Beneath the ruins of the Old Divine Court, in a chamber long sealed with forgotten names, a glyph pulsed.
Just once.
No light.
No heat.
Only rhythm.
A heartbeat, remembered by the world itself.
And then—
A whisper.
"Now… they are learning to begin again."
Inside that chamber sat a throne.
But not one of gold, bone, or memory.
It was forged from ash.
Not the burned kind.
The preserved kind.
What remained after the first fire.
The real first fire.
Not Xu Shen's.
Not the gods'.
Before even choice—
The Fire That Waits.
It was not a being.
It was not a path.
It was the possibility of fire itself.
And for ten thousand cycles, it had said nothing.
It watched Xu Shen live and die.
Watched him rebel, reclaim, rewrite.
And it whispered once, when his flame nearly touched it:
"Not yet."
Now, with Coalspark alive…
Stitchfire blooming…
Hundreds of students shaping their own soulflames across the land…
It stirred.
In the Soul Flame School, in the lowest archive vault, Wei Lin paused mid-step.
He felt something.
Not danger.
Not fear.
Just…
Pull.
In the Vale of Temples, Lao Yun blinked and dropped her forge stylus.
The flame around her hand bent in a direction it never had before.
It wasn't breaking.
It was pointing.
Even Shen Tai, in deep meditation, heard a voice beneath his thoughts:
"You're not just lighting flame anymore."
"You're approaching where fire begins."
Back beneath the Court ruins, the ash throne pulsed again.
One more whisper into the void:
"Soon… one of them will step close enough."
"And when they do…"
"They won't rewrite me."
"They will ignite me."