The world was too quiet.
Kale stood in the clearing where the stars had died. His limbs trembled—not from fear, but from the aftershock of channeling Azrael. The grass beneath him no longer grew, and the sky above was fractured like glass that refused to fall.
Then he felt it.
A presence—no, three.
Each one wrong in a different way. Like their existence offended the laws of reality.
The first arrived without footsteps. A girl no older than eight, barefoot, eyes sewn shut. Her white dress floated behind her as if underwater. She hummed a tune that made Kale's stomach twist.
"I see all your endings," she whispered, though her mouth didn't move. "You scream in each one."
The second came as a shadow cast by no object at all. It coalesced into a man in black robes, face hidden behind a mirror-like mask. The third rode down on a blade of wind — a blindfolded knight with rusted armor and a spear that shimmered like memory.
"Threadmarked," the knight said. "No… worse. You are contradiction."
The Unravelers.
Azrael's voice was silent.
Kale's throat dried as the humming grew louder. The little girl tilted her head, and the world around them blurred. Trees melted into salt. The moon bent in half.
She was showing him a vision—a death path.
In this one, he choked on his own blood before a silver spear pierced his heart.
No.
Kale forced aura into his hands, forming twisting fractals of crimson and gold. The contradiction stirred within him, leaking through his veins like molten ice. His shadow stretched, flared, then split into wings made of broken glyphs.
"Azrael," he hissed. "You want me to die here?"
Still, no answer.
The knight vanished.
Kale's instincts screamed—too late.
The spear sliced the world. Wind and steel tore through Kale's neck.
Silence.
For a moment, his head rolled, landing in the dirt.
Then the air vibrated with a strange pulse.
Golden light poured from Kale's severed body. Glyphs spiraled from his blood, and time hiccuped—not reversed, but denied.
His body floated, head snapping back into place with a sound like bones folding wrong.
"You… were supposed to unravel," the knight said, backing a step. "You are not Azrael."
Kale's eyes glowed with two rings—one of burning void, one of fractured creation.
His voice was layered now. "I am not."
The girl tilted her head again. "Then why do you wear his name?"
The third Unraveler finally spoke—his mirror mask cracked as he said:
"You are not the vessel. You are the anchor."
Kale's power surged, but not in triumph. In horror.
His body wasn't reacting to his will anymore. It was moving in patterns, ancient and programmed. Like something buried inside was fighting its way out.
Azrael's voice returned—weak, trembling, almost… afraid.
"Run."
Kale didn't question it. He tore through the veil of blurred reality, fractals peeling open as he escaped through a fold in space.
As he vanished, the Unravelers stood in silence.
"It begins again," the blind knight muttered. "The Loom frays further."
"We waited too long," said the mirror-mask. "He doesn't know what he is."
"No," whispered the girl. "But it does."
End of Chapter 13