The first sign was the stillness in Jason's eyes; he had stopped blinking. Not entirely—just enough that the rhythm of his face felt wrong.
Kael tracked the change on a Tuesday. Rain lashed the academy glass in a dull, metronomic beat. Beneath the hum of the overhead lights, thirty students sat like statues, their Mnemosyne interfaces shimmering above their shoulders like neon halos.
Jason occupied the seat three desks to Kael's left. Three years ago, he had wept over a dissected frog. Two months ago, he was still clumsy enough to trip over his own boots. Only last week, he'd been loud—laughing too hard at a joke that wasn't funny.
Today, he was a study in rigid geometry. No slouch, no restless fidgeting, no stylus gnawed between his teeth. Above his shoulder, a pale blue panel shimmered with clinical data:
[Subject: Jason Miller]
[Lineage: The Centurion of the Third Cohort]
[Synchronization Rate: 14% → 18%]
The number ticked upward mid-lesson. Eighteen percent. It was accelerating.
Kael ducked his head, feigning focus on his book. He wasn't following the words; he was counting Jason's respirations. Four seconds in. Four seconds out. Measured. Military. Jason used to breathe like someone always caught in the middle of a half-laugh.
"Mr. Miller."
Professor Veyne's voice cut through the room, precise and surgical. "Explain why the Siege of Oakhaven failed."
The old Jason would have frozen, looking to Kael in a panic. This Jason rose smoothly.
"It was not a tactical failure," he said. His voice had deepened, stripped of its tremor. "Commander Thorne refused to sacrifice civilians to stall the advance. Sentiment compromised strategy."
A heavy silence followed. While a few students looked on, impressed, Professor Veyne offered a thin, ghost of a smile.
"Excellent," Veyne breathed. "You are Blooming beautifully."
Blooming. Kael's grip tightened until the plastic of his pen cracked between his fingers. They used that word like it meant growth. But Kael had watched the harvest before. The smiles faded first, then the habits, then the very pauses that made a person human. By twenty percent, there was nothing left but ancient opinions wearing teenage skin.
Jason sat down. He didn't look at Kael; he hadn't looked at him all week. The interface above him flickered again.
19%.
Kael swallowed hard. His own interface hovered at the periphery of his vision. He forced himself to look:
[Subject: Kael Arden]
[Lineage: NULL]
[Synchronization: ERROR]
[Status: Hollow]
He was the only Hollow in a city of ghosts. He closed the panel before anyone caught him staring at his own void.
The bell rang. Chairs scraped and voices returned to the hall, but Jason packed his books with mechanical efficiency and left without a word. He didn't forget his lunchbox, didn't bump into a desk, and didn't trip. He moved like a man who had already marched across a hundred battlefields.
Kael watched him go. Something in his chest felt tight—not with fear, but with the cold weight of recognition. It always started this way.
A hand landed on his shoulder.
"Kael!"
Jonas Hale grinned at him, wide and warm and undeniably alive. His interface glowed with a comforting, low light:
[Lineage: The Ironclad Vanguard]
[Synchronization: 3%]
Three percent. Safe.
"For now," Kael muttered.
"What?" Jonas laughed. "You spacing out again?"
"You caught the dodgeball without looking today," Kael said.
Jonas flexed jokingly, oblivious. "Reflexes, man. Feels like I've done it before."
"That's how it starts."
Jonas's grin faltered. "You say that like it's a disease."
Kael didn't answer. Because it was.
They stepped outside into the rain. Aethelgard stretched before them—gothic spires wrapped in steam and cobblestones slick with oil. Gas lamps flickered under a sky the color of bruised iron. It was a city built atop the bones of its ancestors, where history didn't fade—it simply piled up.
"Arcade?" Jonas asked.
"Can't."
"Lira again?"
Kael nodded. Jonas's expression softened. "How's she doing?"
"She started," Kael said.
Jonas's smile returned, genuine this time. "That's great! What Lineage?"
"Not clear yet."
"Bet it's something amazing."
Kael looked toward the distant Palace Spire, glowing faintly through the downpour. He didn't answer.
They split at the crossroads. Kael took the longer route home, avoiding the trams. The crowds were too loud—not with noise, but with the spiritual static of hundreds of partially overwritten minds humming beneath their skin.
He turned into the Weavers' District, where narrow alleys wound between old textile factories. Halfway through, the air changed. It turned cold—not the chill of the rain, but a heavy, grave-cold.
Kael stopped. Two men in long, dark coats stood at the end of the alley. Between them, a third man lay on the ground, convulsing.
"Rejection," one of the men said, his voice flat.
"Please—" the man on the ground choked. "I'm still me—"
"Host instability confirmed."
A grey blade formed in the speaker's hand—neither metal nor light, but something in between. Kael pressed himself into the brick wall, holding his breath. The blade descended. The scream stopped.
Then, it happened. Not to the killers, but to Kael. A violent pull, like a hook driven into his ribs and yanked. Cold flooded his lungs. Panic. Regret. The image of a child's face flashed before his eyes.
I didn't say goodbye.
For a moment, the alley vanished. He was the man on the ground, bleeding, thinking of unpaid rent and a daughter with a fever.
"No," Kael gasped. Red text burned across his vision:
[Passive Ability Activated: VACUUM]
[Soul Fragment Detected]
[Absorbing...]
The dead man's essence rushed into him. Nature hated emptiness, and Kael was a void. He dropped to his knees, forcing himself to build the mental walls he'd used since childhood—a black box to lock the foreign thoughts away.
I am Kael Arden. Not Markus. Not father. Not failure.
Compress it. Silence it. The panic dulled, and his breathing returned. His interface flickered:
[Echo Acquired: "Desperate Father"] > [Effect: Heightened Situational Awareness] > [Warning: Emotional Instability Risk]
Kael leaned against the wall, shaking. The killers were already gone; they never noticed him. He stood slowly, his senses now razor-sharp. He saw the loose bricks, the escape routes, the shadows deep enough to hide a body.
He hated that he noticed. He hated that it helped.
The Arden apartment smelled like stew when he arrived—normal and warm.
"Kael!" Lira's voice called from the kitchen.
She was twelve, hair tied back messily with flour on her sleeve, still smiling. But as he watched her reach for a salt jar, her posture shifted. Her spine straightened with an authority that didn't belong to a child. Her fingers snapped around the jar with effortless grace. Then, as quickly as it had come, the slouch returned.
"Headaches?" Kael asked quietly.
"Gone," Lira said. For a split second, her eyes flashed a vivid, unnatural crimson. "Actually, I feel clear."
His interface activated:
[Subject: Lira Arden] > [Lineage: The Crimson Empress] > [Synchronization: 2% → 9%]
Nine percent since yesterday.
"You're staring," she said.
He forced a smile. "Just tired."
"You should rest," she said softly. It wasn't advice; it was a command. His body nearly obeyed. He bit his tongue until he tasted blood to break the spell.
"I'll study first," he said. She watched him one heartbeat too long, then smiled again. It was sweet, perfect, and entirely wrong.
That night, Kael couldn't sleep. The Desperate Father scratched at his mind, urging him to check the locks and scan the corners. He climbed to the roof instead.
"You're loud."
He turned to find a girl in a black dress standing by the water tank, her feet bare and her eyes like empty wells.
"Who are you?"
"Nox."
His interface flickered uselessly: [Status: OUT OF BOUNDS].
"You absorbed someone today," she said calmly. "A father. He is screaming."
Kael froze. "How do you know that?"
"You are silent," she said, stepping closer. "But your ghosts are not." She touched his forehead. Her hand was ice-cold, and the screaming in his head stopped instantly.
"I closed the lid," she explained. "You're dangerous, Kael Arden. If you keep collecting them without control, you will break."
"I don't have a Past Life," Kael said. "I don't have anything."
"You have space." She looked toward the Palace Spire. "Your sister is heavy. The Empress will not take long."
"Can you stop it?"
"No."
"Then how do I?"
Nox met his eyes. "Find the signal. The one calling them back." She stepped backward off the edge of the roof. There was no body—only fog twisting into shapes that looked like forgotten script.
Kael stood alone. His sister was at nine percent. Jason was at nineteen. And something in the dark was calling the ghosts home.
He looked at his hands. They were empty, hungry, and ready. The funeral had already begun; he just didn't know whose coffin would close first.