We stand there longer than we should.
The cold keeps biting.
Neither of us moves.
Sage pulls back first.
Not far.
Enough to look at me.
"You never answered something," she says.
I brace.
"When you talk about Nazz," she continues, slower now, "are you afraid of him… or of yourself?"
That lands deep.
Right where the obsidian hum never shuts up.
"I am afraid of choice," I say.
"Every time I let him surface, things end faster. Cleaner. And part of me likes that."
Her jaw tightens.
"And part of you hates that you like it."
"Yes."
She exhales.
Steam curls between us.
"You think power equals corruption," she says.
"You think strength turns you into Mercier."
"I watched it happen," I reply.
"Over and over. Men with authority. Men with vision. They rot. They rot and call it progress."
She steps to my side.
Looks out across the frozen land.
"Then do not be a man like them," she says.
"Be worse. Be honest."
I glance at her.
"That is your advice?"
"Yes."
A pause.
"I am serious," she adds.
"They lied to themselves. You do not. You stare straight at your own damage. That matters."
The wind howls.
The shard pulses in my palm.
"I killed people who deserved it," I say.
"And people who did not. Lines blur after a while."
She nods.
"I know."
That stops me.
"You know?"
"I feel it when you sleep," she says.
"When your breathing shifts. When your hand curls like you expect a weapon."
I look away.
Shame creeps in, sharp and hot.
"I never meant for you to see that."
"You never meant for Lucy or Scarlett to see it either," she says softly.
"And they still did."
Silence stretches.
"I am not them," Sage says.
"I know."
"No," she insists.
"You think you know. You do not."
She turns to face me fully.
"I am not fragile. I am not innocent. I chose this path. I chose you."
Her voice wavers.
She keeps going.
"If you fall, I will not pretend surprise. If you change, I will adapt. If Nazz takes more space, I will stand closer."
I clench my jaw.
"You should not have to."
"Stop deciding what I should be," she snaps.
Then softer.
"Let me be what I am."
I breathe in.
Slow.
Grounding.
"You are hope," I say.
She flinches.
"Do not put that on me."
"Then what are you?"
She thinks.
Longer than expected.
"I am proof," she says.
"That you are still choosing."
The words hit harder than any blade.
I nod once.
"Then stay close," I tell her.
"When this gets worse."
She offers a tired smile.
"I already am."
We turn forward together.
Snow crunches under our steps.
The world stays broken.
Enemies still wait.
The climb still hurts.
But I am not walking alone.
And for now, that keeps the darkness patient.
We walk for a while without speaking.
Not because words run out.
Because silence feels earned.
The terrain shifts under our feet. Snow thins. Stone shows through, cracked and scarred, like the world tried to heal and gave up halfway. My boots crunch slower. Each step drags memory with it.
"I keep thinking about Monroe," I say eventually.
It slips out before I plan it.
Sage tilts her head. "The one who pulled you out."
"Yes."
I pause.
"The one who chose to see me as human."
She waits. She always does.
"He never asked what I was," I continue.
"Never tried to measure me. He saw the mess and still cut me loose from it. No leash. No conditions."
"That is rare," she says.
"That is why it terrifies me."
She glances at me. "Because you think he was wrong."
"Because I think he paid for it," I answer.
We stop at the crest of a ridge. Below us stretches Nia, fractured plains, distant ruins, faint light bending wrong near the horizon. The dome scars still linger like ghosts of pressure.
"I keep wondering," I say, "if everyone who helps me ends up worse for it."
Sage steps closer. Her shoulder brushes mine.
"You did not break Monroe," she says.
"You survived him."
"That is not comfort."
"It is truth."
I laugh under my breath. Short. Bitter.
"Truth feels expensive."
She looks up at the sky. "Everything valuable is."
I flex my hand. The shard hums, steady, patient. Killiden stirs beneath my skin, restrained by habit and exhaustion.
"When I follow their intentions," I say, "the remnants, the ones who took parts of Serkauis, I feel them thinking. Planning. Justifying."
"And?" she asks.
"And none of them think they are evil."
She closes her eyes.
"That scares you more than monsters."
"Yes."
She opens them again. Steel in her gaze.
"Then hunt them anyway."
I turn to her.
"They chose to fracture a god," she continues.
"They chose power over consequence. Intention does not absolve outcome."
I study her face. The calm. The conviction.
"You sound like me," I say.
She smirks faintly. "I have been paying attention."
A distant rumble rolls across the plains. Not thunder. Movement. Something massive shifting far away.
I feel it instantly. A tug in my chest. A direction.
"One of them is close," I say.
Sage tightens the straps on her gear. No hesitation. No fear.
"Which piece?"
"Do not know yet," I reply.
"But it knows me."
She meets my eyes.
"Then let it learn faster."
I draw my bow. The obsidian veins along my arm glow faintly, restrained, obedient. Power coils, waiting for permission.
We move again.
Toward intention.
Toward consequence.
And for the first time in a long while, the path ahead feels chosen, not forced.
We feel him before we understand him.
The ground does not shake.
It compresses.
Each step grows heavier, like the world remembers weight and decides to enforce it again. My lungs work harder. My thoughts drag, like they need to push through something unseen.
Sage slows beside me. She does not speak. She does not need to.
Something is here.
We crest a ridge and the land opens into a basin carved smooth by refusal. No erosion scars. No ruin. Stone pressed into order by time and pressure alone. At the center stands a shrine.
Not abandoned. Not broken.
Waiting.
I approach first. I place my palm against the stone.
Nothing.
No pulse. No recoil. No warning. Just cold certainty. Whatever built this does not answer to me.
Sage steps forward, frowning, then presses her hand to the same place.
The shrine exhales.
Stone plates slide apart with a sound like mountains shifting in their sleep. Heat spills out. Old heat. Deep heat. The kind that never learned urgency.
Sage pulls her hand back, breath unsteady. "It reacted to me."
I nod once. "Figures."
We descend.
The passage spirals downward, wide and deliberate, like it expects processions rather than intruders. Gravity thickens. My bones feel heavier, not strained, just… acknowledged.
At the bottom, the chamber opens.
I stop.
Something enormous stands at its center. Humanoid in shape, but wrong in scale and texture. Plates of stone grind against one another with each breath, not in chaos, but compression. Cracks run through its chest, glowing faintly, molten light pulsing slow and steady.
A heart.
Then I see the hand around its throat.
Killiden, twisted into fingers, biting into stone and endurance alike.
Malfious.
He holds the towering figure aloft as if weight is a suggestion.
"I find this excessive," Malfious says, voice smooth, irritated. "So many Remnants gathering in one decaying system."
Remnants.
Sage stiffens. My jaw locks.
The stone giant does not resist. Does not thrash. Does not plead.
It endures.
Malfious tilts his head, studying his captive. "Tell me, Armilio. Why do they always come to you?"
The name lands heavy.
Armilio.
Sage's breath catches. Mine stops entirely.
"The Foundation," Malfious continues casually, tightening his grip. "The one who never fell. Reduced to standing quietly while history piles up around you."
The glow in Armilio's chest flares once. Then steadies.
"And tell me," Malfious adds, eyes narrowing, "where is the fault?"
My spine goes rigid.
"The fracture," he says. "The thing walking around wearing Chaos like armor. Where is it hiding?"
Sage's fingers clamp around my sleeve. Hard.
"And where," Malfious continues, almost bored, "is the rest of Serkauis. Scattered, stolen, yet still such an inconvenience."
Armilio finally speaks.
Slow. Gravel-deep. Patient.
"Faults are not failures. They are where pressure reveals truth."
Malfious laughs quietly. "You always did romanticize stone."
He leans closer to Armilio's face. "Endurance preserves. I reshape."
The molten light in Armilio's chest brightens. Heat rolls through the chamber. Time feels thick, syrup-slow.
Then Armilio's gaze shifts.
Not to Malfious.
To us.
No shock. No anger.
Recognition.
Sage whispers, barely audible, "He sees us."
"I know," I murmur.
Malfious follows the gaze. His smile sharpens.
"Oh," he says softly. "Good. The fault has arrived."
The chamber tightens.
Stone groans.
And for the first time since we entered, the one Malfious named Armilio begins to turn.
I do not hesitate.
I move.
The moment Malfious finishes the word fault, my body answers before my mind catches up. The bow snaps into my hand, obsidian crawling over my arm like it has been starving for this exact moment. I do not aim. I know where he is.
The arrow forms mid-draw. Killiden spine. Shakore's residue still screaming inside it. I release.
The chamber detonates in violet light.
"MALFIOUS."
My voice rips out of me raw, feral, layered. I hate how close it sounds to him. To Nazz.
The arrow hits.
Not flesh. Not stone.
Reality bends.
Malfious twists, not fast enough to avoid it, but enough to avoid damage. The blast shears the chamber wall behind him, molten rock cascading like rain. His grip loosens.
That is all I need.
"Sage," I shout, not looking back. "NOW. HELP HIM."
She moves instantly.
Sage breaks from cover, sprinting toward the stone giant without hesitation. The air around her vibrates. Magnetism surges, invisible lines snapping into place as she reaches for the Killiden fingers around Armilio's throat.
Metal screams.
The Killiden hand jerks sideways, dragged by a force Malfious did not account for. Armilio drops.
The impact shakes the chamber. Stone slams into stone. Dust explodes outward.
Armilio lands on one knee.
Not fallen.
Never fallen.
Malfious clicks his tongue, irritated. "You are persistent."
I am already on him.
Obsidian plates shift, locking into place. Electricity crawls over my skin, red and blue tearing at each other until purple burns between them. I close the distance in a blur, blade forming in my hand mid-stride.
I swing.
Malfious blocks with bare palm.
The impact cracks the air. Shockwaves ripple through the chamber. My arm screams. His feet slide back half a meter.
He looks at me properly now.
Not amused.
Interested.
"You burn louder than before," he says. "Unstable. Good.
I snarl and swing again. Faster. Harder. No technique. No restraint. Everything pours into the strike.
He catches the blade and twists.
Pain lances through my shoulder. Bone grinds. I feel it try to break and then knit itself back together mid-motion. I laugh through clenched teeth. It sounds wrong.
Behind us, Sage plants her feet beside Armilio.
His chest glows brighter, magma light pulsing like a heart refusing to stop.
She presses her hands to the stone plates instinctively. "I do not know if I can help you," she says, breath shaking. "But I am here."
Armilio's head turns slowly toward her.
The pressure lifts.
Time breathes again.
The molten glow surges outward, wrapping Sage in heat that does not burn. Her eyes widen as something anchors around her, heavy and absolute.
Unbreak.
Malfious feels it.
His gaze flicks past me, annoyance sharpening into something colder.
"So," he says, releasing my blade and stepping back. "You choose endurance."
I stagger, catch myself, blade reforming.
"No," I say, voice low, wrecked, furious. "We choose not letting you decide."
Armilio rises fully now.
The chamber creaks under his weight. Stone plates grind. The Bastion Core flares like a buried sun.
Malfious exhales slowly.
"This system grows tedious," he mutters.
I plant my feet beside Sage and Armilio, electricity snapping, obsidian locking tighter.
"Good," I say. "Because I am done being patient."
The ground trembles.
And for the first time since he arrived, Malfious does not smile.