The wind cracked like broken glass above the mountains of Khar'dan. Dark clouds rolled in fast, splitting the sky in half—one side burning gold, the other swallowing black. Something unnatural was coming. And it wasn't the storm.
It was him.
Zeeler stood barefoot on the cliff's edge, eyes half-closed, arms loose at his sides. Thirteen years old. Lean. Dirty from travel. His white tunic was torn at the ribs, soaked in sweat and dried blood. He looked like a runaway.
But the two armies closing in didn't see a child. They saw a threat.
On one side—the Veyari, cloaked in shimmerlight, blades drawn, voices humming in harmony. Their weapons glowed with sigils. They moved like dancers.
On the other—the Noctari, wrapped in shadowed armor, riding beasts shaped from nightmares. Their blades pulsed black, and the ground around them withered as they marched.
Neither side spoke to the other. They didn't need to.
They were both here to kill Zeeler.
He opened his eyes. One eye burned faint silver, the other deep violet. The sky behind him cracked again—light clashing with dark.
"Guess this is it," he said quietly.
No warcry. No speech. Just a deep breath.
And then he stepped forward.
The cliff shattered behind him. He didn't fall. He moved.
In one blink, he fractured through space. One body into two realms. A streak of afterimage trailed behind him—one side shimmering like song, the other coiled in smoke.
The Noctari moved first. A beast-lord charged, swinging a cleaver of obsidian rot.
Zeeler spun under it. His foot dragged sparks off stone.
His right arm, coated in Veyari light, snapped forward—fingers spread.
Sound erupted. A ring of compressed harmony blasted from his palm, like a bell being shattered. The Noctari beast screamed—its hide boiling, bones disjointing under the pressure of pure resonance. It collapsed, limbs folding in on themselves, convulsing as memory bled from its eyes.
Another Noctari lunged with a serrated spear. Zeeler's left arm, wrapped in darkness, moved.
He grabbed the spear mid-thrust. Shadow crawled up it instantly.
The weapon twisted. The spear turned to black ash in the attacker's hands. His armor cracked—not from impact, but from something worse. Regret. Zeeler had stolen a moment of his past—his first kill, his worst mistake—and turned it into a weight. The soldier fell backward, vomiting blood from memory bleed.
Zeeler didn't stop.
He dashed forward—fracture-stepping. His body flickered between planes, moving faster than a blink. One instant he was a blur. The next, behind enemy lines.
The Veyari reacted too late.
One raised a sigilblade. Zeeler ducked low, kicked off a stone, and sang.
Not with words. Not with voice. With will.
The song didn't soothe. It cracked the world.
A string of harmonic force rippled out in front of him, slamming into three Veyari. They screamed, disoriented, as their blades dropped. The light around them shattered like crystal under pressure. One dropped to his knees, ears bleeding, unable to tell up from down.
Then Zeeler turned.
A wall of shadow was rising behind him—Noctari mages invoking a netherbind, a massive binding field meant to trap souls in place.
Zeeler's hands sparked. Light and dark, meeting in his palms.
He slammed them together.
Dissonance Pulse.
The shockwave rolled out in a sphere, colorless but vibrating with power. It didn't destroy—it unraveled. Magic unraveled. Memories unraveled. Even space twisted.
The netherbind cracked like glass. The Noctari mages reeled back, their constructs shattering, voices choking in mid-curse.
He could feel it now. The fracture waking up.
His body ached. His skin glowed faint at the veins—white on one side, black on the other. And in his chest, something pulsed. Like two hearts out of sync. Not killing him. Forging him.
Another rush.
He lifted his hand—and a memory echo formed beside him.
A figure stepped out of the air. It was Zeeler—but older. Stronger. His face marked with scars that hadn't happened yet. His eyes were calm.
The echo said nothing. Just raised its hand—and pointed.
The real Zeeler followed it.
They moved as one—blinking through planes, carving through the battlefield like a wound in reality. The Veyari fell back, not understanding what they were seeing. The Noctari tried to counter with dreamshards—psychic projectiles that infected thoughts.
Too late.
Zeeler twisted through them, singing dissonance. The dreamshards froze in midair, then shattered into motes of regret.
The battlefield screamed around him.
More soldiers poured in from both sides. He could feel them closing. The light was dimming. The air thick with hate and fear.
His body trembled. Too much power. Too fast.
Then came the moment.
A golden blade pierced his side.
He gasped. Blood spilled across his shirt. A Veyari warrior had gotten close.
But Zeeler didn't fall.
He turned—eyes wide. And then… he split.
Not just metaphorically. Not just across realms.
He physically separated.
Two Zeelers stepped apart—one cloaked in light, eyes full of harmony. The other, shadows dripping from his fingertips, face calm and cold. A Soulfracture.
Time slowed around them.
The battlefield twisted.
The two versions of Zeeler moved—like a storm coming from both ends of the sky. They spun, clashed, then rejoined in a burst of white-black fire.
The entire field was knocked flat.
Every warrior—Veyari and Noctari—was thrown to the ground. Trees snapped. Rocks lifted and hung in the air like thoughts that had lost gravity.
When it cleared, Zeeler stood alone.
Bleeding.
Exhausted.
But alive.
The others didn't move. None dared to get up.
He looked down at his hands.
They were shaking.
Not from fear.
From change.
He wasn't just Veyari. He wasn't just Noctari. He wasn't half of anything.
He was something else now.
Something fractured. And something whole.
The wind picked up again. Calm this time.
Zeeler turned away from the battlefield. Not running. Just walking.
And in his wake, a scar in the fabric of the world remained—a line where light and shadow had kissed and never let go.