The Vault screamed.
Not with sound, but with pressure.The chains of law shuddered as something inside pressed outward — not yet free, but no longer still.
Elian's blade hummed louder than ever.The Memory Steel recognized the Seed.It wanted to be closer.
He fought the pull.
The Silent Court encircled them now.
Dozens of robed figures moved without haste, as though certain of victory. Their faces remained hidden beneath polished masks — faceless, eyeless, watching through presence rather than sight.
Auren stood at their head.
She spoke calmly.
"This was always your destination, Warden. You merely traveled the long path to deliver it to us."
Elian took one step forward, blade raised.
"I didn't come to deliver anything."
"You misunderstand," Auren replied. "You are the delivery."
She gestured to the Vault.
"The Seed requires a host. Not a vessel, not a prison. A will strong enough to channel its rebirth. You closed the First Fracture — you proved yourself. We merely waited for you to come home."
Elian's stomach turned.
Of course.
They hadn't tried to stop him.
They'd guided him. Allowed him to grow. Allowed him to cleanse the fractures. They had been grooming him — not as an enemy, but as an heir.
The Court didn't just want his blade.
They wanted him.
Lysara's glyphs flared bright.Cray drew his shortblades.Calen gritted his teeth, hands glowing with stabilizing energy.
Veylen simply stood still, watching.
"You can refuse," Auren said softly."But understand — once the Seed fully awakens, it will choose someone. It cannot remain contained. And there are others—"
She gestured.
Two Court Sentinels dragged forward a figure wrapped in chains of mirrored light.
Elian's breath caught.
Master Orien.
His old commander. The one who betrayed him to the Orders. The one who declared him corrupted.
Now — broken.Hollow-eyed.Whispers leaking from his skin.
Auren's voice became silk again.
"The others cannot bear it. You can."
She smiled.
"Choose."
For a moment, time thinned.
Elian heard the Vault's pulse inside his skull.
I am not prison.I am potential.I am the undone choice.
He saw flashes in his mind:
The world remade.
The fractures healed.
The Court broken.
Endless power.
He staggered.
The Seed pressed.
You could fix everything.
Then—
A hand grabbed his shoulder.
Veylen.
His voice was low, firm.
"Don't listen."
Elian blinked.
The others stood with him — Lysara, Cray, Calen.Exhausted. Flawed. Mortal.
But free.
Elian steadied.
He raised the blade.
"No."
The Court moved.
The chamber erupted.
Lysara's glyphs ignited like suns, forming layered shields. Cray launched forward, cutting down the first wave with twin blades flashing. Calen stabilized the floor beneath them, locking the shifting reality into place.
The Court surged like a tide.
Elian charged straight toward Auren.
Their blades clashed — hers a thin staff of folding dimensions, his humming with living memory.
Steel met silence.
Power met purpose.
"You cannot stop us!" Auren shouted, her voice twisting into a thousand echoes.
"I'm not here to stop you," Elian growled.
"I'm here to end it."
He forced her back, strike after strike. Each blow shattered layers of her construct armor. Sparks of broken reality burst from the impacts, dissolving into raw light.
Behind them, the Vault began to rupture.
The chains splintered.
The Seed reached.
Suddenly, Veylen stepped forward, casting something into the air — a device of his own design, forged from the stolen knowledge of the Cartographer.
It latched onto the Vault.
A stabilizer.
A temporary lock.
The Seed howled.
Auren screamed in fury.
"You don't understand what you refuse!"
Elian drove his blade straight through the center of her mask.
The Speaker of the Court fell.
The remaining Sentinels hesitated — then fled into the folds of the Dominion.
Silence returned.
For now.
The Vault hovered, trembling, its containment barely holding.
The Seed was awake — but contained.
Veylen exhaled.
"That won't hold forever."
Elian lowered his blade.
"Then we find a way to seal it properly."
Calen approached, voice shaking.
"There may not be one."
Lysara spoke softly, eyes fixed on the Vault.
"Then we make one."
In the distant shadows, far beyond the ruins of the Court's shattered assault, something else stirred.
It had no name.
Because even the Court feared to name it.
The true danger was not the Seed.
But what had once fed upon it.
And it was hungry again.