The rain had stopped, but the world still dripped.
Roof edges wept. The streets gleamed like veins of silver.
Eryndor Valein sat on the floor beside his mother's bed, staring at her still hand.
The ChronoMark on her wrist had faded completely — just pale skin now.
No light. No sound. No time.
Outside, the mourning bells began to toll.
Low, heavy, endless.
Each toll meant another hour reclaimed by the Ecliptic Order.
Each death was a transaction.
---
A knock echoed at the door.
Three slow taps — the kind that carried authority.
Eryndor didn't answer, but the door opened anyway.
A man stepped in, tall and thin, wrapped in a cloak of dark blue. His mask was shaped like a clock face, its golden hands frozen at midnight.
On his wrist glowed a priest's insignia: Ecliptic Order — Bell Collector.
He bowed slightly. "Lira Valein. Her time has ended?"
Eryndor's throat felt tight. "She's gone."
The Collector nodded once, stepping closer to the bed. From his bag, he pulled a small glass sphere — smooth, clear, and pulsing faintly with light.
"Her remaining seconds must return to the Flow."
He placed the sphere over her wrist. For a moment, faint blue mist rose from her skin — the last fragments of her residual time. The sphere glowed brighter, then dimmed.
The Collector slipped it into his bag and turned. "Her hours will be redistributed to the Core. May the Flow preserve balance."
Eryndor's hands clenched. "You mean you're giving it to the rich."
The priest paused. "To those who maintain order."
"She worked all her life. She gave everything. And now you just—"
The man's tone didn't change. "Time belongs to the Flow, boy. Not to us."
"She's not part of your Flow," Eryndor whispered. "She's my mother."
The priest sighed softly. "Fourteen years old, and already talking like a heretic."
That was the first time Eryndor heard himself called that.
It wouldn't be the last.
---
When the Collector left, the house felt hollow — like the world had forgotten to breathe.
Eryndor stood for a long time, staring at the empty space where the light had left her.
He didn't cry.
He just felt quiet.
The kind of quiet that never goes away.
Then he heard something outside.
A hum.
A soft, rising pitch that vibrated through the air.
He stepped to the doorway and looked down the street.
A funeral convoy rolled past — black carts pulled by humming drones, each carrying a body wrapped in glass. Their wrists still glowed faintly beneath the covers, ticking down the last residual seconds before the Collectors would harvest them.
People stood on the sides of the road, heads bowed.
No prayers. No tears.
Only the sound of time draining away.
---
Eryndor followed the convoy.
He didn't know why. He just did.
They moved through the lower district until they reached a vast circular plaza — the Reclamation Grounds.
At its center stood a colossal structure: a clock made of stone and bone, its hands made from hundreds of glowing wristbands fused together.
The Bell Spire.
Priests stood around it, chanting in rhythmic monotone.
With each chant, one of the glass coffins was lifted into the air by invisible force — slowly turning to ash, releasing a faint stream of light that spiraled into the Spire's heart.
Eryndor's eyes widened.
Each soul's remaining time — seconds, minutes, fragments — was being absorbed into the Spire.
The Order wasn't just collecting the dead.
They were mining them.
---
"First time seeing the Bell Spire?"
A voice came from behind him.
Eryndor turned.
A boy about his age stood there, a smudge of grease on his cheek, eyes sharp and restless. His wrist glowed faintly — [00:00:45:09].
Less than an hour left.
He smirked. "Creepy, isn't it? All that time, just swallowed up. My dad's in there somewhere."
Eryndor said nothing.
"They call me Kael," the boy continued. "Bell thief, sometimes."
Eryndor frowned. "You steal from them?"
Kael grinned. "Only what they don't deserve." He nodded toward the Spire. "See those lights? Each one's a vial of time waiting to be claimed. The priests say it keeps the city running. I say it keeps them rich."
Eryndor looked back at the Spire.
The light pulsed like a beating heart.
He could almost feel it — the rhythm syncing with his own.
Kael's voice dropped. "You lost someone, didn't you?"
"My mother."
Kael nodded slowly. "Then you understand."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small vial, half-filled with pale blue sand.
"Corpse time," he said. "From the Spire itself."
Eryndor stared. "You stole that?"
Kael shrugged. "They won't miss a few seconds. You want it?"
"I don't steal from the dead."
Kael laughed softly. "Then maybe the dead will steal from you."
Before Eryndor could respond, Kael tossed the vial into his hand and disappeared into the crowd.
---
Eryndor looked down at the glowing sand.
It shimmered faintly, whispering — too quiet to make out words.
He felt his skin prickle.
When he looked back at the Spire, he swore he saw faces in the light — faint, ghostly, flickering in the flow.
His mother's voice seemed to echo in his mind.
"The Flow is never kind, Eryn. But maybe one day, you can make it honest."
He closed his fist around the vial.
---
That night, the bells of Ecliptica rang again — louder this time.
The priests said it was for balance.
But Eryndor Valein knew better.
They were ringing to remind the slums what they owed.
And somewhere deep inside him,
a thought began to grow —
quiet, heavy, and dangerous.
If the Flow can take everything…
then maybe one day, I'll take it back.
To be continued...