everlasting.