(THE PENULTIMATE CHAPTER HERE!!!)(I'm so fucking sorry for the wait, I really am, but I'll have a deeper explanation at the bottom of the chapter, enjoy!)

He watched the third person this week be taken away. Saints, he couldn't believe this is what his afterlife had become. He knew what would happen to those people. He would torture with the worst memories of their lives and that didn't even come close to the physical torture. His heart grew heavy and he averted his eyes. He felt a hand on his shoulder and he shuddered. He felt his knees go weak and nearly fell.  He turned around to see who it was. Marie? She looked down at him and smiled. She grabbed his hand and helped him get back on his feet. 

"How are you holding up? I haven't seen you since you were released."  Fedyor shook his head.

"I don't want to talk about it," he told her. She nodded, but gave a little frown. 

"Ok, do you want to talk about something else?"

"How's Sergei?" Marie paled. Their relationship had ups and downs and currently they were in a down. They were in a down so deep that it finally broke the camels back.

"He's moving to another floor."

"How did he swing that?" Marie blew a hair out of her face.

"He betrayed Alina remember? He decided to redeem his good graces."  Fedyor rolled his eyes. Truly they were better off without him. The two of them walked over to the bar and began to drink out their sorrows. A.M. was destroying the afterlife. In the corner of Fedyor's eye he could see Matthias Helvar. A former "witch hunter" and not very popular amongst Grisha. He tried his best to be tolerant, but with so many Grisha losing their lives to people like him. Well... he had to understand that his presence was not a welcomed one. Fedyor watched as Helvar's hands squeezed a glass so hard it broke. He finally lost it. Marie's right eyebrow raised at the display of anger. This would not turn out well for Helvar. 

They ended up dragging him kicking and screaming out of the bar. He wasn't seen ever again.

XxX

Kaz's plan was to grab Botkin! Brilliant. Everyone in the afterlife respected him. Botkin looked to Mikhael in contempt, but made no attempt to rid Mikhael's hand from his wrist. He was ok with this, thought Fedyor. The Darkling looked on with a silent angry look on his face. The fighting slowed as people looked on in reverence. Botkin and Mikhael ran to Kaz the fighting resumed. Matthias put his hand on Fedyor's shoulder. 

"The fighting isn't over. Let's end this Heartrender once and for all," Matthias said. Fedyor nodded and they got into a fighting stance. They just went off instinct. Fighting came natural to the both of them. Who would've thought a Drüskelle and a Grisha soldier would fight together to save the afterlife?

Who would've thought there actually was an afterlife? And they fought and fought. Both had gotten a few good hits in, and each had some misses.  Matthias launched his first in the side of Ivan's head.  He crumpled to the ground. Matthias sat back onto the ground. Was it finally over? Ivan rose his head off the ground and Fedyor stepped on his head forcefully. Matthias could hear the crack of the bones in his face. Ivan didn't get back up. The two of them sighed in relief. Fedyor helped Matthias up again and went to find Kaz. The loud bang of a gun was shot up in the air. Botkin was holding it above his head. 

It had been so long since Fedyor had seen him. Botkin and Fedyor never interacted in the afterlife. Fedyor had his own personal things to deal with. The Darkling had hurt him first before anyone else in the afterlife. His punishment for wanting to leave and being reincarnated.  Botkin had been taken away pretty early into the Darkling's reign. He didn't want competition. Fedyor never got to thank him. Even in the Afterlife he was still respected and strong. Fedyor and Matthias needed to get there immediately. Botkin's stare penetrated every last one of them. A hush fell over the crowd and the fighting ceased. 

Even the Darkling himself couldn't move. No one knew his abilities because they didn't need to know. Botkin's presence was just that powerful. 

"Rise! You want freedom? Earn it!" He barked to the wave of friends. Would it be enough? He turned to Matthias who looked remorseful. 

"Let's just get to them. The throne is what matters. Sometimes we have to leave fighting behind. Let's save these people and find Ilya." The pair ran through the stunned group. They met up with Kaz, Alexei, Mikhael, and Botkin. Botkin's eyes went to him and Matthias. He didn't smile, but he his frown shifted into a more neutral expression. He looked to the crowd again.

"Look!" He was more fluent in the afterlife. It was weird hearing him speak like that. His broken Shu had become iconic in the minds of many Grisha in the Little Palace. he didn't need to speak much there. "His people killed our own for so long! Yet he is here! Fighting for you!" The stun that had worked it's way throughout the crowd was starting to wear off. The Darkling snarled.

"You think simple platitudes can defeat me!" The shadows in the room moved around like living people and circled the group. "I'm not letting go!" The shadows expanded and snaked their way to Botkin. "You have no Sun Summoner here  to defeat me! You won't free Ilya and you won't defeat me here!" Where were Marie and Jordie? Fedyor hadn't seen Birgit as well. This didn't bode well for Kaz Brekker's dead little crew. Matthias bit the inside of his cheek. The light from the room was being vacuumed out. The air was swirling. There! It was like Birgit was in the Darkling! Under the long cloak. He was a living amplifier. Her power was being unleashed to it's greatest potential. Then it was pitch black. That's when the screams started. 

XxX

Matthias saw Nina. Well, she didn't look like Nina, but something in his heart knew it was her. She was blonde with a heavy brow. She looked like a Fjerdan. Something Matthias had always imagined in his mind. However, she looked deflated and depressed. She smoothed out her pale blue dress and opened the door in her little hut. A black bag fell out and opened. She frowned and opened the bag. It was a rotting Drüskelle. He had scars on his face and his body type looked similar to Matthias'.

"You like causing trouble don't you? Well, once I get him back then you won't be able to anymore." She looked at it with a dull gaze. She waved her hand and it rose. She was manipulating the bones. It moved liked a puppet. She moved her hand as a mouth and made a deep voice. 

"Well, you killed me. Why shouldn't I cause trouble?" Matthias felt all color dissolve from his body. Was this one of the Darkling's tricks or was what he seeing real? 

"Nina!" She didn't register his presence. 

"Because I'll do worse things to your friends!" She screamed. Dead bodies flew out of the cold ground and Nina began to laugh. "All I need his head and his heart and then he's gonna come back to me!"  Matthias' eyes widened and the sky grew darkened. No, what was she doing? This couldn't be real.

"Nina!" He shouted again. She still didn't notice that he was watching her. Nina smiled darkly and laughed. 

"Smells like lightning, perfect." Nina changed back in a flash to who she was previous. She really looked like herself, but something was not right. It was all off.  Her eyes were brown. Nina didn't have brown eyes, and this clearly wasn't the work of a tailor. This was just a mistake. "Nina" grabbed the bodies and practically flew outside. She started doing horrific things to the bodies. ripping them apart and sewing them into something whole. The skin didn't match all the other body parts. Matthias didn't fear dead bodies. He had caused his fair share, but something about the sanctity of corpses made what Nina was doing all the worse. Matthias choked back vomit. Nina grabbed Matthias' body and started cutting delicately into his body using an extra sharp fingernail. 

"We'll be together soon, my love." Matthias watched in horror as Nina handled his heart and shoved it into the new body. Just then. Lightning struck and Matthias could smell the cooked skin. Matthias felt his mind move. If that was even possible. He was seeing through Nina abomination. 

He was Nina's abomination. Matthias gasped for air as he gazed into the fake Nina's eyes. 

"What have you done?" He asked, his voice rasping out. "What have you done to me?" She gazed down at him sadly. 

"I brought you back, my dear," she told him. "Why are you upset with me?"

"You're not Nina," he choked out. "All that compassion, gone!" Nina's eyes widened. "What are you?" Nina let go of Matthias and his head hit the hard ground. He groaned in pain and expelled a breath through his teeth. 

"How did you figure it out?" 

"I'm not an idiot, Nina's eyes aren't brown. You think Nina would kill people to bring me back to life? There's too much love in her heart for that." Nina stood up and took off her disguise. She shrunk in many ways and became well... Matthias wasn't sure what she was. It was a shadowy glob in the shape of a person.

"You are indeed less stupid than I thought." The voice that came out was just as shadowy as the figure. "That's not saying much, but you did exceed my expectations."

"Who are you?" 

"Sergei," the shadowy figure called. "I called myself Sergei, once." The image of the fake world Matthias was stuck in faded away. All that was left was shadow. Matthias' fake body melted away into the shadows as well and now Matthias was now a spirit in the dark. 

"Let me out! Bring me back!"

"No." 

"Helvar!" It was Brekker. Brekker's voice was coming at him from all directions. 

"Brekker! Where are you?!" 

"Just hold on!"

XxX

Kaz woke up back with the Dregs. He was soaked in his own blood on the wooden floor of Esfir and Ilya's house. He wasn't where he first 'died'. Nina stared at him sadly from a king sized bed. This was Esfir and Ilya's bedroom. Inej kneeled before him. 

"What happened?" Kaz croaked out. "Why am I back? I was so close." No one looked at him.

"Kaz," Inej said, quietly. "You were about to die. You lost so much blood you wouldn't have been able to come back."

"It was all for nothing!" Nina spit out. "I watched Inej kill you and Matthias isn't even coming back!" The door opened and Esfir poked her head in. 

"He's back?" She asked, she looked down and frowned. She looked to Matthias' body still in the black bag. "I'm so sorry Nina," she told her. "I really am." 

"I was so close," Kaz said, angry that his one chance to actually bring back someone he had lost was gone. He didn't even get to properly say goodbye to his brother. "How could I have lost?" Esfir planted her lips in a firm line. 

"He's the Darkling," she said. "You don't even have Grisha powers. I could barely even defeat him," she whispered. 

"So you admit it, then? You're Alina Starkov?" Kaz asked, looking for at least one reason to be smug. Esfir looked at his with daggers in her eyes. She bit her lip angrily and left the room. 

"What happened in there?" Inej asked him. "Did it at least work?" 

"I saw him, Helvar and I talked. In fact we were in the middle of over throwing the Darkling before you took me out of the world."

"How?" Nina asked, "what were you doing?"

"Simple revolution, Nina," Kaz replied. "I don't see why you need to know what I did."

"Tell me!" Nina shrieked. She launched herself from the bed and made Kaz shake. She was shaking his body with her Grisha powers. Lightning flashed outside. For just a second Kaz could've sworn everyone in the room changed. Kaz's body was lifted from the ground in a way that didn't make sense for what Nina could do. Inej grabbed Kaz's wrist and Kaz nearly threw up. Inej wouldn't do that to him. She wouldn't. Kaz fell to the ground and he groaned in pain. He stood up. His limp was gone. 

This was fake. 

Kaz was still in the underworld. He needed to find a way to wake up or get out of whatever prison he was in. He looked for anything unusual. Something he could use to get him out of this very realistic illusion. 

"Give it up," he said to the people pretending to be dregs. "I know you're not the real thing. Just shed your disguises and fight me. Quit being cowards." The one pretending to be Nina rolled her eyes. She shed her disguise revealing Birgit in her place. 

"You think you're so smart, but you will fail, Kaz Brekker. Sasha will defeat you." The scene disappeared and it was just Birgit and Kaz. This wasn't going to end well, he knew it. He had a feeling that if she killed him, then he would be dead for real and he couldn't save Matthias. He would never see Inej again, or any of the other Dregs but that wasn't his main concern. 

"Let me go Birgit. Let me free Morozova." Birgit shook her head with her lips pursed. 

"I can't let you do that, I'm not letting you take Sasha away from me." Her tone was that of a whiny child. It was a shame really. She had been so young when she was killed. Kaz could empathize a little, considering he had faced death before at a young age. He wasn't gonna, but he could if he wanted to. She had been a child once, but she had been dead for years. This wasn't a child anymore. This was a deranged young woman who never got the chance to mature. She was dangerous. And a Grisha on top of it. 

"Are you afraid?" He asked. Birgit was taken a back. She glared at him for a second, but then she looked down.

"No, how dare you suggest that!" Wind came from all around and pushed Kaz against the back of the wall.

"He showed you power, right? And now that you left Morozova you're scared that you're going to be punished," Kaz rasped out. Tears peeked out of Birgit's eyes.

"No!" The pressure of the air started to decrease and Kaz started to advance on Birgit. "Stop! Leave me alone! Everything was fine until you got here!" 

"Do you call suppression fine? You were killed by Drüskelles! And That was wrong, but you had no right to lock them away!" To be honest, Kaz was just talking out of his ass. He needed to get closer to her. 

"They burned me alive!" She shouted, tears fulling flowing down her face. Kaz put a hand in front of his face to block the air from drying his eyes out. 

"And now you're torturing them! Just let us bring back Morozova and face your punishment!" Kaz was almost there. 

"I just wanted to make them pay!" The air was weak. Kaz towered over a weakened and distressed Birgit. She was just too sick. Kaz looked down at her sadly and snapped her neck. Slowly the fictionalized version of of Esfir and Ilya's orphanage disappeared and Kaz was back in the chamber where the battle against the Darkling was taking place. Kaz was laying face first on the brown. The cold tile pressed into the right side of his face. He opened his left eye just wide enough to see what had happened.  Birgit had fallen onto the ground, but that didn't stop the Darkling from extending his shadows. However, his reach had decreased. Matthias was on the ground in front of him. 

The Darkling seemed to finally notice that Birgit was down and out. His attention shifted for just a moment and Kaz sat up. His eyes scanned Matthias' body. He was uninjured and Kaz crawled over to him. Shadows touched part of his foot, keeping him in the trance. 

"Helvar," he said, barely above a whisper. He pressed his hands onto Matthias' shoulders, shaking him.

"Where are you?" Matthias struggled out, eyes shut. 

"Just hold on," he told him. Other people were also waking up slowly, but he could feel the Darkling's grey eyes boring a hole in his head. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. 

"Brekker, your death will painful," the Darkling spit out. "I will make sure it's impossible for Morozova to bring you back!" If Kaz could've paled anymore he would've. Was that how "dead" people were brought back? Kaz stood up and pulled Matthias up. He spat out a curse, Helvar was heavy. The Darkling's shadow grew weak and broke away from Matthias, waking him up. 

"You need to get to Morozova in the throne. I'll distract the Darkling."

"But Brekker, you'll die?" Kaz scoffed. That might've very well been true, but he was still alive in the real world. Maybe someone would bring him our of it just before death. He put on a brave face. He was going to do it. He was going to free someone from the afterlife. Kaz Brekker would be the greatest thief of all time. 

"Oh ye of little faith, get Morozova. That's an order, soldier," he barked. He dropped Helvar onto the ground and stood his ground. "Come and get me shadow boy." The shadows in the room fully receded into his body and the rest of his little team woke up. 

"To the throne!" Fedyor said, charging. Kaz however, ran in the opposite direction. He picked up his cane and grabbed the gun Alexei had given him. He needed to give them time. All of the shadows converged into a single point and it was heading for Kaz. It stopped just before him, like the Darkling was threatening him with a gun.

"What did you do to Birgit?" The Darkling asked, his voice reverberating throughout the shadow. 

"You were the one who sent her into my vision, you have to know what I do at this point," Kaz said. "Was your own fault really." The shadow chased up Kaz's body finding itself comfy in one of Kaz's wounds from Inej. Kaz nearly cried out in pain, but he didn't want to give the Darkling the satisfaction. He was trying to rip him apart from his wounds. 

"She was a child!" He snarled.

"And she was only one life compared to all these others," he grunted out. The pain grew worse and reached over to his feet. He heard struggling at the throne. They were pushing. He heard Fedyor barking orders and Matthias cheering for strength. The Darkling's shadow moved to the throne. "You wanna hear how I did it?" He asked, getting the Darkling's attention.

"How did you kill her?" He felt one of his wounds pop open, blood seeping through his clothes. 

"She was crying," Kaz said. 

"What!?" The Darkling flew closer to Kaz. Birgit's body slipped out of him and was limp on the floor. He didn't stop to look back at her. The Darkling was a man of purpose. Of course he wouldn't look back. He had to look forward. It was a good strategy. "You're worse than me," he spat. 

"No I'm not. You killed a lot more than me. Besides Birgit is already dead," another one of his wounds opened up. He grunted in pain. "You can just bring her back."

"You're going to suffer long and hard."

"She was crying because she didn't know what to do, she thought about leaving you. she was torn."

"No!" The shadows wrapped around his neck. Kaz started gasping for air. He could feel all of his wounds opening in up. In the background shouts were becoming more frantic. Kaz tried turning his head, but he felt more blood escape from his wounds. 

"I..." Kaz tried to finish his sentence, but the shadows tightened around his neck. His vision started to get spotty, when all of a sudden, he had a little bit of a reprieve. The shadows around his neck loosened, slightly, only slightly, but it was better than the past few seconds. "I made the choice for her!" He said. The Darkling advanced onto Kaz. His hand reached out to grip his neck. 

"You really are bleeding!" He said in shock. "Are you, are you alive?" 

"What gave it away?" He struggled out. Before he could take any final measure, though. He felt it. Energy. A wave of energy came out from the throne and Kaz fell to the ground. 

"Hello Aleksander," a voice called from the throne. Kaz smirked, it was him, Ilya Morozova. He won. Suddenly, the Darkling was powerless. Well, not exactly, but he was stunned and weak. Kaz heard people running in his direction. 

"Kaz!"

"Brekker!" It was Jordie, and Matthias. Kaz could hear heavy footsteps behind them, probably Fedyor.

"No!" The Darkling called "Stop! Don't come any closer! He's alive! I'll kill him!" Ilya Morozova simply walked towards the Darkling and stared at him. 

"No you won't." Kaz felt faint. He was dying again. 

"We freed you," he choked out. "Now let me take Helvar back." He was bleeding excessively. He didn't know how long he had before he died for real and was stuck here. 

"I'm glad you got my message. Very well," he said. "You have freed me and as such I will send you both back to the land of the living." Matthias helped Kaz up and he looked around. His little team of dead people gathered around him. Fedyor looked the most confused, Marie looked relieved, Alexei was clearly just as relieved as Marie was, Jordie knew it was the last time he would see his brother, as did Kaz, so his face was that of retrospection, and Mikhael looked satisfied by a job well done. 

"You're alive?" Fedyor asked. Kaz nodded. 

"What gave it away? Was it the blood?" Fedyor laughed humorlessly. 

"How?" He asked simply, but Kaz was leaving in a few seconds. He needed to say goodbye. 

"Jordie, I..." It was hard to find the words now that they had a time limit. He nodded, simply. 

"I know little brother, don't worry. I know." Suddenly, though, before he could say anything else. Say goodbye to any of the people he had met in the Afterlife, they were gone. 

Hi everyone, 3844 words for a chapter, not bad eh? I'm so sorry I was gone for so long. It's been almost a year. I can't believe the last time I updated was in August. It's June! I don't expect a lot of reads from this chapter, but well. I'm glad I got it done. I've changed a lot as a person in the 2 and a half years I've done this fanfiction for. To be honest, as much as I love the Grishaverse, it's just not my main priority now.  Part of me was scared to write this chapter and that's why it came so late. This is the most important chapter of the story after all. This is where it all comes together and I was scared of disappointing all of you. I let my fear and my anxiety get the better of me and I ignored this story for months. I had planned to have this chapter out by September of last year, but I just couldn't do it. I've grown a lot as an author since starting this fic. It made writing the current fic I have priority on all the easier. (also one of the reasons is that in late January (again, I love starting fics in late January I suppose) I started a Doctor Who fic on my AO3. That story is on official hiatus, but I'm actively writing it in my spare time. It's almost 80,000 words and only 43,000 of those are published. So that one will be active again in the following months. If any of you are interested in it lol comment and I'll tell you what it's about. it's tenrose tho)

So here are the reasons I guess. 1, fear. 2, my interests are a little different now. 3, terrible terrible burn out.  

It's the worst burn out I've ever had in my life. Like it physically hurt me to work on this fanfiction. I'd started it when I was freshly 15 and not very used to people reading my work, and now I'm six months away from 18, with a few writing contests under my belt and a long ass tenrose fic on AO3. In the end, I'm just a different person than the girl who started this fanfic all the way back in 2018. I just am, and that's to be expected. This story has prepared me for a lot of things in a variety of ways. There was no way I could write so much on Doctor Who if I didn't have this. So thank you. 

Originally I had planned a sequel, but since I only have one more chapter left and a waning interest in the story I think I'll just tell you what I planned instead. Kaz was supposed to bring back a piece of the Darkling with him on accident and it was going to find Alina and give her shadow powers. It was going to be an angsty story fixing all I thought was wrong with ruin and rising. However it has no impact on this story in particular so I doubt I'm going to be writing it. (also King of Scars came out and fucked with it) One more chapter left guys, and that's more or less an epilogue, but come on guys, you know me by now. I love cliff hangers. 

but I promise the wait won't be almost a year.