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Void
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Its voice was not sound but absence—a hollow resonance that unraveled the air, leaving silence thicker than stone. Neo-Pandora's survivors huddled in the Chrono Sanctum, an ancient bunker buried beneath the city's bones. Lila Kane monitored the void's advance on fractured holograms, her hands steady but her mind fraying.
"It's speaking," Kieran said, his eyes black voids reflecting the nothingness outside. "It says… it's lonely."
Zara Voss paced, Elias's memories flickering in her irises. "It's not lonely. It's hungry. And it's using Lysandra to feed."
A scream echoed through the Sanctum's walls—human, then metallic, then something worse.
"It's here," Wren whispered.
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Badlands
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The void had reshaped Lysandra Veyra into a prophet of decay. Her body was a lattice of obsidian and starlight, her voice a chorus of dead timelines. She stood at the city's edge, arms outstretched as the void poured through her into the Hollow Star.
"You fear the emptiness," she crooned to the fleeing crowds. "But it is purity. No pain. No memory. No you."
Her hand brushed a child's cheek, and the girl dissolved, her essence fueling the Star's growth.
"Stop her!" Lila ordered, but the rebels hesitated.
"How?" one muttered. "She's not even real anymore."
Before Lila could speak. Lysandra escapes using an fracture.
The team went back to the city wherever Kieran encountered an vision. In a chamber in Chrono Sanctum, where an Mural and Elias voice saying to go there.
"We need to go to Snactum, Now." Kieran shouted.
Everyone was shocked.
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Chrono Sanctum
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Kieran led Zara and Lila to the Sanctum's core—a chamber lined with murals of a starless sky. At its center lay a pedestal holding a shard of the original Hollow Star, its edges singing with the void's frequency.
"The Arbiter's creators built this place," Kieran said. "They tried to destroy the void by trapping it here. But it escaped… and ate them."
Zara traced the murals: figures in crystalline armor, fleeing a black sun. "They didn't just trap it. They bred it. Made it sentient."
"And now it wants revenge," Lila concluded.
Kieran looked at the Hollow Star's shard.
"It should not get in the hand of evils."
Lila arranged that no one should came to this chamber and increases the security.
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Lila's lab
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They went back to the lab looking in Big Screen showing alert warning.
Zara went to the bedroom to rest
Suddenly the void infiltrated Zara's mind that night.
"You could have saved him," it sighed, morphing into Elias's shape. "Jax died because you hesitated. But I can give him back. A world without voids, without sacrifice. Just… peace."
Zara recoiled, but the vision deepened—Neo-Pandora whole, Lila laughing, Kieran free of his curse. Jax, alive, his arm flesh and bone.
"Lies," she hissed, clutching the Compass.
"Is it?" The void smiled with Elias's lips. "The Hollow Star can reset it all. Just let me…in."
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Chrono Snactum
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Wren uncovered a buried file in the Sanctum's databanks—a hologram of a hooded figure, The Architect, their voice distorted by eons.
"The Hollow Star was never a weapon. It is a womb. We sought to birth a new reality, but the void… it was the first child. A perfect, ravenous nothing."
The hologram flickered, showing the Architect's demise—consumed by the entity they'd created.
"Great," Wren muttered. "So we're up against God's first draft."
"Yes, look if there is any way to stop." Zara asked.
Wren searched through the database found a file. Suddenly, Wren's comms.
"Wren came here, I need a help." Lila's voice.
"I wil be back. You look into databas. Tell me if you found anything." Wren went outside room.
Zara and Kieran began to read the file. They were shocked by the content of the file.
"You shouldn't tell this to anyone. We only need this when it is necessary." Zara tells to Kieran.
They went outside the Snactum.
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Hallways of Snactum
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Lysandra's voice boomed through the Sanctum's walls. "You cannot hide, little relics. The void is patient. It will wait… until you beg for the end."
The rebels panicked. Some opened fire on the walls, others clawed at their own faces. Lila raised the Compass, its light barely holding the void at bay.
"Kieran! The shard!"
He hesitated, the Hollow Star's resonance syncing with his paradox energy. "If I do this… I might not come back."
"You will," Zara lied, gripping his shoulder. "We'll bring you home."
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Kieran plunged the shard into his chest. Light erupted, tethering the void to his soul. The Hollow Star shuddered, its core cracking to reveal a pulsing, infantile darkness—the void's true form.
Lysandra screamed as her body disintegrated, her essence devoured by the entity she'd worshipped.
"It's… a child," Zara breathed. "A scared, hungry child."
The void stared at them with galaxies for eyes… and began to cry.
To Be Continued…
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