First off - Sorry to everyone who is waiting for something to update. I'm a horrible person, I know, but I'm also in college and having Duke as a muse seems to have created apathy. I'll get to work on things, slowly but surely. Probably more slowly. I do have quite a bit of note type things on my computer for most of those other ones - KHALY, Symphony of the Brightest Star, they have chapters written up for later, far later in some cases. I don't even remember what I was last working on in Host- actually, I just remembered because I thought about it. Hmmm.

Well, here's something I thought up. Will have one short chapter to follow it.

I own nothing, much to Duke's relief.

Estelle gave a weak cry as Duke flickered into place in the air above her, Dein Nomos slamming into the ground and creating a shockwave that made the pinkette princess crumple.

"Damn it!" Raven swore, fishing in his pockets for a life bottle, and missed the war hero's return to the ground, and the shields that floated about him spiraling into a line. The floating man's statement as the pieces of metal fired was lost under Raven's cry as he too crumpled.

"No!" Rita quickly jumped into the air, activating a formula nearly identical to the one Duke used, quickly beginning to flick her scarf through the air. "Oh countless particles that wander the very heavens-" While Yuri scrambled for a life bottle, he heard Duke match Rita for casting. However, the pale man's chant was far shorter.

"I now unleash the full force of my life!" Yuri hated to dive away while Rita could not, but if he was left standing then he could revive the others. "Guilty Resolver!" Yuri gritted his teeth as Rita fell from the air, her body crashing into the ground.

"Damn it! Damn it!" He heard Karol yelp, Repede bark, Judith shout, and kept moving.

"Luna Rondo!"

"Destruction Street!"

He heard them go down just as fast. There! A life bottle. Yuri turned and booked it for Estelle, only to skid to a halt when Duke appeared before him, as if he had just slid into place.

"Dragon Swarm!" He clipped one of the shields, but completely missed the hero, spinning past him.

"Dragon Ascendant!" And Dein Nomos slammed into him, wreathed in flame.

"Screwed up." Yuri grunted, hitting the ground. Darkness hovered about the edge of his vision but didn't completely steal it away. The bright glow from Duke might have had something to do with that.

"'And they were never heard from again.'" The glow dimmed as Duke stated this, almost musingly, as if tasting the words. "Although, there will be none left to have heard of you..." The sounds of Duke's boots hitting the floor created by the spell he had unleashed while absorbing Aer. "...You were far more foolhardy than your plan..." A pair of steps, then the world was falling. Duke's boots moved right past his face, stepping over Estelle as the brick garden returned to below them. Pale blue light and faint chirping indicated that Duke had pulled his formula back into existence. "Perhaps it is for the best..." Calm footsteps. Surely Duke realized they weren't dead? Or did he simply not care, because they were incapacitated? "Humanity would not take well to the change you would impose upon them. It is better for them to simply disappear."

"Dammit.." That was Raven, grunting as he tried to keep awake, the old man grimacing at the ground and his lack of strength. "Yer.. givin' up, on everythin'?" The archer's fingers missed the pale man's boot as he walked past, altering a symbol or two there, stepping over the purple coated man to another point and writing symbols into a blank location that appeared.

"There was very little left for me to give up." Duke states, indicating just how little he felt for his own kind.

"Khroma... didn't want to see you do this." Judith tells him, watching as he moved to a new point and altered his formula. "Take revenge on your own kind."

"Such frail ties..." Duke murmurs, removing a symbol and adding a new one. "As I had told you then, I do not hold that bond as common race to be of any importance. Terca Lumireis is better off without humanity and all their foolish whims."

"You don't care? That you're giving up your life?" Estelle struggles to turn her head to watch him.

"Child of the Full Moon..." Duke stops where his boots are in her vision. "I had thought you, with your words to Phaeroh, would be more likely to understand." He turned from her, altering the formula again. "What do you need..." Dein Nomos returned to the man's hand as he rested the other on the glowing wall that represented his formula.

"Duke... stop!" Rita glares at him. "Just try our way, please, it will work!"

"You risked your life and plan in a gamble against my own and failed." Duke states, stripping a glove off and calmly dropping it while examining his palm. "I have no interest in testing your cause when your strength, your conviction, was not enough to best mine." Dein Nomos' edge was casually pressed against his palm, the hand closing then opening again. Blood stained finger traced a symbol, then studied the formula. "

There." The chirping slowly crescendos, and Duke stepped away from his walls. "Farewell, Brave Vesperia." Light faded and grew and washed out the world.

And Yuri woke cold.