The ground scread as the fissures split wider, vomiting rivers of molten light that surged like veins of a dying god. Towers collapsed one after another, their ruins swallowed by the flood. The sky bled in sympathy, its wounds tearing open until light cascaded downward in endless sheets.
The survivors staggered beneath the weight of it. Dust, fire, and fragnts of faceless bodies swirled into a storm that cut like glass.
Kael pushed forward through the blinding haze, his blade-shard glowing like a coal in the dark. His scars seared, flaring brighter than ever, but his body buckled with every step. He shouted through gritted teeth, though his voice was drowned by the storm: “Hold ground! Don’t scatter!”
Elara clutched the boy against her chest, though his body vibrated with the glow pulsing from within. Each beat strained against her arms, threatening to rip free. Her tears streaked across ash-stained cheeks as she whispered, desperate, “Please... please don’t burn yourself away.”
The widow crawled toward the widening fissure, her bloody hands dragging along the glowing stone. She mouthed silently, eyes hollow with awe: It’s awake. The world itself is awake.
The scarred woman braced herself with her broken spear, hair whipping wildly in the storm. She howled laughter into the chaos, spitting blood from split lips. “Awake or not—it’ll bleed like the rest!” She slamd her spear down, splintering it further, sending arcs of molten light leaping outward.
The farr struck his drum, but the storm nearly drowned its voice. His rhythm faltered, his arms heavy as stone. He staggered to his knees, clutching the drum to his chest like a child. “It doesn’t listen anymore,” he gasped. “It’s past listening.”
Then the boy broke free. He slipped from Elara’s trembling grip, stumbling into the heart of the fissures. His glow swelled, expanding until his small fra was a silhouette inside blinding radiance.
The faceless remnants still writhing at the edges bent toward him, their hollow bodies collapsing into dust as if offering themselves to the storm.
Kael lunged forward, but the heat forced him back. “Boy!” he roared, voice cracking.
The light in the boy’s chest ruptured upward, forming a column that tore into the bleeding sky. The storm howled in answer, rivers of broken stars spiraling down to et him. The earth buckled. The towers groaned like titans dying in their sleep.
From the heart of the fracture ca a new sound—not the boy’s scream, not the storm’s roar, but a voice vast and resonant, shuddering through stone and marrow alike:
“I was unford. You gave face. I was silent. You gave voice. I was bound. You break free.”
Elara collapsed, arms outstretched toward her son, sobbing wordlessly.
The widow shook violently, her palms burning red, mouthing with terror: It speaks through him.
Kael raised his blade despite the shaking of his limbs, his teeth bared against the blinding light. “Then it speaks to us in war.”
And the sky itself split open.
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