The wind changed.
It wasn't natural wind—not something made by weather or mountains. It came from deeper. Beneath the roots of the world. A tremor in the fabric of peace. The kind that turns still air into a warning.
Elior felt it first. Standing by the pool, his hands still faintly glowing from where he'd placed the staff fragments, he turned his head sharply. The light around him shifted—too fast, too jagged. Eliano looked up from where he was stacking small stones, blinking.
Then Seraphis growled.
Low.
Deep.
He crouched, claws digging into the soft silver grass, his tail flicking side to side in short, precise cuts.
The pool darkened.
The sky above them stuttered. Not with clouds. With tears. Fractures. Thin rips of black cutting through the soft green morning they had made.
Something was coming.
No.
Something found them.
Elior moved fast. In a blur, he stepped between Eliano and the pool, his hand raised. The staff pieces behind him vibrated. They recognized the pressure. They remembered war.
One shard rose from the ground on its own.
Then another.
And another.
They floated, spun—slowly forming a circle. A barrier. A seal.
Seraphis leapt forward just as the sky ripped open like cloth.
From that split came shadow—not just darkness, but erasure. A giant figure slammed down into the field, landing on two feet, its body cloaked in shifting armor that looked like smoke trapped in steel. Its face—if it had one—was hidden by a twisted helm of black bone.
In its hand: a blade.
Longer than a man. Made of frozen silence.
The impact cracked the pool.
Elior's voice was quiet. "Get behind the ward."
Eliano obeyed. No words. Just trust.
Seraphis didn't wait.
He charged.
The beast was a blur—fire bursting from his paws with each step, a line of red light tearing behind him. He jumped, twisted midair, claws igniting into arcs of sun-colored flame—and slammed into the invader's chest.
The enemy slid back.
But didn't fall.
Instead, it raised its sword—and dragged it through the ground. The blade didn't cut grass. It cut memory. Wherever it passed, the field forgot it existed. Trees blinked out. Echoes went silent.
Elior moved.
He snapped his hand up.
The remaining staff shards lit up and flew to him—reforming not into one weapon, but a halo of pieces. Twelve shards, floating, orbiting. Each humming with a different light.
He stepped forward, the field bending around his steps.
The enemy turned.
Charged.
They met in the middle.
The blade came down.
Elior didn't block.
He spun sideways, hands flashing—six shards launched forward, crashing into the sword like meteors. The weapon cracked. Just for a moment. Just enough.
Elior slid in close, palms open—memory-thread shot from his fingers, wrapping the enemy's arms. Not rope. Not spell. Stories—his own, woven tight into light.
The enemy roared, jerking free.
But Elior was already gone—above, midair, shards spiraling around him.
He dropped like lightning.
And struck with all twelve.
The field exploded in a column of gold and ash.
Seraphis flashed through the dust—his body blazing now, lines of light burning from his ribs to his eyes. He leapt again, claws like blades, carving down the enemy's legs.
The armored figure stumbled—but didn't fall.
Instead, its helm split.
And from inside came not a face—
—but more shadow.
It screamed.
And the sound shook the world.
Elior was thrown backward. Crashed through a tree that hadn't existed a moment ago. He landed hard, blood in his mouth, ribs cracked. His vision blurred.
He looked up.
The enemy raised its sword again.
Not toward him.
Toward the ward.
Toward Eliano.
"No," Elior breathed.
He forced himself up.
Too slow.
The sword came down.
Seraphis moved.
Faster than he ever had.
He threw himself in front of the strike. Took it full.
The blade carved through his shoulder, through his side.
He hit the ground hard.
Didn't move.
Eliano screamed. "Seraphis!"
Elior roared.
The shards answered.
They didn't wait for commands. They knew. They rose—burning. Each one now shaped like a memory.
His mother's hand.
Vera's eyes.
Lioran's crest.
Twelve stories.
Twelve blades.
They spiraled around him, fused—and the staff returned, taller than before, wrapped in threads of fire, water, sky, and bone.
Elior raised it.
And the earth answered.
The pool cracked open. Not with water—but with light—pouring upward in a column of raw potential.
Elior stepped into it.
And changed.
His armor reformed—not metal, but threadwoven moments. His skin glowed with runes not of power, but presence. He wasn't drawing from the past.
He was choosing now.
He blasted forward.
Hit the enemy with the full force of the staff.
The sword shattered.
The helm cracked.
Elior spun the staff over his back and slammed it down with both hands.
A ring of memory tore out.
And inside it—the battlefield stopped.
The enemy looked around.
Confused.
Frozen.
And in that moment—Elior spoke.
"You don't belong here."
He thrust the staff forward.
Light wrapped the shadow.
Pulled it apart.
Not with violence.
But with truth.
The enemy screamed again—but this time, it wasn't rage.
It was fear.
As it dissolved.
Back into the nothing it came from.
Gone.
The air stilled.
The sky mended.
Elior dropped to one knee, the staff clattering beside him. He gasped, chest heaving. Blood on his lip. Hands shaking.
But he was alive.
And Eliano ran to him.
Wrapped small arms around his waist. Buried his face in Elior's shoulder. "You stopped it…"
Elior held him tight. "Not alone."
Seraphis lay still.
Too still.
Elior rushed to him, Eliano beside him.
The beast's eyes were half-lidded. Breathing shallow. Blood soaked the grass under him.
"No," Elior whispered. "No, no—don't do this."
Seraphis smiled, just barely. "Told you... I'd see it through."
"You're not done yet," Elior said, voice breaking.
Seraphis blinked slowly. "Then help me remember."
Elior pressed both hands to the beast's side.
And let go.
Poured every remaining thread of memory—not just his, but everyone's—into the wound.
The staff flickered.
The shards inside it cracked.
But the light flowed.
And the wound closed.
Slow.
Then faster.
Until Seraphis coughed, wheezed—and growled. "...That's cheating."
Elior laughed through tears. "I'll allow it."
They sat together for a long time. Quiet again.
Until the field began to shift once more.
But not in warning.
In welcome.
From the pool rose a figure.
Not human.
Not beast.
Just light.
The Guardian of this place.
It looked at Elior. At Eliano. At Seraphis.
Then bowed.
Not in reverence.
But in invitation.
Elior stood.
The staff in his hand, still dim, still tired—but whole.
He looked at the figure.
Then at his son.
Then back at the sky.
And nodded.
"We're not done yet."
The path opened again.
And this time—
It led forward.