The platform shimmered beneath Nyra's bare feet, still pulsing faintly with the magic of the trial. A gentle breeze ruffled her silver hair, damp with sweat and Stardust. Her knees buckled for just a moment, but she caught herself. No collapsing this time.
She had walked through the hollows of her mind. Faced her fractured self. Screamed into the void. And the void? It had screamed back.
Now she stood quietly victorious.
A soft chime echoed from her forearm. The Architect Mark had changed—no longer just radiant lines and circuits. Nestled near the centre was a fractal glyph, spiralling inward like a neural tree, pulsing gently with soft blue light.
Seraphine hovered nearby, arms folded, wings faintly spread. For once, her eyes held no mischief, only a proud, enigmatic glint.
"Well," she said. "You didn't melt. That's promising."
Nyra chuckled, voice hoarse. "Came close."
From behind, two pairs of feet skidded to a stop on the platform.
"NYRAAA!" Mira cried out like a cannonball and tackled her with zero restraint.
Kaeli followed close behind, sandwiching Nyra in a three-way hug that made her ribs scream louder than the trial ever had.
"I was so close to storming in there," Mira sniffled. "I had a rescue speech ready and everything."
"You were crying through it, though," Kaeli added softly, brushing a tear away with the back of her hand.
"I wasn't crying. I was leaking courage through my face!"
Spark, perched atop a floating crystal shard nearby, crossed his tails dramatically. "Aww, group trauma cuddle. How quaint. I give this performance... seven out of ten. Too wet."
Nyra buried her face in her sister's shoulders. The ache inside her hadn't vanished, but it felt… quieter now. Muted. Manageable.
"I saw myself," she whispered. "All of me. The scary parts. The angry ones. Even the part that hated being reborn."
Mira pulled back slightly, expression softening.
"And?"
Nyra smiled—tired, cracked, but real.
"I think I'm ready to write a new part now."
Seraphine clapped once, sharply.
"Perfect timing, darling. Because you've just been patched. And I am excited to test what this version of you can do."She pointed at the glowing mark on Nyra's arm. "Let's see how well the new firmware holds up, shall we?"
Spark grinned.
"Patch notes incoming. Pray to whatever gods still tolerate us."
Nyra sat cross-legged atop a floating crystal disk as Seraphine paced in front of her like a mad professor mid-thesis defence. A glowing datasphere hovered between them, filled with spiralling runes and pulse-glyphs, reacting to the shifting lines of Nyra's Architect Mark.
"First things first," Seraphine began, conjuring a tiny chalkboard from thin air. "You've undergone what I like to call a soul-level defrag. That was not just symbolic, dear—it was code-deep."
She tapped the chalkboard. It made a holographic ping.
"Here's what we're working with now."
Nyra's Patch Notes: v2.1
Mirrorweave – A reflexive glyph-thread spell that allows Nyra to replicate or bounce magic back at the caster. Warning: doesn't work on bad vibes or Spark's insults.
Architect GlyphOptimisation – Casting speed up 30%. Glyph complexity limit increased by 2 tiers. Possibility of runic fusion unlocked.
Essentia Flow Calibration – Internal channelling is smoother. Nyra can now cast mid-motion, in stressful conditions, without mana lockout.
Passive Update: Fractal Conduit – Mark harmonises with lunar essence on instinct, allowing for latent defence spells when unconscious or overwhelmed.
"Basically," Seraphine said with a twirl, "you're a tiny little god-in-beta. And I am so proud I could pop a wing."
Mira's head popped up from behind a floating shard.
"She gets a passive upgrade!? What is this, a mobile gacha game?"
Kaeli elbowed her from behind cover. "Shhh, I'm taking notes."
Seraphine smirked. "Since you two are lurking, why don't I invite your instructors in early?"
She snapped her fingers.
The sky shimmered.
And then, chaos entered with fashion.
The clouds above parted like stage curtains as Vaelgard descended—not walked, not floated—descended via sparkling thread-ladder made of rainbow fire.
Massive. Majestic. Muscles that made statues weep. Dressed in a sleeveless, rose-tinted tunic cinched by a ribbon belt with a butterfly clasp.
He struck a pose midair.
"Hellooo, darlings~ I heard someone needed discipline with a generous side of sparkle."
Mira's mouth opened. No sound came out. Awe and a hint of an identity crisis.
Where Vaelgard was fire and flair, Ellesmere was grace woven into silk. She emerged riding a curling vine that slithered across the arena, coiling into a throne of petals that opened like a blooming flower.
She curtsied mid-air. Her voice was like a lullaby.
"Greetings, little heirs of storm and moon. I come bearing peace, patience… and pressure."
Kaeli's eyes sparkled. "She's so pretty. I want to bow and also cry."
Seraphine sipped her conjured tea with a wicked grin.
"Let the mayhem begin."
Spark, watching all this unfold from atop a floating biscuit tray, raised an eyebrow.
"We've officially crossed into an anime opening sequence."
Mira twirled once in her newly conjured training attire—a sleek, dark purple combat suit that sparkled like stars…except for the giant frilly ribbon slapped across her chest like a gift tag that read: "Trouble".
"I love it," she whispered. "I feel powerful. I feel cute. I could suplex a unicorn."
"Please don't," Kaeli muttered, fidgeting with the lace-lined hood of her ensemble, which looked more like an enchanted nun's battle habit than anything designed for stealth. "Why does mine have prayer beads? I'm not even religious."
Ellesmere floated between them, gentle but unyielding. She waved her vine-carved staff, and the beads on Kaeli's sleeves shimmered into vines coiled around thin blades.
"You may not be religious," Ellesmere said, tone honey-sweet, "but you do wield essence like a hymn. Your spells sing. Now let's teach them to resonate."
Vaelgard strutted around Mira like a flamboyant drill sergeant, arms behind his back, heels clicking like this was a runway and a battlefield at the same time.
"Now listen, glitter-bomb," he said, tossing her a long-handled sabre with a pink jewel in the hilt, "we're gonna channel that volatile sass of yours into something divine. Your Essentia screams chaos—but fabulous chaos."
Mira caught the sabre and did a twirl with it. It fizzled, sparked, and briefly turned into a mop. Then back.
"…I can work with this," she grinned.
Kaeli's lesson: Learning to harmonise her wind and healing essence into Verdant Echoes—a series of healing pulses that follow the rhythm of heartbeats.
Mira's challenge: Stabilising her raw power into Flashrift Strikes, teleporting slashes that leave afterimages shaped like crescent moons.
Meanwhile, on her platform, Nyra sat with Spark perched upside down on her head.
She watched her sisters train, sweat, and flounder—but they didn't give up.
"So," Spark chirped, "is this the part where you realise you're not the only glittering prodigy in the family?"
Nyra smiled. Tired. Proud.
"No," she said softly. "This is the part where I realise I've never been alone."
Back at the twin training zones, Mira was already sparring with a conjured illusion of herself—and losing spectacularly.
"Why is Past Me so smug?!"
Vaelgard blew her a kiss. "Because she hasn't seen your redemption arc yet, darling."
Kaeli, meanwhile, stood steady as petals bloomed under her feet with each cast. She wasn't flashy, but her magic shimmered like a wind-chime orchestra in springtime.
Ellesmere clapped politely. "Exquisite. You are already becoming the storm before the bloom."
In the centre arena, Seraphine spun in place and sipped from a mango-shaped teacup.
"The triplets have awakened," she muttered. "Gods save whoever tries to flirt with them now."
Spark threw a popcorn kernel into his mouth and grinned.
"Can we get matching capes? I vote yes."
A low pulse echoed through the Divine Arena, followed by a chime that sounded suspiciously like a bell from a magical theme park.
"TRIAL SIMULATION: PARTY SYNC TEST—BEGIN."
Seraphine's voice echoed like an announcer, way too enthusiastic. The training platforms shifted, converging into a battlefield ring with moonlight-glass floors and arched sky-bridges.
"Three sisters. One battlefield. One very glitchy hydra illusion," Seraphine grinned as a massive nine-headed serpent phased into reality, each head breathing a different elemental type—from fire to wind, ice to glittering sonic waves.
Mira grinned and cracked her knuckles. "So… what's the plan?"
Nyra, now back in action after her upgrade sessions, stepped forward and summoned her Architect glyph mid-air, smooth, radiant, pulsing with rhythm.
"We follow the script," she smirked. "Kaeli leads defence and terrain control. Mira, you're on offence with me."
Mira pointed her sabre. "Yes, ma'am, Glitch Queen."
Kaeli groaned. "You two are gonna get us killed with cool poses, aren't you?"
"Yes," they said in unison.
Phase 1: Scatter
The hydra illusion roared, and the arena shattered into hexagonal tiles floating midair. Heads lunged.
Kaeli danced across platforms, casting Verdant Echoes, weaving healing pulses through lunar currents. Wherever she stepped, flora bloomed and formed springboard vines to redirect falling debris or boost her sisters into better positions.
"I'm not just a healer anymore," she muttered, shielding Nyra with a pulse. "I'm the battlefield's rhythm."
Phase 2: Clash
Mira streaked past a hydra head, teleporting mid-slash with Flashrift Strikes. Her attacks left glowing crescents that detonated like mana mines after a few seconds.
"Who needs wings when you've got ✨chaotic ballet✨?"
Vaelgard screamed in the distance, "THAT'S MY GIRL!! STAB THAT HEAD WITH FLAIR!"
Mira obliged—slamming into the central head, slicing through an illusion core with such drama it set off sparkles.
Phase 3: Sync
Nyra floated above them all, glyphs circling like moons around a planet. Her voice echoed with Kairos-tinged modulation as she shouted:
"Architect Override: Bind all glyph frequencies. Cast Mode—Symphony!"
The glyphs linked mid-air—hers, Mira's and Kaeli's—into a single glowing constellation.
Kaeli channelled her vines into binding chains. Mira charged all remaining power into a mirrored dive. Nyra overrode the hydra illusion's elemental matrix with a divine command-line.
All three shouted:
"TRIPLE THREAD: LUNAR OVERDRIVE!"
A triple impact of stealth, strength, and spellwriting erupted into a moon-shaped blast that erased the hydra in one celestial boom.
Aftermath
The arena reassembled.
Spark, on Seraphine's shoulder, stared slack-jawed.
"Okay… okay, damn. They just did a family combo move. That's not fair. That's illegal."
Seraphine slowly applauded, half-smirking.
"And they said siblings would never work well in divine-level formation. What a delightfully chaotic rebuttal."
Vaelgard threw a bouquet of conjured roses at Mira. Ellesmere curtsied toward Kaeli. Nyra just exhaled, still glowing slightly.
Kaeli, wide-eyed, looked at her sisters. "Did we just… do that?"
Mira beamed, panting. "We did. And it looked awesome. We need a team pose now."
Nyra didn't argue.
They struck a ridiculous—but—weirdly majestic pose.
"Triplets of Lunareth," Mira declared. "Coming soon to a prophecy near you."
Spark huffed, rolling his eyes. "Gods save me from emotionally bonded murder princesses."