Part 3 of 3 – To Break, to Fuse, to Burn Anew
Day 30 – The Final Collapse
Grim stood at the center of the storm, his skin seared with runes, breath rattling.
The twin cores within him—storm and fire—had become comets colliding.
Each pulse of Ether threatened to tear him apart. His body was splitting down the middle. One half surged with thunder and wind. The other with Kindled flame.
"You can't fuse them," Sparks said, glitching in and out. "They'll kill each other. They'll kill you."
"Then they'll learn to burn together," Grim growled, hands trembling as they drew both energies in.
He dropped to his knees.
The realm cracked.
Reality bent.
His storm core surged, flaring like a newborn star. His fire core shattered—and then reformed—golden, refined, altered by pain and wrath and evolution.
And then… they collided.
Moments from Death – A Spark
Sparks, watching helplessly, felt her soulcore pulse for the first time since her fusion with that ancient fragment.
"No. Not like this."
Her voice—no longer glitchy, no longer sarcastic—cut through the fire.
"You're not done. We're not done. Get. Up."
Grim's fingers twitched.
The two cores spun inside him, orbiting each other. Then…
They began to spiral.
Together.
A singularity of flame and storm.
BOOOOOM.
The explosion rocked the entire dream realm. A pillar of stormfire shot into the skies, ripping through the void. The dragon's realm shook with awakening.
The Awakening – Reforged
Grim stood.
New.
His aura radiated a fire that crackled with thunder.
One eye stormblue. The other embergold.
The mark on his chest had reshaped—now a rotating emblem of a flame caught in a cyclone.
His body glowed with the embers of something ancient. Something unstoppable.
Sparks hovered in stunned silence.
"Okay. So... I might like you a little now."
Vortharion Appears – The Truth
From the sky descended Vortharion, the Crimson Sovereign, wings folded with slow pride.
"Thirty days... and you did not die."
"Barely," Grim rasped.
The dragon nodded once.
"You possess what only dragons ever forged: a twin core. Now merged. Balanced in chaos."
"You're stronger than before… and far more dangerous."
"But know this, Solace—Subject 04A—this power is only the beginning. You are no longer just heir to fire... but storm as well."
Grim looked down at his hands. Lightning flickered between his fingers. Golden fire curled around his arm.
"What happens now?"
The dragon turned his molten gaze to the horizon.
"Now… the Court will tremble."