Almagh was awake, even in the deepest hours of night.
The city breathed with the sound of a soul holding its breath — a low, muted hum that lived between silence and decay.
As the wind brushed against the stone streets, the echoes of time itself rebounded from the walls, worn and weary.
Lian moved through the gray mist, his footsteps soft, steady — as though even the stones beneath him were breathing.
The child he had saved slept in what could loosely be called a safe corner of a ruined inn.
His soul was fragile, flickering like a pale white flame.
But Lian could not stay.
The scent of the Void still lingered in the city — the vibration of corruption thickened the air.
He stopped at the turn of a narrow alley.
Something stirred — not the Void this time.
This was different.
More controlled. More deliberate.
He lifted his head.
Through the haze, three figures emerged.
The edges of their cloaks dragged along the cobblestones; their faces were hidden behind masks.
Each wore a silver seal around the wrist — and the symbols upon those seals pulsed with a faint gray light, beating like a quiet heart.
Soul Hunters.
He had only heard of them in whispers.
They called themselves the Purifiers.
Any soul that had touched the Void, they deemed beyond salvation — and erased completely.
They believed corruption could never be reversed.
To them, purification meant annihilation.
Lian slipped into the shadows and watched.
The group made their way toward an ancient temple at the city's center.
It seemed woven from stone and bone alike.
Its gates had fallen, its walls scarred with the gray traces of the Void.
As they entered, Lian felt it —
a vibration in the air, faint but unmistakable.
The residue of a soul still clinging to the world.
Their leader raised a hand.
The others withdrew silver cylinders from their packs — vessels for spiritual chains.
The air quivered.
A heartbeat later, one of the chains shot into the darkness of the temple.
A muffled scream followed.
Not human — a soul's cry.
When the chain recoiled, a gray, translucent form was bound at its end —
a twisted, eyeless face that wept silently.
The soul was still conscious.
"I'm still here… don't leave me…"
The voice rang inside Lian's mind,
but the Purifiers didn't hear.
Their ears were closed to anything but the echo of their own creed.
The leader touched the end of the chain.
A surge of gray light erupted —
the scream was brief,
and then there was nothing.
Only silence remained.
Lian's face did not change,
but something flickered in his eyes —
a restrained, deliberate anger.
They call it cleansing, he thought.
But all they do is destroy.
And every destruction feeds the Void.
Then he understood — the Soul Hunters, without realizing it, were nourishing the very thing they sought to erase.
The Void did not grow from death,
but from emptiness.
By extinguishing pain, fear, and hope alike,
they stripped the world of feeling.
And the Void fed on that silence.
He narrowed his gaze as he watched them.
One of the Purifiers suddenly turned,
eyes searching the darkness.
"Who's there?"
Lian said nothing — and did not move.
The man with gray eyes drew his blade.
Runes glimmered along its edge; the air hissed.
"I can smell the Void," the man said.
"Show yourself."
Lian stepped forward.
The mist parted slowly around him.
A faint violet light shimmered across his face.
"The scent you smell isn't from the Void," he said quietly.
"It's from yourselves. You've burned too many souls."
The man's expression hardened.
"You're tainted. Your soul is stained. We can cleanse you."
Lian's voice was cold as stone.
"Cleanse?"
His eyes caught the gray light and returned it.
"You mean destroy."
At that, the leader of the group intervened.
His face was hidden behind the mask,
but his voice carried the weight of age.
"Enough, Aris," he said, turning to the man.
Then to Lian: "A violet soul…"
Silence stretched between them.
Lian's light seemed to clash against the gray that surrounded them.
"One of the mind-resonants," the old man murmured.
"Those who interact through thought."
Lian inclined his head slightly.
"The Void despises the mind," he said.
"Because thought always precedes fear."
The old man took a cautious step closer.
"Have you come to fight the Void, violet soul?"
Lian shook his head slowly.
"No. I've come to understand it."
For a moment, the silence deepened —
thick enough to hear the pulse of the mist itself.
Then the leader spoke again, softly:
"Those who seek understanding… are the ones who vanish first."
The group began to withdraw.
Chains coiled back into their cases,
symbols dimmed,
and the mist swallowed them whole.
Lian was alone before the temple.
The echo of the destroyed soul still lingered in the air —
as though even the stones carried its pain.
He closed his eyes and listened.
A faint whisper reached him:
"I could have been healed…"
Lian's spirit trembled.
For an instant, his violet light wavered — touched with gray.
"The more we try to cleanse," he whispered,
"the more we are stained."
He lifted his gaze to the sky —
a sky as gray and hollow as the breath of the Void itself.
And in that stillness, a murmur drifted through the darkness:
"I'm watching you, Lian."
Violet light flickered once more —
then dimmed.
The Void was no longer just a threat.
It had become a consciousness.
And for the first time,
its eyes had turned toward him.