Kael didn't sleep.
He sat beneath the moonflower tree with three journals open across his lap, the fading glow of Essence tracing between them like veins. Lyssa dozed nearby, wrapped in her cloak, her breathing calm, steady.
But something in the air had changed.
The wind moved wrong.
The Weave was thinner tonight, trembling under an unseen weight.
Kael pressed two fingers to the dirt, whispering a wordless command.
The grass around him shifted.
And in the distance—barely detectable—he felt them.
Watchers.
He closed his journal.
---
They left before dawn.
Lyssa didn't question it. She saw it in his eyes—the look of a mind three moves ahead.
They packed lightly. No goodbyes.
Just the road, and a direction Kael had never mentioned before: Southwest. Toward the ruins of Drellem's Gate—a lost fortress, said to have housed pre-divine technology. Forbidden. Forgotten. Protected by ancient death.
Lyssa walked beside him without complaint.
"Why there?" she asked after hours in silence.
"Because it's off the map."
"That's not a reason."
"It's my reason."
She didn't argue further.
---
They reached the first ridge by nightfall. From there, Kael could see the shattered stones of Drellem's Gate stretched across a valley like broken bones. No fires. No movement. Just silence.
But the Weave here was thicker.
Stronger.
Older.
He turned to Lyssa. "This place has no gods."
She raised a brow. "You sound relieved."
"I am."
He stepped down the ridge, boots crunching against shale.
She followed.
Inside the ruins, Kael dropped to one knee and traced a wide circle into the stone. Then a triangle. Then five runes from a language Lyssa didn't recognize.
"What is that?" she asked.
"A lock."
"To what?"
He glanced at her.
"Everything."
---
The seal glowed.
And then the earth shook.
Lyssa grabbed his shoulder, steadying herself. The air shifted. The Weave compressed around them like a breath held by the world itself.
And then…
The ground cracked open.
Not deep—just wide enough for a staircase to reveal itself. Stone. Clean. Untouched by time.
Kael descended without hesitation.
Lyssa followed him into the dark.
At the base of the stairs, a door waited—etched with a symbol she didn't recognize.
A diamond, split into four smaller facets, each pulsing with a different light: red, blue, green, and silver.
Kael's fingers brushed the bottom facet.
The door responded.
The facets vanished.
And the chamber opened.
Inside: a cathedral of machines.
Pillars of steel. Glass conduits. Weave-harmonic forges suspended midair. Tables carved not for worship—but experimentation.
Lyssa froze. "This… this isn't Talent-built."
"No," Kael whispered. "This was made by Learners."
Her voice was almost reverent. "Before the gods…"
"Before the gods killed them."
Kael stepped forward.
The air in the room responded to him. Panels flickered awake. Symbols rearranged themselves. Books levitated, organizing into the precise geometry of his thoughts.
This place didn't recognize Kael as an intruder.
It recognized him as successor.
---
Far away, in the heart of the Crystal Citadel, Lyssa's absence was finally noticed.
A message was delivered to a golden hall.
To a woman draped in violet and flame, her face carved from beauty and cruelty alike.
The moment she read the name Kael, her glass shattered.
Because Lyssa wasn't just any Talent.
She was the heir of House Virelen—the Myth-tier family closest to the gods themselves.
And she had vanished with a Bearer who broke the laws of divinity.