Chapter Four: Parallel Pulse
Part Twelve
Date: Maelis 26, Year 204 PCR
Location: Caervale Ridge – Shattered Pulsewar Basin
Time: Midnight fractured
The sky collapsed into itself.
Not with thunder—with memory.
Glyph shards twisted upward like glass struck from below, freezing mid-air as Zephryn vanished into the humline.
The squads screamed his name—too late.
The basin didn't echo it.
For a moment, only silence.
Then—
The glyph detonated outward.
And Zephryn stood at the center again.
But he was not the same.
His body was streaked with residual glyphburn—spiraling arcs of silver and ash curled along his arms and neck.
Bubbalor hovered behind him, humming a tone no one had ever heard before—not Pulse, not Choir, not Doctrine.
Kaelen dropped back a step.
"What… is that noise?"
Yolti stared wide-eyed.
"It's a remembered chord—but no one alive should know it."
Zephryn's eyes weren't glowing.
They were reflecting.
Not light.
Not energy.
But history.
Sylie stepped forward, ready to speak—but Zephryn raised a hand.
And the moment he did—
Tether collapsed to one knee.
The Choir agent screamed in static.
Not words.
A desperate, broken hum—like a broadcast ripped through a shattered instrument.
Rhea covered her ears.
"It's retreating."
Mino's voice sharpened.
"It's unraveling."
Zephryn looked at the Choir soldier.
And spoke without casting.
"Tell them this…"
His voice was calm. Too calm.
"Tell the Hollow Choir I found the pulse they buried under Caelus' last breath."
Tether screamed again—louder this time.
The Choir ring cracked down the middle.
Its glyphs began burning away, unraveling as if exposed to something forbidden.
Selka stepped to Zephryn's side, blade still half-raised.
"What did you just say?"
Zephryn turned to her slowly.
The spiral glyph hovered behind him—∞ drawn in full pulselight, edges humming like a Veilmark too old to name.
"The world's not broken because we forgot," he said softly.
"It's broken because they made us remember wrong."
And from the far edge of the basin, where shadows had been watching—
A voice echoed in.
Not from Tether.
From the faceless one still standing near the fractured ring.
One word. No accent. No hesitation.
"Ruinborn."
The squads froze.
Nima dropped her snack.
Liora's glyph flickered.
Kaelen gripped his halberd with white knuckles.
Mino turned sharply.
"What did it just call him?"
Yolti whispered, eyes wide:
"Not Zephryn."
"Not Riftborn."
"Ruinborn."
The basin began to hum again.
A tone no one had taught.
A tone everyone remembered.
And Zephryn…
Smiled.