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"In the head of the dead, everything whispers, and nothing lies still."
—Old Xandarian proverb
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Guided by the mysterious encrypted message, Kaelar prepared for a journey none on Vorthar had taken before—a crossing beyond known flame-lines, into the Unbound Reach, where lawless stars glimmered like knives and civilizations bled in silence.
T'Rel objected, even pleaded. But Kaelar knew the spark within him was now part of something far larger than even his world. He was Chosen—and the fire demanded motion.
Aboard the Aetherwing, a vessel gifted by the Vortharian Artificers and powered by crystallized solar flame, Kaelar sailed beyond the spheres. His ship moved like a phoenix between black holes and broken moons, until—like a void-thought whispered—Knowhere emerged.
A city of rot and brilliance. Streets carved through gray cerebral matter. Towers built atop cortical ridges. A melting pot of Kree smugglers, Skrull informants, Xandarian traders, even a few off-world mutants… and always under the gaze of one eternal presence:
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Kaelar expected danger. What he didn't expect was obsession.
The moment he stepped foot into the atrium of bone and starlight, the Collector greeted him with a smile too wide and eyes that twitched with ancient curiosity.
> "Flameborn… oh, you're real.
I once collected a spark fragment from a Chosen who died during Trial Ascension…
But none of them survived the Third Stage—until you.
I must have you—your essence, at least."
Kaelar frowned, already reaching for the Star Hammer.
But the Collector raised a hand. He was insane—but not suicidal.
> "Relax. I don't mean death.
I mean… knowledge.
For I have something of yours."
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Inside the Collector's vault—guarded by Chronos Entropy Shields and guarded by tamed Mindless Ones—Kaelar was shown a containment prism pulsing with flame. Not Vortharian flame, but something more primal, older.
It danced erratically, like a soul fragment still fighting.
> "This," the Collector said, "belonged to a Klyntari-born Chosen.
He failed the Trial's final fear—drowned by memories of genocide.
But his flame remained… fractured, but intact."
Kaelar approached. The flame reacted. It stretched toward him—recognizing a kindred spirit.
In that moment, Kaelar saw visions.
The Trial ground on Klyntar.
A being made of shadow and silk, screaming in failure.
A wound in the Architect's realm where lost Chosen drifted endlessly.
He stumbled back.
The Collector only smiled wider.
> "You see now, don't you?
There's a tear. A leak in the Architect's design.
Not all worthy souls ascend. Some… rot.
What would you give to fix that?"
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Kaelar was torn.
To take the fragment into himself would be to carry another's grief, a broken soul etched with trauma and rage. But to leave it was to abandon a fellow Chosen—even if that Chosen had failed.
He made his decision under the guidance of his flame.
> "No part of the Flame should be forgotten."
He reached forward, touched the prism—
And the fragment merged with him.
Flames exploded. The vault screamed. The Mindless Ones bowed.
Kaelar's form surged—he glimpsed the boundary between Second and Third Stage, felt the fire refining, pushing, evolving.
> "One step closer," the Flame whispered.
"One soul reclaimed."
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As Kaelar left the vault, flames still smoldering around his shoulders, the Collector caught his eye.
> "You're not the only one searching.
There are others—Chosen who took the Fourth Step… and vanished.
And there's one who hunts them."
Kaelar froze.
> "A hunter?"
The Collector nodded, unusually grim.
> "Nullborn. A being born in the moment the Architect breathed first fire.
It exists to devour Chosen Flames and extinguish the Trial from reality.
And it grows… closer."
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Back aboard the Aetherwing, Kaelar stood in silence, watching Knowhere shrink into the void. In his palm, the Star Hammer pulsed with two flames now—his and the fallen Chosen's.
He didn't know it, but across the cosmos, his name was being whispered:
> On Spartax, among Nova officers.
In Kree war-courts and Skrull prophecy domes.
Even among the Watchers, who turned one eye toward Vorthar.
The Flame had begun to spread.
And Kaelar had just lit a beacon the galaxy could no longer ignore.
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