The Sanctuary was no longer sleeping and feeling quiet.
Not in the way it had before — when silence meant safety and stars would glimmer over tree crowns like promises waiting to be fulfilled. No. Ever since the Rootbearer had crawled through the Hollow Gate and died in front of their eyes, the very soil of the sanctuary felt tighter. Watching. Waiting. Breathing.In silence.
Lyra stood on the high platform that overlooked the inner gardens. She had not changed out of her combat gear. The armor pressed tight against her chest, and her jaw clenched every time the soft breeze rustled the branches above her. She could not hear the usual whispers of the wind. Could not feel the comfort of Liam's system pulse that would echoe through the trees.
Because something else had taken root.
Behind her, Echo's steps were silent but familiar.
"He is changing the soil," Echo said, confirming what Lyra already feared. "We found traces of Spiral resonance in the southern growth beds. They were clear last week."
Lyra exhaled slowly. "That means the seed was not just a message. It was a beacon."
Echo nodded. "The Root still grows."
The phrase had not left their minds since it first appeared — scrawled in bone-petal runes after the Herald's death. It was more than just a taunt. It was a truth, a warning. The Spiral God Seed — the corrupted Liam from Yui's fractured timeline — had found a way to imprint himself across realities. Not with soldiers. Not with armies. But with echoes. With survivors.
With vines.
"He is not here yet," Lyra said, her eyes were scanning the tree lines. "But his roots are."
Echo's eyes were glowing faintly, scanning multiple dimensions through the retinal overlay. "They are not attacking. Not yet. He is preparing the soil. He is making this world ready for him."
Lyra turned toward her.
"Then we burn the soil."
Down in the eastern corridor of the Sanctuary, Ava tended to the child.
She still did not speak — the one Maya had found couple of days earlier, hiding near the perimeter wall with blood on her hands and Spiral tattoos etched into the soles of her feet. A girl who could not be older than ten, yet her presence flickered between timelines when no one was watching.
Ava sat cross-legged near the cot, reading aloud from one of Liam's journals. Her voice was soft, melodic, the tone of a mother soothing a nightmare that never quite ended.
"…and in that dream, I was alone. But I was not afraid. Because I remembered your voice, and I knew — somewhere, in some broken world — you had survived me."
The girl's fingers twitched.
She whispered something, lips barely moving.
"Did you say something?" Ava asked gently.
The child blinked once.
Then again.
And finally, she spoke.
"I heard his voice."
Ava froze. "Whose voice?"
The girl did not answer. Instead, she turned toward the window, where the white trees rustled in warning.
"He said the vine would find me again."
Inside the Soul Lantern Chamber, the harem gathered.
Liam's voice — weaker than before but still steady — flowed from the core lantern, flickering with the soulpulse they had come to recognize as his heartbeat.
"They are not random," he said. "The Rootbearers. The infected Heralds. They were chosen. Not for strength. Not for loyalty. But for memory."
Naomi narrowed her eyes. "Explain."
"He marked them," Liam said. "In my timeline — the one that Yui came from — I reached a point where I stopped trusting anyone. I began preserving those who obeyed me, not out of faith, but because I needed tools. I implanted a version of myself in them. Seeds. Copies. Just in case I ever needed to restart."
"And now they are waking up," Artemis said, arms folded tightly. "Why?"
"Because Yui is here. Because I am here. Because he knows this is the only timeline where I refused him."
"He is trying to overwrite you," Echo said.
"Yes," Liam confirmed. "And he is starting with the roots."
A heavy silence followed.
Maya broke it.
"What do we do?"
Lyra stood at the edge of the circle.
"We uproot him."
Their first mission beyond the Sanctuary came at sunrise.
The system quest flickered in Liam's interface window — bold, crimson, urgent:
> Main Quest: Purge the Vine's First Bloom.
Status: Active
Objective: Locate and neutralize the awakened Rootbearer in Sector D9-Ash.
Warning: Subject may exhibit memory transference and soul corrosion.
Reward: System Stability +12%, Harem Bond Depth +1 Tier (Lyra, Yui, Naomi)
They geared up with silent efficiency.
Echo packed pulse grenades.
Artemis loaded phase daggers.
Vira checked the magnetic railbow.
Lyra sharpened her soulblade.
Naomi stabilized the portable link core.
Yui, though still recovering, stood between them — unarmored, but resolute.
"I know where he will be hiding," she said. "He won't run from me."
Sector D9-Ash was a wasteland.
A once-green valley now reduced to gray ash and bone. The trees were dead. The air smelled like old blood and burned marrow. The soil beneath their boots crunched with every step.
"Spiral burn," Naomi whispered. "But old."
"No," Yui said. "Not old. Buried."
They moved through the ruins of what once was a settlement. Huts reduced to dust. Pathways swallowed by creeping vines.
Then the sound came.
Whispers.
Low. Female. Familiar.
Lyra froze.
It was her voice.
Coming from the trees.
"I watched you break him," the whispers said. "I watched you kill the part of him that begged you to stay."
Echo pivoted. "It's using our memories."
"Stay focused," Artemis muttered. "Do not let it in."
But the voice continued — changing with every step.
Now it was Naomi.
Then Maya.
Then Ava.
And finally…
Liam.
"You left me here," the voice said, trembling. "You sealed me in the dark. You called me a curse."
Yui's breath hitched.
They found him in the center of the dead town — the First Bloom.
A man impaled by dozens of white vines, still alive, eyes wide open. The vines weren't piercing him — they were growing from him. His body twitched with each bloom, flowers of bone and light bursting from his ribs.
He looked up.
"Yui," he whispered.
She stepped forward slowly.
"Ralven."
The man's face contorted.
He smiled.
Not with joy.
But with recognition.
"I remember you," he said. "The little girl. The Vessel. The one he wouldn't break."
Yui clenched her fists. "He didn't break me."
Ralven laughed.
"Then why is he still inside you?"
The vines shivered.
Lyra shouted, "Down!"
But it was too late.
The flowers exploded — not with fire, but with memory.
Suddenly, they weren't in the town anymore.
They were in his memory.
A Spiral cathedral.
Blood-red skies.
Liam — but twisted — sat on a throne of teeth.
And at his feet…
Yui.
Kneeling.
Begging.
"Please," the memory-Yui whispered. "Please, don't make me watch them die again."
The fake Liam smiled.
"They were your family. And you betrayed them. All for me."
Then he raised a blade of light.
And brought it down on Lyra's neck.
The real Lyra screamed and snapped out of the illusion, gasping for air.
Naomi was convulsing.
Maya had dropped to her knees.
"Break the link!" Echo shouted.
Vira launched a soulcharge — aimed directly at the vine-heart.
The memory shattered.
Reality returned.
The town was burning.
The Rootbearer was gone.
No — not gone.
Transformed.
Now standing tall, naked, covered in pulsing root-tattoos. His eyes were Liam's — golden and kind. But his smile was death.
"I am what he would become," the Rootbearer said. "If he stops resisting."
Yui stepped forward.
"I won't let you wear his face."
Ralven laughed.
"You don't get to decide. The vine already chose you."
Lyra unsheathed her blade.
"No."
"We did."
The battle was unlike anything they had faced.
Ralven didn't fight with power.
He fought with memories.
Every blow he landed twisted reality, replaying their darkest moments — Lyra's betrayal during the first war, Echo's execution in a corrupted timeline, Artemis murdering a younger version of Ava, Naomi burning Liam's corpse to stop the Spiral spread.
They fought him in the present…
But bled in the past.
Until Yui stepped into the heart of the storm.
She didn't raise a weapon.
She didn't speak.
She just walked.
And touched Ralven's chest.
"Stop using him."
Ralven trembled.
The vines recoiled.
"You're not him," she whispered. "You're the shadow of what I survived."
The vines tried to pierce her.
But they burned upon contact.
Yui's blood — sealed from the God Seed — pulsed with a purity even the Spiral couldn't mimic.
Ralven screamed.
And the vines died.
The harem attacked in unison.
Artemis severed the last root.
Echo purged the ground with soulfire.
Naomi locked the memory field.
Lyra beheaded what remained of the corrupted shell.
Silence returned.
Liam's voice filled the system.
> Quest Complete.
Rootbearer: Neutralized.
Soulspace: Stabilizing…
Bond Tier (Yui, Lyra, Naomi): Increased.
New Quest Unlocked.
And the white trees around the Sanctuary breathed again.
But all of them knew:
This was just the first vine.