They came not with fire, but with silence.
Three days after the fall of the Red Circle's warband, Eren's growing caravan of fighters and believers reached the southern edge of the Cradle Hills rolling land once used for pilgrimage, now twisted with scorched brush and strange stillness.
The signs were subtle at first. Villages emptied without struggle. Markets abandoned with coins still stacked. No signs of bloodshed. No signs of theft.
Just… absence.
Elira read the silence with increasing unease.
"This is how the Covenant moves," she said. "They don't march. They prepare."
Syra agreed. "They cut away sound before they strike."
By the time they reached the third village in that condition, the pattern was undeniable. The Covenant wasn't simply watching.
They were closing in.
Eren gathered the core of his group in the remains of an old wayhouse Syra, Elira, the swordhands, the healer, the singer-turned-scout, and two brothers who had followed the flame after watching their home vanish under Reclaimer banners.
Maps were laid. Paths debated.
"What do they want?" one of the brothers asked. "They've made no demands."
Syra folded her arms. "That is the demand. Obedience without question. They believe the flame should be dissected. Examined. Stripped of myth."
"And if we refuse?" the other brother said.
"They erase us."
Eren stood at the head of the table, Akreth resting on a broken shelf behind him. "The Covenant doesn't want the sword. They want to unmake what it stands for. If they take this group if they take me then the cycle doesn't restart."
He looked at the faces gathered around him.
"It ends empty."
The fire in his voice wasn't loud. It didn't need to be. It cut through the room like blade through still water.
They made their choice that night.
No one left.
That same night, the first shadow came.
A single figure, cloaked in grey-black robes, drifted into their camp just before midnight unguarded, unarmed, and unafraid.
Eren met him halfway, Syra and Elira flanking silently.
The figure lowered his hood.
He was old. Eyes like cold glass, face lined with runes instead of wrinkles. His voice, when it came, was as gentle as it was final.
"You are not the first flame to walk free."
Eren didn't answer.
"You are, however, the most dangerous."
"Why?" Eren asked. "Because I refuse to kneel?"
"No," the old man said. "Because you refuse to define."
He gestured toward the sword.
"Akreth has taken hundreds of names. Saints. Tyrants. Prophets. You give it none."
"I gave it my own," Eren said.
"That is not enough."
"It will have to be."
The old man smiled, faint and sad.
"Then the Covenant will come in full."
He turned without another word.
Syra wanted to stop him. Eren raised a hand.
"No," he said. "Let them deliver the message."
Elira watched the old man vanish into the darkness.
"That was a Seer," she said quietly. "One of the originals. They only speak when war becomes scripture."
The next day, the hills moved.
Lines of Covenant vanguards armor draped in grey, faces masked in silver mirrors marched along both ridgelines, hemming the caravan in without touching them. Scouts who had wandered too far were found asleep, not dead, but dreaming of impossible futures. Horses refused to ride north. The wind no longer whistled.
Only Eren could move freely through it all.
It was as if the land had bent around him.
When Syra tried to push forward, her boots sank into mud that hadn't been there seconds before. When Elira cast spells to clear the path, the runes flickered and reversed, as if rewriting her intent.
"We're caught in a veil trap," she growled.
Eren didn't hesitate. He stepped forward, holding Akreth aloft.
The blade pulsed not in anger, but in recognition.
Then it flared.
Silver fire burst outward, not to burn but to clear.
The ground rippled. The fog split. The road beyond reformed in perfect silence.
The Covenant did not block him.
They only watched.
From the edges of hills. From behind trees. From the air itself.
And that silence… was an invitation.
That night, Eren lit the first signal fire.
Not for allies.
For enemies.
He stood atop a mound at the center of camp, Akreth stabbed into the earth before him, flames rising behind.
"This is not a war for possession," he called into the dark. "This is a war for truth."
His voice echoed.
"This sword has been a tool, a weapon, a curse. But now it is a mirror. And I will not let you decide what it reflects."
Dozens gathered in the firelight.
He met their eyes.
"If you fear what I carry, then face me. If you would bind it again, then try. But you will not twist its meaning in silence."
Behind him, the fire roared higher.
And for the first time since Serethal, the wind answered him.
From far to the east, a new flame rose.
A banner ignited.
Not one of Circle. Not Reclaimer. Not Covenant.
But his.
Silver, red, and white Akreth's new flame, stitched by the scout who once sang for kings, held by hands that had never wielded power.
And on it:
No sigil.
No name.
Only the flame.
Unbound.