[Fin's POV - Soul Chamber Beneath Elmer Academy]
I couldn't feel my fingertips anymore.
I tried punching and sending dismantles at the cage, but it did nothing. The bracer on my arm pulsed in rhythm with the glyphs carved into the dome.
Below me, the siphon hummed louder.
I'm gonna be honest, this isn't looking entirely great for me. I tried to calm myself down and think of a way out of this; my breath was visible, the Cold Resistance was working well. But the worst part was Helga. She hadn't moved. Not even a twitch.
Her chest rose. Barely.
But she was alive.
That was somehow worse.
Across from me, Saelira stood at the base of the machine again, her hand gently gliding along the edge of the console, not even bothering to check if I'd escaped. I wasn't a threat anymore. And she knew it.
"Do you feel it?" she asked softly, not looking at me.
I didn't respond.
She smiled anyway.
"It's happening now. His soul, our father's, is almost here. The last threads are weaving through the siphon, aligning with the core. With your blood, with Helga's pain. With everything."
She looked up at me with eyes too bright, too hopeful. Like this was her wedding day.
"I used to dream of this moment, you know? Not always clearly. Sometimes it was just a voice in the dark. Other times it was fire. But it always ended with him. With Father. Standing at the centre of it all, whole again."
"You're insane," I muttered.
Saelira giggled.
"Maybe. But I'm not wrong."
I wanted to scream. To punch through the barrier. To cut it. But it wouldn't budge. My body was frozen in place, suspended by the same sickly threads of soulsteel that now crawled around the cage like vines made of wire.
Below me, the siphon shuddered.
A new light emerged from the core, not violet or gold.
Black.
Dark, writhing strands pulsed outward like a heartbeat. The machine was waking up, and I had no way to stop it.
A figure moving swiftly at the console.
Yorz.
Still alive. Still composed, even with three fingers and an ear missing. She'd wrapped the wounds with strips of her cloak, her hand stiff as she worked the controls.
"Is it stable?" Saelira asked her, voice lilting.
Yorz didn't look up.
"For now. The energy flux is growing too fast. He's too strong. If we don't seal it correctly, this chamber won't survive the transfer."
I latched onto that.
"He?" I said hoarsely. "You mean Kael'ven. That bastard's soul. You actually think bringing him back is going to solve anything?"
Yorz glanced up at me.
Finally.
Her eyes were like a cold slate.
"Not solve," she said. "Reset."
"What the hell does that even mean?"
She didn't answer.
She turned a dial, and the machine hissed.
Saelira twirled again, laughing to herself as black mist poured from the glyphs along the chamber floor.
"I was the only one he truly spoke to," she said, dreamily. "In the time between. He told me about you. About her. About what he needed. He said we were all part of his soul, pieces cut away and scattered when he died. But now…"
Her gaze rose to me again.
"...now we're finally whole."
"No," I hissed. "You're not whole. You're broken. You're being used."
"Used?" Her eyes flared, but not with anger, just confusion. "No, Fin. I'm chosen. That's different."
The cage trembled again, a low pulse rolled through it.
I tilted my head at Saelira, then at the machine.
"So, lemme get this straight," I said, loud enough to echo through the chamber. "You're telling me all this, because what? Daddy told you bedtime stories from hell, and now you're out here cosplaying cult Barbie?"
Saelira blinked.
The smile slipped, just a bit.
"But he spoke to me—"
"Yeah, yeah. I'm sure that's what all the voices in your head say. Doesn't change the fact that you're not special, you're just available."
Yorz's head snapped up, her eyes flaring. "Be silent."
I grinned wider.
"What? Gonna cut off an ear for me? We can match."
Her hand twitched toward the console.
I was pushing it.
Good.
If I couldn't break the cage, I could at least break their focus. Disrupt the ritual. Or maybe, piss one of them off enough to mess up.
"You're so desperate to make Daddy proud, Saelira," I said, tone dripping with sarcasm. "But newsflash, he's gonna abandon you the moment he comes back. And Yorz? She's not helping you. She's managing you. Like a walking hazard with tits."
Saelira took a step forward.
One hand twitched, light sparking at her fingertips.
"You're just afraid," she said.
"Afraid of what? You? You're a budget necromancer with daddy issues and a Pinterest board for ritual sacrifice."
"Enough," Yorz snapped, her voice a sharp cut.
She pressed something on the panel, and suddenly the threads of soulsteel tightened around me, digging in like a vice. My breath hitched, vision flashing white for a second.
Okay.
That hurt.
My jaw clenched, but I laughed through it. "Aww, did I hit a nerve? Sorry, I didn't realise this was therapy time."
Saelira's face twisted. Her smile was still there, but it cracked at the edges. I could see the twitch in her cheek now, the pulse in her neck, the tremble in her fingers that weren't glowing anymore.
"Why are you doing this?" she asked. "Why fight it?"
"Because I've got one thing you two don't," I said through gritted teeth.
She cocked her head. "And what's that?"
I spat down toward the console.
"A functioning brain."
Saelire rolled her eyes, ranting on about Kael'ven, and Yorz didn't respond.
She didn't argue. Didn't lash out. Didn't threaten.
She just pressed another button.
The glyph beneath my cage flared white.
I felt the shift before I saw it. My spine arched as the threads of soulsteel evaporated, leaving behind a sensation like my skin was being peeled off cell by cell.
I dropped—
But I didn't fall.
Something caught me. Shackles, invisible at first, then suddenly solid, wrapped around my wrists and ankles mid-air. The bracer pulsed once, and then the shackles pulled, locking my arms out to the sides and my legs downward, suspended like I was being crucified midair. My back arched against the force. Magic, soul magic, hummed around the bindings.
I couldn't move. I could twitch slightly, but anything past that?
Gone.
That cage I'd just been in was a prison, but this...This… was the altar.
The console lit up. Below me, the siphon flared in sequence. Then again. Then again. The light pulsed with rhythm now, like a countdown.
I gritted my teeth, trying to focus through the pressure building behind my eyes.
Yorz adjusted a dial and spoke, calm and clinical.
"Phase Two initiated. Core and catalyst are in position. Energy threshold stable. Beginning soul bridge alignment."
Her voice echoed with the dispassion of a surgeon.
Saelira let out a breath like she'd been holding it for years.
She stepped away from the side of the machine, her bare feet gliding across the stone, her hands outstretched, arms trembling like a worshipper standing before some divine flame.
"It's happening…" she whispered, tears trailing down her cheeks. "He's almost here… He's almost here."
I thrashed in the air.
Didn't work.
Didn't even budge the shackles.
"Don't do this!" I yelled. "You don't know what you're bringing back! You think he's going to love you? Thank you? He's going to use you!"
Saelira looked up at me with a serenity that made my stomach crawl.
"I want to be used. That's the point."
The siphon screamed.
Not with sound. With pressure. It felt like the walls were breathing, like the glyphs were crawling. My cursed energy surged up instinctively; my body wanted to fight, to burn, to resist.
I tried again to cut at the shackles, but again there was no difference; it was like they weren't physically there.
But it couldn't.
Yorz's gaze flicked up to me.
"Let him scream," she said flatly. "The ritual will be cleaner if the vessel's resistance breaks early."
I could feel the pulse of the bracer now.
Not just on my arm, in it.
Like something was crawling through it.
No, through me.
Like Kael'ven's soul had already slipped one finger through the crack.
My breath caught.
Then...black.
...
...
Hmm... It's dark now, I guess.
I looked down.
Hands. Normal.
No brainer. No soulsteel vines. No broken fingers. No cursed energy humming in my bones.
Just… hands. Eighteen-year-old hands.
What.
I flexed them, blinked, then looked up.
Empty black void.
Stretching in every direction like some kind of half-assed limbo. No stars. No floor. No sense of time. Just an oppressive nothingness that felt too still.
Then I turned around.
A farmhouse.
Of course.
Just… sitting there. Perfect little porch. Thatched roof. One busted window with the wood still splintered from when I threw a tantrum and launched a chair through it at age seven.
So yeah, that was the old farmhouse. Before the monsters. Before soul magic and system messages, and watching people die in front of me like it was a seasonal event.
I frowned.
"...No way this is heaven. This is too passive-aggressive to be heaven."
I started walking.
The void didn't really shift under me, but somehow I got closer. The boards of the porch creaked like they always did. The door was still too heavy, the kind that tried to trap your fingers if you weren't careful.
I stared at it for a second.
Knocked.
No answer.
Okay, sure. Guess we're doing this solo.
I pushed it open.
Same smell. Dust and firewood. A bit of stew, even. The table was still there, the same scratch marks from my blades, the same candle wax stains. The walls still had those dumb drawings I made, back when I still thought stick figures with swords were peak art.
It was quiet.
Too quiet.
And that's when it hit me.
This was mine. Mine. Not something conjured by Saelira. Not a soul cage. Not an illusion spell.
This was… my space.
"...Yep. This is definitely gonna suck."
Whhhsssssssssshhh—clack
A kettle.
No, seriously. A kettle. In the middle of this soul-sucking void, a limbo memory projection nightmare. A kettle. Someone was making tea. Or coffee.
Because apparently, my psychotic war-criminal cult leader of a father believes in creature comforts.
I turned my head slowly.
There. In the kitchen.
Kael'ven Morvayne.
Pouring steaming water into a chipped ceramic mug like we were about to have a cozy little heart-to-heart over biscuits and trauma.
He was exactly how I remembered him from our last conversation. Not robes or armour. Not a floating spirit made of screams and black fire.
Just… a man. Mid-thirties, maybe. Grey-streaked hair, sharp jaw, a black turtleneck and suspenders like some villainous Disney dad. The kind of guy who definitely puts pineapple on pizza and calls it "refined taste."
He didn't look at me.
Not yet.
Just stirred whatever was in the cup with a long, silver spoon, then turned slightly, raising the mug.
"Coffee?"
My mouth opened.
No words came out.
Kael'ven tilted his head, almost amused.
"I'd offer tea, but this is your memory, not mine. And you were always more of a caffeine goblin, weren't you?"
He gestured to the chair across from him.
"Come. Sit. We don't have long."
I stayed where I was.
Mostly because my legs were trying to decide whether to punch him, run, or just give up and start crying.
"Is this some kind of power move? Hot beverages in soul limbo?"
Kael'ven took a sip. Didn't answer right away.
Then he looked at me. Really looked.
And that warmth in his tone?
Gone.
"This is me being polite."
The way he said it…
It wasn't a threat. It was a fact.
"Polite. Right. You resurrect yourself with my body, and now you want to play 'Father Knows Best?'"
"I didn't resurrect myself."
He sat down, placing the mug gently on the table.
"You brought me here."
My skin prickled.
He folded his hands in front of him.
"Come. Sit. I won't ask again."
I hesitated.
Then, sighing dramatically like a kid being dragged to a parent-teacher conference, not that I've ever experienced it, I dragged out the chair and dropped into it.
"This better be decaf."
Kael'ven smiled faintly.
"You really are something, aren't you?"
"Oh, here we go. The 'you are special' speech. Just get to the part where you call me weak or a disappointment or whatever."
Kael'ven didn't flinch.
Didn't blink.
Just stared, like he was studying a bug under glass.
"You're not weak."
That caught me off guard.
"You're wasteful."
He leaned forward, just slightly.
"All that power. That System. The cursed energy. The other worlds. Everything you were given, and for what? Petty revenge? Sobbing over a woman who never told you she was pregnant?"
My spine stiffened.
"I've seen it all, Fin. Your memories. Your failures. Your tantrums. You've had two lives, and still, you stumble around like the world owes you something."
I gripped the edge of the table.
My fingers ached.
"So what? You gonna tell me you would've done better?"
Kael'ven's eyes burned cold.
"I already did."
The void around us pulsed.
"Cool. So what's next? You take over my body? Pull a 'thanks for the vessel, kid' and wear me like a suit?"
Kael'ven raised the mug again.
"I haven't decided fully yet."
He sipped, then set it down gently.
"You're gonna have to kill me first," I noted.
"That's the thing."
He leaned back slightly.
"I don't think I have to."
The lights around us dimmed. The farmhouse cracked slightly at the edges, like a photo burning slowly in reverse. The void bled in through the windows.
"I just have to wait for you to break." Kael'ven smiled.
I swallowed hard, gripping the edge of the table like it would stop the world from tilting.
"So that's it?" I asked, trying to keep my voice steady. "You've been watching me like some creep through a window, and now you want to... what? Fuse? Possess me? Get joint custody of my body?"
Kael'ven chuckled. It was low, smooth, almost pleasant, like the kind of laugh a man gives when he's already made up his mind.
"I didn't choose to watch, Fin. I was tethered. When your blood touched that blade, my last fragment attached to you, to your soul. The System didn't block me. It didn't even notice me."
He leaned back, resting one elbow on the table, fingers circling the rim of his mug.
"And I saw everything. The tantrums. The powers. The tears over a dead relationship. You have all this power, blessings, skills, knowledge of other worlds, and what do you do with it?"
I narrowed my eyes.
"I survived."
He raised an eyebrow.
"Barely."
"Bite me." I spat
Kael'ven didn't rise to it. His expression was cool. Dissecting.
"You wasted everything. That first life? You let it slip away. You were ordinary. Mediocre. Died in traffic."
"Gee, thanks."
"Then, you're reborn. A clean slate. A literal cheat code on your wrist. You could have built empires. Hunted gods. Rewritten fate itself. And what did you choose?"
His voice dipped.
"Sulking in shadows. Whining about Helga leaving the house. Crying over children who betrayed you after one dinner. Fighting like a child with his fists too big for his body."
My fists curled under the table.
"And yet, despite it all," he continued, "you still managed to carry me. You still reached this place. So yes… I'm disappointed. But I'm not surprised."
I stood up, chair screeching back behind me.
"Is this why you're here?" I snapped. "To gloat? To lecture me like I'm your failed science project?"
"No."
He stood too.
And when he did, the void around us reacted. Like it pulled away in reverence. Like it knew who was king here.
"I'm here because you are still my blood."
He stepped forward, slowly, as if explaining something to a child who just wouldn't listen.
"You are a vessel. Imperfect. Weak. Soft. But there is lineage in you. Power, older than this world's gods. A potential shaped not by talent, but by proximity to me. I don't need your permission. I don't even need your understanding."
I stepped back instinctively.
He didn't stop.
"I'm going to crush you. Turn your soul to ash and wear your skin like a coat. But that would be wasteful. And beneath me."
He stopped in front of me, close enough that I could see the reflection of the flame-kissed glyphs in his irises.
"So I will give you the greatest honour I could give, and use your body to take over everything."
My mouth was dry.
"What—"
"I'll start with Fae'run," he clarified. "Then, after I use The System, I will take over every possible world I can."
He lifted one hand, thumb and forefinger inches apart.
"And if you don't submit, I will crush you like the fly you are."
My heart pounded. Every instinct in my body screamed to run, to punch, to throw up, to scream. I didn't.
Instead, I forced out the only thing I had left:
"You talk a lot for a dead man."
Kael'ven smiled.
"You talk a lot for a child holding a borrowed blade."
And suddenly, just like that, the void shuddered.
I could feel it.
The soul siphon was pulling us back. Back to the chamber.
Kael'ven looked up, as if he could hear it too.
He didn't say goodbye.
Didn't nod.
Didn't gloat.
He just turned back to his coffee… and let the world burn around us.
...
End of Chapter