It happened at dusk.
The lantern flared without warning, and from its core burst a shard of light—not flame, but thread. It hovered midair, trembling, before weaving itself into a shape.
A mouth.
It spoke not in tone but in countless overlapping voices, as if every reflection Ahri had ever glimpsed had found its tongue.
"Do you seek the fracture's end, or its dominion?"
Aya gasped, clutching Ahri's arm. "It's speaking!"
But Ahri couldn't answer. Her throat had closed with recognition. The voices weren't foreign. They were her own. Each version of her that had ever wondered, doubted, or refused.
Jin stepped closer, his shadow stretching longer. "Ignore it," he warned. "It isn't guidance. It's temptation."
The shard pulsed, the voices rising. "One flame cannot hold both truths. One path must die. Which will you burn?"
The lantern crackled. The two flames leaned apart, desperate to escape one another.
Ahri's marked palm seared. She knew that this moment was not just about the lantern. It was about her, about all of them. The fracture demanded choice—not later, but now.
She closed her eyes, caught between gold and black, between reflection and shadow.
And in that silence, she realized: refusing to choose was also a choice.