The song of the Shattered Realms was not a melodyit was a *scream*.
The woman of starlight stood before them, her golden eyes reflecting the fractured sky. Where her bare feet touched the ground, the bleeding earth*healed*, the viscous star-flecked substance crystallizing into delicate silver veins.
The Devourer's avatar recoiled, its twelve eyes narrowing to slits of violet fire,
**You,"* it hissed, its voice a chorus of breaking glass. **You were shattered.**
The woman"the First Core*smiled. **And yet, here I stand.**
Veythars Void Core pulsed in response, its cracked surface humming in harmony with her presence. The pain in his ribs dulled, replaced by a strange, resonant warmth. Runes grip on his wrist tightened, her golden light flaring brighter, purer, as if the womans mere presence had scrubbed the last remnants of corruption from her veins.
Behind them, Thalion gasped, his body jerking as life flooded back into him. His severed arm remained lost, but the cursed vines that had plagued him for years withered and fell away like dead leaves.
**What?** he rasped, his voice raw.
Sylviaris answerednot with words, but with a snarl. Her shadow, once fluid and commanding, now writhed like a dying thing, its edges fraying into smoke.
**This wasnt supposed to happen,"* she spat, her violet eyes burning with fury. **The First Core was *destroyed*."*
The woman turned her gaze to Sylviaris, and for the first time, her serenity cracked.
**You,"* she murmured. **The Keeper's shadow. The betrayer's hand.**
A revelation struck Veythar like a physical blow. *
Sylviaris wasnt just a scholar.
She was the Keeper's remnantthe fragment left behind when the First Core shattered.*
--
The vision came unbidden:
- **The First Core**, whole and radiant, cradled in the hands of a figure robed in starlight*the woman before them*.
- "*The Keeper**, their bone mask split by greed, plunging the Eclipse Pike into her chest. Not to protect the realms. To *steal* her power.
-**Sylviaris**, born from the shadow of that betrayal, her purpose twisted: to ensure the Core *never* reformed.
The memory shattered as the Devourer *lunged*.
Its form, still fractured from the sealed rift, was unstablea- patchwork of void energy and stolen flesh. But its hunger was undiminished. It struck not at the First Core, but at *Rune*.
**No!** Veythar moved on instinct, his body flaring with the last dregs of his Void Core's power. He intercepted the blow, his dagger meeting the Devourer's claws in a shower of sparks. The impact sent him skidding back, his boots carving grooves into the crystallized earth.
The First Core raised her hand.
**Enough,** she repeatedand the world *obeyed*.
The Devourer *froze*, its form locked in mid-strike, its twelve eyes wide with shock.
---
The woman's fingers traced a pattern in the air, and the silver veins in the ground *reacted*, surging upward like living tendrils. They wrapped around the Devourer, not to bind, but to *reweave*.
**The Veil was never meant to be a prison,** she said, her voice soft. **It was a *loom*.**
Veythar understood. The ShatteredRealms werent brokenthey were*unfinished*. The First Core's destruction had halted the weaving, leaving the threads of reality tangled, frayed.
And now, she was mending them.
The Devourer *screamed* as the silver threads pierced its form, stitching it back into the fabric of existence. Its rage, its hunger, its very *essence* unraveled, not into nothingness, but into *balance*.
Sylviaris *moved*.
Her shadow lashed out, a blade of pure void aimed at the First Core's heart. **t wont let you undo centuries of work!**
Thalion intercepted her, his remaining arm locking around her throat. **No more games,"* he growled.
Rune stepped forward, her golden light merging with the silver threads. **T ts over.*+
The First Core met Veythar's gazeand *nodded*.
The seal required an anchor.
A *sacrifice*.
Not of life, but of *purpose*.
The First Core extended her hand to Veythar. **Your Core holds a fragment of me. Return it, and the weave will hold. The realms will heal."*
The cost was unspoken but clear: his power. His connection to the Void."Flicker's legacy."
Runes breath hitched. **Veythar"**
He hesitatednot out of fear, but *grief*. To sever the bond was to erase the last trace of the beast that had died for him.
Then Thalions voice cut through the silence. **Do it."* His gaze was steady, his scars gleaming in the silver light. **It's not a chain. Its a *key*.**
Veythar exhaled.
And *pressed his hand to the First Core's*.
--.
Agony. Radiance.
The Void Core in his chest *shattered*not into fragments, but into *light*. The silver threads surged, weaving through the sky, the earth, the very air, stitching the Shattered Realms back together.
The Devourer's scream faded into a whisper, then silence.
Sylviariss shadow dissolved, her form unraveling into motes of violet dust. **" You fool "* she whispered. **Youve only delayed the inevitable."*
Then she was gone.
The First Core's glow dimmed, her starlight robes fading. **The weave is complete,"* she murmured. **But the loom remains. Protect it."*
Her body dissolved, not into death, but into *the sky itself* thousand glittering stars where the bleeding rift had been.
---
Silence.
Then- A *pulse*.
Faint, but unmistakable.
From the ground where the First Core had stood, a single silver thread*lifted*, coiling around Veythars wrist like a lifeline.
Runes eyes widened. **It's calling to you."*
Thalion limped forward, his gaze wary. "*What now?**
Veythar closed his fingers around the threadand *felt* it.
A heartbeat.
A *promise*.
Somewhere, in the mended Veil, the Devourer *stirred*.
And the loom *waited*.