Kaelith's decree faltered, then cracked.
The Throne's beat—once absolute, once unchallenged—stuttered in the silence Leon carried.
The Null Requiem spread like a tide, erasing sound, erasing rhythm, erasing even the possibility of command. Kaelith's hand trembled, not from weakness but from the alien absence pressing against him.
"No…" the sovereign whispered, eyes narrowing. "Not defiance. Not rebellion. Absence."
Leon's Core pulsed once, but it was not a pulse in truth. It was the imitation of rhythm—the hollow that followed every beat, the breath between sound, the gap that had never been ruled because no one thought it could exist.
Kaelith's jaw clenched, fury sharpening his expression. "You think silence can bind a Throne? You think absence holds dominion?"
He raised both hands, and the battlefield convulsed.
