The light faded slowly, like dawn forgetting how to rise.
When the wind returned, it carried ash.
Tower Varda no longer stood.
Its upper rings had folded inward, twisted metal jutting toward the rain-choked sky.
Search beacons carved blue lines through smoke as Archive rescue teams combed the ruins.
"Command, ground zero reached. No survivors yet."
A medic knelt beside a fragment of armor.
"Warden's mark," she whispered.
"Kael's confirmed… gone."
Archive Central — Command Deck
Every screen was black.
Emergency lights painted faces in red.
Sarah Avelon stood beside Vonix.
"Rescue's pulling core fragments—no life readings," Comik reported.
Vonix: "The field?"
"Collapsed, but the grid's holding."
Sarah's eyes were distant. "He stopped the cascade."
Vonix: "At the cost of everything he was."
She looked once more at the dead screens.
"This isn't balance," she said. "It's debt."
Then she turned and walked away.
No one stopped her.
The door shut behind her with quiet finality.
Southern Ridge — Ruins
Rain hissed on molten stone.
Rescue drones hovered low.
"Residual resonance detected!"
They found Kael's blade, half-melted, humming faintly.
The medic reached—paused as the metal trembled.
"Back away!"
A surge of gold flickered beneath the rubble—then vanished.
Archive Central
"Energy spike—brief, untraceable," a tech reported.
Vonix stared at the static. "Lume."
Sarah was already gone.
Outside, the storm broke.
The city lights below flickered like tired stars.
Vonix murmured to the empty room,
"She was never one of us. Maybe that's why she survives."