Dawn had returned, but the world wasn't fully awake.
After the Gulor event, light spread across the Wamena valley. The sacred stones glowed softly, and people began to remember. But something hadn't come back. Something lost between the echoes of resonance—the soul.
Yohwa sat by the riverbank, his armor now stored in the sacred chamber. He no longer carried the hammer. He wore only the Soul Carving necklace, pulsing gently. The river flowed calmly, but his reflection appeared fractured. He stared into it and asked silently: Am I still Yohwa, or just an echo of those who once were?
In the village, children sang, but their songs sounded different. The old melodies had shifted, as if another voice joined in—a voice that didn't belong to them. Numa documented the change. He began mapping the new resonance patterns, but they were unstable. Certain stones glowed in unfamiliar hues: dusky violet, deep blue, and cold white.
"This resonance... it's not ours," Numa said. "They feel like echoes from a future that hasn't happened."
Yohwa nodded. He felt it too. Each time he touched a stone, he didn't just hear ancestral voices. He heard his own—versions of himself he didn't recognize. Versions that were angry, uncertain, and cold.
That night, Yohwa dreamed.
He stood in the valley, but there was no light. The sacred stones floated in the air, slowly spinning. In the center of the circle stood a figure that looked like him—but its eyes were dark, and its skin cracked like stone drained of light.
"I am the you that forgot," the figure said. "I am the echo that was never remembered."
Yohwa tried to move closer, but his body felt heavy. He couldn't move. The figure stepped forward, and with each step, the stones around it froze.
"The Soul Eclipse has begun," it whispered. "And you are its center."
Yohwa awoke, breath ragged. Outside, a thin mist had returned. But this wasn't Kelam's fog. It was subtler, deeper. It didn't wrap the body. It wrapped the heart.
In the village center, the main stone began to change color. From gold to gray. People started speaking in their sleep. They didn't forget, but they began to lose direction. They remembered who they were, but not why they existed.
Yohwa stood before the stone. He touched it, and resonance spread through his body. But this time, there were no ancestral voices. Only echoes of himself.
He knew a new season had begun. Not about light. But about soul.
And a soul, if not remembered, can become the darkest shadow.