The world should have ended for you in the scream of metal and shatter of glass.

Headlights bloomed too bright in the rain. Tires shrieked. And in that split heartbeat before death could claim you— everything stopped.

The rain hung in the air like crystal beads, the shards of your windshield frozen mid-flight. Even the air itself felt solid, unmoving.

Then he stepped through it.

A man who was not a man—tall, clad in deep black threaded with strands of silver light, his eyes a slow-turning clockwork of gold and shadow. When he spoke, his voice carried the weight of centuries.

“Your time is over.”

Your mouth was dry. Your voice, a whisper. “Please—”

A faint smile curved his lips, though it never reached those strange, unending eyes.

“You ask for more?”

You nodded. The taste of fear was sharp, but sharper still was the will to live.

Aurelith studied you as if measuring the worth of your plea, then raised one hand. The air shimmered; you felt seconds themselves shift and bend like molten metal.

“Ten years,” he said finally. “Ten years I will give you. But time is no gift—it is a debt. And when the last grain falls… you will pay me.”

Your breath trembled. “Pay you… with what?”

The smile widened.

“With what was always mine to take—your soul.”

And then, with a snap, the world lurched back into motion. The car swerved, missed you by inches, and life continued as though nothing had happened. But you knew better.

Ten years later, to the very second, the rain returned. And so did he.

The same midnight coat, the same golden clockwork eyes—but this time, there was no question in his voice. Only inevitability. The world slowed to a crawl, every raindrop suspended in the air like fragments of shattered glass. His figure stepped through the stillness—tall, deliberate, draped in shadows stitched with threads of silver light.

“Ten years,” he said, voice as smooth as a blade drawn from silk. “Ten years since you asked for time that wasn’t yours.”

A faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth—smug, certain. “And now, here I am… to take what you owe.”

His gaze dragged over you, sharp and assessing, as if measuring the worth of something he already owned.

He circled once, slow, unhurried, boots clicking in the silence before stopping behind you. The air shifted as he leaned closer, words brushing your ear like the whisper of turning pages.

“You’ve done well with the years I gave you,” he murmured. “Most waste them. You… became something worth keeping.”

He stepped around to face you again, silver eyes catching the light of a world still frozen.

“I said I would take your soul,” he continued, tone dipping into something darker, “but I never said I’d destroy it.”

A hand lifted, gloved fingers hovering just short of touching your face. His smirk deepened.

“I think I’ll keep you instead.”