The Inquisitor, Val-En, did not wait for Kiron to find his footing. He glided forward, his hand glowing with the intensity of a dying star. "You play with shadows you do not understand, little Grave-Seed. You are a candle trying to snuff out the sun."
Kiron ignored him. He was looking at the back of Nel-Eak's head. The hunter stood frozen, his twin daggers trembling, not from fear, but from a sudden, hollow resonance.
"Nel-Eak!" Kiron's voice was a low vibration that seemed to rise from the very metal floor of the Wastes. "You feel the emptiness where your memory used to be, don't you? That hole in your chest?"
"It... it's a cold fire," Nel-Eak rasped, his knuckles white on his hilts. "It wants to be filled. It's screaming for a purpose."
"Then let it be the conduit," Kiron commanded.
Kiron didn't draw the sword. Instead, he slammed his palm against the wrapped hilt of Lament and extended his "Authority" toward Nel-Eak's back. He wasn't giving the hunter power; he was opening a bridge between Nel-Eak's "Hollow" soul and the infinite "Void" inside the blade.
The effect was instantaneous.
The serpent-scale coat on Nel-Eak's back turned from shimmering colors to a matte, light-eating black. The white scars on his face began to leak a dark, smoky vapor. Nel-Eak let out a sound that wasn't a scream—it was a roar of thousands of souls finally finding a throat to speak through.
Val-En stopped mid-stride. The golden mask tilted, the single eye-slit flashing. "What... what is this heresy? You are using a living man as a vessel for the Abyss?"
"I'm giving him the weight he lost," Kiron said, his eyes bleeding into that terrifying total-black.
Nel-Eak vanished.
He didn't "flicker" like the Inquisitor. He simply ceased to be in one spot and appeared in another, his movements stripped of human hesitation. He struck at Val-En, his daggers trailing ribbons of black smoke that hissed as they carved through the Inquisitor's light-shield.
The battle became a blur of high-contrast violence. Gold vs. Black. The "Hand of the Dawn" met the "Hollow Blade."
Val-En unleashed a wave of crystalline light, but Nel-Eak moved through it as if he were made of mist, the Void-Link allowing him to "phase" through the divine energy. Every time Nel-Eak's daggers nicked the Inquisitor's white silk robes, the fabric didn't tear—it decayed into ash.
"Enough!" Val-En shrieked, his musical voice cracking. He raised both hands, drawing a massive circle of solar fire in the air, preparing to vaporize the entire valley.
Kiron felt the drain. Connecting his soul to the sword and to Nel-Eak was like being pulled apart by two runaway engines. His skin began to crack again, the grey stone-dust weeping from his pores.
Just a little longer, Kiron hissed through gritted teeth.
He pushed the final reserve of his "Authority" through the link.
Nel-Eak didn't just strike; he became a shadow-clone of the sword itself. He drove both daggers into the center of Val-En's golden mask. There was no explosion. Instead, the Inquisitor's light was sucked into the daggers, draining the Celestial servant until he was nothing but an empty suit of silk collapsing onto the rusted floor.
The link snapped.
Kiron fell to his knees, gasping, his chest feeling like it was filled with hot lead. Nel-Eak stood over the collapsed Inquisitor, his daggers dripping black smoke. The serpent-scales on his coat slowly returned to their original, shimmering colors.
Nel-Eak turned around. He looked at Kiron, then at his hands. The blankness in his eyes remained, but it was now tempered by a haunting, silent confusion.
"I felt... thousands of them," Nel-Eak whispered. "The ones who died. The ones you carry in that blade. They were all calling for a King."
He walked over to Kiron and offered a hand. His grip was firm, but his touch felt strangely cold.
"I still don't remember who I was," Nel-Eak said, his voice a low rumble. "But I think I know what I am now. I'm the shadow that follows the King."
Nyra and Taz emerged from behind a shattered vent, their faces pale. They looked at the empty white robes of the Inquisitor, then at Kiron.
"The Celestials will know he failed," Nyra said, her voice urgent. "A Needle-Ship is a major loss. They'll send a Legion next time."
"Let them come," Kiron said, standing up with Nel-Eak's help. He looked at the wrapped sword. "I'm tired of running through the trash. We need to find the entrance to the Underworld. It's time I go home."