The obsidian platform cracked into reality-sized shards, floating apart like drifting pieces of a shattered mirror.
Aurelianth clutched the ground as it tilted beneath him, lungs straining for air that wouldn't come.
Lioren collapsed beside him, fingers digging into the floor as if trying to hold reality together.
Solance was gone.
Not dead.
Not erased.
Gone.
The bond that once pulsed between the three of them alive and warm now felt like a torn vein leaking ache through Aurelianth's chest.
Lioren sobbed hard enough her voice broke:
"Aurelianth...
Aurelianth...
it's gone...
I can't feel Solance...
I can't feel ANYTHING..."
Aurelianth grabbed her arms finally able to touch pulling her into him.
His voice was low and ragged:
"Breathe.
Lioren look at me...breathe..."
She shook violently against him.
"I can feel YOU...but I can't feel Solance...why can't I feel Solance...
WHERE IS SOLANCE...??"
Aurelianth closed his eyes tightly, forehead pressed against hers.
"I don't know.
But we're going to find him."
The Watcher's cracked voice drifted from behind them:
"THE TARGET'S SIGNAL NO LONGER REACHES YOU."
Aurelianth snarled without looking back.
"Where did you send him?"
"THE LOSS REALM."
Lioren's breath hitched.
"What… what does that mean?"
The Watcher folded its hands like brittle paper.
"LOSS IS NOT DEATH.
IT IS ISOLATION."
Aurelianth stiffened.
"Solance is ALONE?"
"CORRECT."
Lioren collapsed again, hands over her mouth.
The Watcher continued:
"THE LONGER YOU TAKE TO FIND HIM,
THE MORE OF HIS IDENTITY
WILL DISPERSE."
Aurelianth's eyes went cold.
"What happens if we're too late?"
"THE TRI-LINK FAILS."
"And Solance?" he growled.
The Watcher tilted its cracked head.
"SOLANCE BECOMES UNBEING."
Lioren screamed.
Aurelianth squeezed her tighter, shaking.
He faced the cracked Watcher, teeth bared.
"Open the path.
NOW."
The Watcher extended its thin, split hand.
The shards of the broken platform assembled but not into a perfect floor.
Instead, they formed a descending path of floating steps stretching into a dark expanse below.
Lioren grabbed Aurelianth's arm desperately.
"That's where Solance is?"
Aurelianth stared into the void.
The ache in his chest pulsed with a low, drowning pain...a faint echo of Solance's last scream.
"Yes."
Lioren swallowed hard.
"Then… we go."
Aurelianth nodded.
Together, they stepped onto the first shard.
The Watcher whispered behind them:
"IF YOU FAIL, ONE OF YOU WILL BREAK FOREVER."
Aurelianth didn't look back.
"We won't fail."
The Descent into Absence
The steps sank into dimness like teeth disappearing into a giant jaw.
Aurelianth held Lioren's hand, guiding her carefully along the unstable path.
Their bond...their link now felt like a wound with two sides but no center.
Solance had been the silver thread binding their two human hearts to something luminous.
Without him...
Aurelianth felt heavier.
Slower.
Unbalanced.
Lioren felt hollow.
Unanchored.
Afraid of how quiet her thoughts had become.
"Do you… feel anything?" she whispered.
Aurelianth shook his head.
"No.
Only the absence.
Like a shape that used to exist and now is missing."
Lioren's voice cracked.
"That's exactly what I feel."
The void around them deepened.
A faint whispering came from below:
…solance… solance… solance…
Lioren gasped.
"That's...that's his voice...!!"
Aurelianth shook his head.
"No.
It's a memory.
An echo."
Lioren clutched his arm.
"But it sounds like him..."
"I know."
Her breath trembled.
"How do you know the difference?"
Aurelianth looked at the void around them.
"Because Solance doesn't echo.
He glows."
Lioren's tears spilled again.
"You're right…"
Their descent continued.
The Realm With No Solance
They reached a level surface a flat dark field with no sky, no light source, and no shape beyond shadows.
The moment they stepped onto it, the tri-bond surged painfully.
Aurelianth winced.
Lioren clutched her chest.
"Something's pulling on us...
Aurelianth...!!"
A whisper curled into the air:
"THE TARGET'S LAST LOCATION WAS HERE."
Aurelianth set his jaw.
"So Solance was..."
Lioren cut in:
"...and then he faded…
and then he moved.
Or was moved."
The Watcher's disembodied voice responded:
"CORRECT."
Aurelianth shouted into the dark:
"SOLANCE...!!!
SOLANCE, ANSWER ME...!!!"
No reply.
Only a low, sinking sound like something small being pulled deeper into darkness.
Lioren whispered:
"What if he can't hear us?"
Aurelianth clenched her hand.
"Then we get closer."
The Echoes of Unbeing
Shapes rose from the floor amorphous silhouettes made of the absence Solance left behind.
Not creatures.
Not illusions.
Echoes.
The first one stepped forward shifting its face into a broken mimic of Solance's.
Lioren screamed.
Aurelianth pushed her behind him.
The echo whispered:
"…Au...re...li...anth…"
Aurelianth growled:
"You're NOT Solance."
It reached for him.
He punched it and his fist passed through as if hitting fog.
Lioren gasped:
"They're not attacking...they're trying to connect!"
Aurelianth narrowed his eyes.
"They're made of the bond.
What's left of it."
An echo drifted toward Lioren,.murmuring fragments of her name.
She backed up.
"Aurelianth...
I feel...cold like it's trying to pull something from me"
Aurelianth stepped between them.
"They feed on the missing identity.
They're hungry."
The echoes multiplied mimicking Solance's voice, his tone, his small curious noises.
Lioren whispered:
"They're what remains of the parts we lost…"
Aurelianth clenched her hand tighter.
"We don't feed them.
We find him."
Aurelianth's Half-Break
Further in, the ground began to warp.
Every step felt heavier.
Aurelianth stumbled suddenly, catching himself against a jagged shard.
"Aurelianth...?!" Lioren cried.
He clutched his chest.
"My rune it's shaking....
I..."
Light burst through his ribs.
Lioren caught him (barely).
"Aurelianth...stay with me...!!!!"
He gasped:
"Solance his absence it's tearing at the silver side of my rune...
I'm losing balance...
I..."
He collapsed to his knees.
Lioren dropped beside him, panicked.
"What do I do...
what do I DO...?!"
Aurelianth grabbed her wrist weakly.
"Anchor me just like before your touch it helps"
She slammed both hands on his chest, channeling all her warmth into the rune.
The gold steadied.
The silver flickered.
The amber threaded between them.
His breath returned slowly.
Lioren sobbed into his shoulder.
"Don't do that again...
don't collapse...
I can't lose you too...
I can't..."
He held her tight.
"You won't."
The Solance-Shaped Door
At the far end of the dark field, a doorway appeared.
A shape carved into nothing.
Outlined in faint silver light.
The shape was unmistakable.
Lioren gasped:
"It's… Solance's silhouette."
Aurelianth stood slowly.
"He went through here."
The echoing shapes circled them not attacking, but whispering loss:
"…gone…"
"…taken…"
"…unbeing…"
Aurelianth pushed them aside.
"Not him."
He placed his hand on the door.
It pulsed.
Lioren touched it too.
Immediately a wave of sensation blasted through them.
Aurelianth doubled over.
Lioren fell to her knees.
They both gasped the same word:
"SOLANCE...!!"
They felt it...
A flicker.
A spark.
A faint pulse of silver light responding to the door.
He was alive.
Weak.
Lost.
Fading.
But alive.
Lioren's voice shook.
"He's in there...
Aurelianth...he's still in there...!"
Aurelianth pressed his forehead to the door.
"Hold on, Solance.
We're coming."
The door began to open.
Slowly.
As if resisting the idea of letting hope inside.
What lay beyond it was not a room, not a corridor, not a space.
It was...
A drop.
A long one.
A pit carved from pure absence.
Lioren swallowed hard.
"We jump?"
Aurelianth nodded.
"We jump."
She gripped his arms.
"You go first."
He shook his head.
"We go together."
They held each other tight...And stepped into the absence.
The Fall Toward the Missing Light
They fell.
Not fast.
Not slow.
Just endlessly.
Aurelianth kept his arms locked around Lioren as the darkness pulled them deeper.
He whispered:
"Lioren...don't let go."
She clung to him desperately.
"I won't...
I promise...
Aurelianth, I swear..."
Then they saw it.
Below them.
A faint, flickering silver glow far down in the darkness...
Small.
Weak.
Shaking like a scared candle flame.
Lioren gasped:
"SOLANCE...!!!"
Aurelianth's heart cracked open.
"That's him...
that's HIM...
he's alive...!"
The faint glow flickered.
Weakly...
"…Au…re…li…an…th…?"
Aurelianth felt tears sting his eyes.
"Yes...!!
YES...!!
SOLANCE...WE'RE HERE...!!"
The light dimmed.
Then pulsed.
Then dimmed again.
He was slipping.
Lioren screamed:
"WE'RE COMING...
DON'T FADE...!!"
Aurelianth pulled her close as the drop accelerated.
Downward.
Downward.
Toward Solance's weakening glow....
Toward the heart of the Trial of Loss.
Toward the place where Solance's identity was being torn apart.
Aurelianth whispered:
"Hold on, Solance...hold on...hold on for us…"
And the last thing they heard before the absence swallowed them was:
"….I am...so cold…"
They fell faster.
Straight toward him.
Straight toward the part of the bond the Arbiter tried to kill.