The pulse led them beyond the ruins of the ancient library. Beyond the whispering shelves and dream-haunted vaults. Out into the dead forest that curled like a skeletal hand around the edges of the forgotten city.
Moonlight broke through jagged clouds, casting a silver glow on the decaying path. Riven moved ahead, the beast still beneath his skin. His senses were sharp—each scent crisp, each sound amplified. He barely noticed Elara beside him, so focused was he on the rhythm pulling at his core.
The path ended at a broken arch of ivory stone, swallowed by black ivy. Beyond it, a field of cracked earth and overgrown grass lay silent under the night. At its center loomed a fallen chapel.
Time had not merely touched this place—it had hollowed it out.
Its steeple leaned against the sky like a blade ready to fall. Shattered stained glass windows, warped with age, glinted like broken fangs. The front door hung open, moaning softly in the wind.
Elara paused. "This isn't marked on any of the maps."
Riven said nothing. He stepped inside.
The pulse grew stronger.
Inside, moonlight poured through the collapsed ceiling, illuminating the altar. Vines strangled the columns. Bones lay half-buried in the corners—human, beast, and others that defied easy classification. At the heart of the altar stood a pedestal of black stone, cracked straight down the middle.
Upon it sat a single object.
A stone, the size of a man's heart. Smooth. Opaque. Its surface pulsed slowly, like a thing alive. And its color—neither silver nor gray—but something in between. Lunar obsidian.
The moment Riven stepped forward, the stone flared.
And so did the pain in his chest.
He fell to his knees, clutching his ribcage. The glow from the stone matched the rhythm of his heartbeat. Elara cried out, rushing to him—but he waved her off. "No. Let me see... what it wants."
The stone pulsed again—and then it bled light.
The world tilted.
Riven's vision dimmed, then fractured—splintered into shards of light and memory. The chapel vanished. Elara disappeared. All that remained was the moon—towering, enormous, bleeding crimson through a rift in the sky.
Then: screams.
A battlefield stretched below the broken moon. Burnt trees. Torn earth. The air choked with ash and magic. Soldiers of every race and creed—vampires, werewolves, witches, blood reapers, even spectral revenants—fought together against a singular enemy: a tide of blackened horrors, fused flesh and smoke, beings that howled with ten mouths and bled smoke instead of blood.
Time did not flow here. It bled sideways.
At the center of the chaos stood a figure draped in a cloak of flame-shadow. Not entirely vampire. Not entirely beast. Not entirely man.
Aamon Thereon Bloodbane.
Riven had never seen him before, but he knew the name in his bones. Knew the weight of that presence. Knew the stare of those ancient eyes—eyes that were lifeless, eyes that did not age, did not blink, did not forgive.
Aamon strode through the battlefield, unbothered by blades, flames, or monsters. He walked toward a dying werewolf prince, pierced through the heart by a spear of Riftmetal.
The beast-man looked up at Aamon with reverence. "It's too late... I can't change it..."
"You can," Aamon said, kneeling.
From the folds of his cloak, he drew the very stone now nestled in the chapel.
The Lunarch Heart.
"Take this," Aamon whispered. "It was never meant for gods. But it will keep you between the tides."
The werewolf hesitated. "This will curse me."
Aamon smiled—cold and infinite. "No. This will remember you."
He pressed the stone into the dying prince's chest.
Light exploded—and the battlefield screamed.