The Ashlands thinned as Aren ran.
Not vanished—nothing ever truly left this place—but the gray dunes gave way to fractured stone and scorched earth veined with blackened cracks. The air grew sharper, tinged with sulfur and old heat, each breath scraping his lungs raw. Somewhere behind him, the settlement's alarm horns still echoed faintly, swallowed piece by piece by distance and wind.
The Starbound Inquisition would not give up.
They never did.
Aren forced his aching legs to keep moving. Every muscle screamed in protest, his body paying the price for power it was never meant to wield—not yet. The burst of blackened light had burned through his strength like wildfire, leaving behind a hollow, trembling weakness.
But even as exhaustion crept in, the pull remained.
Stronger now.
It tugged at him from the east, subtle but relentless, like an invisible chain wrapped around his heart. With every step toward the starfall, the sensation sharpened—not pain exactly, but pressure, as if something vast were leaning closer to inspect him.
You survived, it seemed to whisper. Good.
Aren ground his teeth. "Shut up."
The land rose ahead of him, jagged and uneven. The Scorched Pass.
Once, it had been a mountain route used by traders moving between territories. Then a star had fallen here generations ago, melting stone into glass and warping the terrain beyond recognition. Now it was a labyrinth of obsidian ridges, molten scars, and unstable ground that could collapse without warning.
Perfect for losing pursuers.
If he lived long enough to try.
Aren slowed as he entered the pass, senses stretched taut. The air here felt wrong. Heavy. Charged. Each step sent faint vibrations through the ground, like the echo of a long-dead heartbeat buried beneath layers of rock.
His vision flickered again.
For a heartbeat, the world peeled back.
He saw the pass as it truly was—or perhaps as it had been at the moment of starfall. Rivers of molten light carved through stone. Screaming silhouettes frozen in glass. A massive shadow overhead, its outline fractured, incomplete.
The Crown.
Aren staggered, catching himself against a shard of blackened rock as the vision snapped shut. Blood trickled from his nose, dark against the ash-stained ground.
"This is getting worse," he muttered.
He wiped his face and pressed on.
Hours passed—or minutes. Time had a way of losing meaning near star-corrupted zones. The sky above the pass glowed faintly, an unnatural twilight that never fully darkened nor brightened. Aren's thoughts grew hazy, fatigue gnawing at his focus.
That was when he heard it.
Footsteps.
Not behind him.
Ahead.
Aren froze, dropping instantly into a crouch as he slid behind a jagged ridge. He slowed his breathing, heart hammering loud enough he was sure it would give him away.
Voices echoed faintly through the pass.
"…confirmed impact within this region."
"…resonance levels off the scale."
"…orders are clear. Secure the fragment. Kill any irregulars."
Inquisition.
More than one this time.
Aren peeked around the edge of the ridge.
Three figures moved through the pass below—two hunters in standard ash-gray combat garb, sigils glowing softly along their armor, and between them, a taller figure draped in dark crimson robes. Unlike the hunters, this one walked with an unhurried confidence, hands clasped behind their back.
An Arbiter.
Aren's blood ran cold.
Arbiters were not sent for retrieval missions unless the Inquisition expected resistance—or catastrophe. They were awakened far beyond the Ash-Bound threshold, wielders of refined star techniques that could erase entire squads if unleashed.
Running past them unnoticed would be impossible.
Fighting them would be suicide.
The pull toward the starfall surged again, violently this time, dragging at his insides like a hook. Aren hissed, clutching his chest as the pressure intensified.
The Arbiter stopped.
Their head tilted slightly.
"So," they said calmly, voice carrying effortlessly through the pass. "You can hear us now."
Aren cursed silently.
"There," one of the hunters said, pointing toward Aren's position. "Resonance spike."
The Arbiter smiled beneath their hood. "How fascinating. An Ash-Bound generating this much distortion."
Aren bolted.
He sprinted along the ridge, leaping across gaps and sliding down slopes of unstable glassy stone. Shouts erupted behind him, followed by the crack of energy discharges scorching the rock where he'd been moments before.
Pain flared through his side as a glancing blast clipped him, searing flesh and spinning him off balance. He hit the ground hard, rolling to absorb the impact as heat licked dangerously close.
He forced himself upright, vision swimming.
The Arbiter stepped into view ahead of him, seemingly appearing out of thin air. The air around them shimmered faintly, warped by controlled star energy.
"You're running in the wrong direction," the Arbiter said mildly. "The star will not save you."
Aren laughed—a raw, broken sound. "Funny. It's the only thing that hasn't tried to kill me yet."
The Arbiter raised a hand.
The world pressed down.
Aren collapsed to one knee as gravity itself seemed to multiply, crushing him toward the ground. Stone cracked beneath him, fissures spiderwebbing outward.
"Submit," the Arbiter said. "Your existence is an anomaly. An unacceptable variable."
Aren's vision darkened. His heartbeat thundered in his ears, each pulse echoing with that same impossible presence.
The broken throne flickered into view again.
Closer.
Not above him this time.
Behind him.
Something shifted.
The pressure eased—just enough.
Aren sucked in a ragged breath and pushed upward, muscles screaming as blackened light bled through his veins once more. It was weaker than before, unstable, but it answered his desperation eagerly.
"I'm tired," Aren growled, forcing himself to stand, "of being your variable."
He slammed his foot into the ground.
The ash beneath him erupted, surging upward in a violent wave that obscured vision and threw debris in every direction. Aren turned and ran, diving headlong into a narrow fissure splitting the pass—a path barely wide enough for his shoulders.
Energy blasts tore into the rock behind him, collapsing parts of the fissure as he scrambled forward on hands and knees.
Light exploded ahead.
Aren burst out of the fissure and skidded to a halt at the edge of a vast crater.
The starfall site.
The ground was melted into a massive basin of glowing crystal and scorched stone, its center occupied by a shard of blinding radiance embedded deep within the earth. The air vibrated violently, raw power radiating outward in waves.
Aren fell to his knees, overwhelmed.
The pull became absolute.
Behind him, the Arbiter emerged from the fissure, gaze locking onto the radiant shard.
"…so this is it," they whispered, awe and hunger bleeding through their calm.
The shard pulsed.
Once.
Twice.
And then—
It pulsed in time with Aren's heart.
Far beyond mortal sight, within the endless void where a broken crown waited, something ancient smiled for the first time in centuries.