The corridor slowed until even breath felt loud.
Inside that stretched tunnel of night, thousands of Liberators held their stance in silence. No one spoke. No one dared to waste motion on anything that was not survival.
As Liberators, they carried knowledge most factions had buried under myth.
They knew about the Primordials.
So when Lucien's words rang through the corridor, faces changed all at once.
Not into fear. But into focus.
Every gaze fixed on the figure ahead as if its smallest gesture could be lethal.
It stood in the void like an error reality refused to correct.
Indifferent and unhurried.
Lucien did not move.
His mind turned cold.
'Of all incarnations… why this bastard?'
Lucien hated indifferent enemies more than arrogant ones.
Arrogance wasted time. Indifference conserved it.
Indifferent killers were efficient. They are machines built for one purpose.
Astraea's storm hovered tight around her shoulders.
Vaelcar's Monolith rotated.
