The world dissolved into light.
Kael was no longer standing beside the black pool; he was falling through it.
Through layers of time, through memory, through something deeper than reality itself.
The pulse of the vein became the pulse of existence. It beat not only in his chest but in the bones of the earth, the stars, and the empty void between.
He could hear it—an endless rhythm that whispered of creation, destruction, and rebirth.
Mira's voice echoed faintly above, calling his name, but it was already too far away. The pool swallowed him whole.
Then—silence.
He stood in a place that wasn't a place. A plain of colorless mist stretching in every direction, with shadows drifting like thoughts given form. In the distance rose the faint outline of colossal figures—half-seen, half-felt—shifting through the haze.
Their movements stirred the ground beneath him.
Every step they took created mountains.
Every breath they drew formed storms.
Kael's knees buckled under the pressure of their presence.
He knew, instinctively, that these were the Echoes—the first-born fragments of the divine, the entities who shaped the world long before humans dared to dream of gods.
And as he stared, they began to turn toward him.
The mist parted, revealing a sky like molten glass.
One of the figures stepped forward—massive, radiant, crowned with shifting constellations. Its face was an ocean of stars, its voice a tremor that shook the void.
"Mortal vessel," it said, its words burning into his mind. "You bear the mark of the First Pulse. Why do you trespass in the memory of gods?"
Kael couldn't move. He felt as if every thought he had was being stripped bare, examined, and judged. "I… don't know," he gasped. "The Heart called me."
Another figure approached, smaller, cloaked in light and shadow. Her voice was softer—but infinitely more dangerous.
"It always calls its lost blood back," she whispered. "You were not born from men, Kael. You were carved out of us."
The words shattered something inside him.
Visions flooded his mind: a being of pure light torn apart, fragments hurled across time. One shard fell into flesh, becoming him.
The truth hit like lightning.
The vein—the black current he'd followed all this way—wasn't just a relic of godhood. It was his origin.
He staggered back, but the plain warped around him, forcing him forward.
More figures appeared now—watching, silent, their forms flickering between divinity and decay. Each one bore a single mark—a glowing rune that matched the sigil burned into Kael's palm.
"You are the last of the Pulseborn," the radiant one said. "Our memory. Our sin."
Kael clenched his fists. "Then why was I sent to live as human? Why forget what I am?"
The goddess-shade smiled sadly.
"Because gods fear what they once were."
The ground rippled beneath them, and a black fissure tore open in the sky. From it spilled images—wars of impossible scale, where divine blood became rivers, and their screams forged stars. The Heart had been their prison and their grave.
Kael saw himself—thousands of times over—in each reflection, wearing faces he didn't remember, dying in worlds long gone.
Each death brought him closer to now.
He fell to his knees, clutching his head. The voices overlapped, a thousand divine murmurs trying to fit into one fragile mind. His human form trembled, unable to contain them.
Mira's voice flickered through the chaos, faint but real. "Kael! Wake up!"
Her voice was an anchor. It cut through the noise like a blade of light.
The goddess-shade tilted her head. "That one… the mortal who walks beside you… she carries the fragment of our opposite."
Kael looked up, breathing hard. "Opposite?"
"Where you are the Echo of the First Pulse, she is the Silence Between. You were never meant to exist together… yet you always do."
The plain trembled violently. The sky cracked open, spilling rivers of black light that burned the mist away.
The radiant figure raised a hand. "The Heart awakens. You must choose—return to your human shell, or stay and remember all that you were. But know this: once you remember, the world you knew will not survive your truth."
Kael hesitated. His chest burned. Mira's distant cry echoed again—pleading, desperate.
He clenched his jaw, whispering, "I'm not done being human yet."
And with that—he leapt into the fissure, back toward the sound of her voice.
He fell through flame and shadow. Through the memory of thunder and the pulse of a thousand dying stars.
Then—breath.
Cold air hit his lungs like a blade.
Kael gasped awake, coughing, his body shuddering as water poured from his mouth. He was lying on the obsidian floor beside the Vein, its surface now dim and silent. The golden fissures that once bled through it were gone.
Mira knelt beside him, her hands glowing faintly with a pale silver light. "You're back," she whispered, voice trembling. "You were gone too long."
Kael blinked, dazed. "How… long?"
She shook her head, eyes wet. "I don't know. Time stopped moving when you fell."
He reached out, touching her cheek—real, warm, grounding. The moment their skin met, a spark of energy surged through both of them, spreading like a ripple through air and stone. The Vein answered faintly, humming once before falling silent again.
Kael frowned. "You felt that?"
Mira nodded slowly. "Yes. But it wasn't yours."
The silence that followed was heavy, almost sacred.
Then Kael whispered, "I saw them, Mira. The Echoes. They said I wasn't… human."
Her hand froze midair. "Not human?"
Kael's gaze drifted to the dim vein beside them. "I was carved from them—the Pulseborn. A shard of something ancient that forgot itself."
Mira's eyes darkened. "Then it's true. The Vault didn't just hold relics… it was a tomb."
A low tremor rolled through the chamber, cutting off her words. The water in the pool began to rise again—but this time, it didn't glow gold. It shimmered silver, and the air grew colder, heavier.
Kael stood, pulling Mira back. "That's not the same energy."
She didn't answer. Her pupils dilated, and the light from her hands turned a deep violet. Her voice lowered, almost in trance.
"Silence answers Pulse. Creation calls its shadow."
Kael's blood ran cold. The words were not hers.
"Mira?"
She didn't hear him. Her eyes had turned completely silver, her body glowing with runes that mirrored his own—but inverted, spiraling inward instead of out. The air hummed with twin forces—his golden pulse, her silver silence—colliding but not destroying each other.
"Two halves of one origin," she murmured, voice no longer her own. "You, Kael, are the first sound. I… am the last silence."
The pool erupted between them.
Water shot upward, forming a spiraling column that carved the symbol of the Ecliptic Vein into the air.
Kael staggered back, shielding his face. "Mira, stop! You're losing control!"
But she wasn't the one losing it.
The chamber itself began to distort—walls stretching, shadows turning into figures with hollow eyes. The air thickened with whispers that sounded eerily familiar: fragments of Kael's own thoughts, spoken back to him in her voice.
"You wanted truth," the whispers said. "Truth demands silence."
Kael gritted his teeth, summoning the pulse within him. Gold light flared from his chest, meeting the silver glow around Mira. The two forces clashed midair, swirling violently until the world turned white.
Then—
Stillness.
When his vision cleared, they were no longer in the Vault.
They stood in a wasteland beneath a violet sky. The horizon was shattered—mountains floating like broken glass, rivers flowing upward into clouds.
Reality was unraveling.
Mira's glow dimmed, and she stumbled, collapsing into his arms.
Kael caught her, cradling her gently. "It's okay. You're here."
Her eyes fluttered open, weak but lucid now. "Kael… what did you see?"
He looked out at the fractured world. "Everything. And it's falling apart because of us."
She tried to smile. "Then we'll hold it together. Just like before."
Kael froze. "Before?"
Her lips parted. "I… remember things. Not all, but enough. You and I—we weren't born in the world. We made it."
A faint wind stirred around them, carrying fragments of forgotten prayers. The stars overhead blinked and shifted, forming the mark of the Vein—half gold, half silver.
Kael held her closer. "If that's true, then what happens now?"
Mira pressed her forehead against his. "Then we remember the rest. Together."
The ground beneath them pulsed once, as if in answer.
The Vein's hum returned—soft, rhythmic, and impossibly ancient.
But beneath that pulse, another sound stirred.
A whisper crawling up from the cracks of the world—something older than gods, older than the Pulse itself.
Kael looked toward the source, eyes narrowing. "Something else woke up with us."
The sky trembled.
And from far beyond the horizon, a voice like thunder whispered—
"Children of Pulse and Silence… you've broken the seal."
Kael's blood ran cold. Mira's hand tightened in his.
The sky cracked open.