The ocean's breath still clung to Raine's skin as the black sands of the Abyssal Coast faded behind them, replaced by the jagged cliffs of the Tempest Spires. The Wind Ember hummed in her palm, its cerulean light pulsing in time with the storm's heartbeat. Kaios walked ahead, his silver hairnow streaked with more white than beforeftickering like a candle in the gale.
The temporal wound from Elysa's dagger had deepened, etching lines of exhaustion beneath his mismatched eyes.
*"The Stormkeep's fall wont go unnoticed,"* he said, voice barely audible over the howling winds. *"The Conclave will send more than Enforcers next time."*
Raine flexed her crystallized fingers, the shards glinting with absorbed Ember energy.
*"Let them."*
The sky answered with a crack of violet lightning, illuminating the skeletal remains of a fortress half-buried in the cliffsGarrs workshop. Its iron gates hung crooked, rusted gears protruding like broken bones. The air here reeked of ozone and scorched metal, a testament to experiments best left forgotten.
Kaios's dagger was already drawn. *"This place is a graveyard."*
*"No,"* Raine murmured, stepping forward. *"It's a trap."*
The gates groaned open on their own.
Inside, the workshop was a cathedral of madness. Ceiling-high schematics of the Rift fluttered like ghostly banners, their edges charred. Glass tanks lined the walls, filled with floating horrorshybrids of flesh and machine. their limbs fused with the Tentacles of the Void Parasite.
At the room's heart stood Garr, his back to them, his mechanical arm whirring as he adjusted the core of a hovering devicea-sphere of crackling void energy.
*"I wondered when youd come,"* he said, voice distorted by the respirator grafted into his throat.
Kaios's grip on his dagger tightened. *"Youre working for them."*
Garr turned.
Raine's breath caught.
His mechanical arm wasnt just machineryit was *alive*. The metal plates had split open, revealing writhing veins of shadowy tendrils that pulsed in sync with the void sphere. His left eye, once human, now glowed the same sickly green as the Conclave's sigils.
*"Working for them?"* Garr laughed, a sound like grinding gears.
*"I *am* them."* He tapped his temple. *"Or what's left. The Void Cultists... the Conclave... same masters, different chains."*
The sphere flared, projecting a hologramElysa, bound in chains of liquid shadow, her body half-consumed by the same parasitic growths.
Her remaining eye locked onto Raine.
*"You shouldnt have taken the Embers,"* she rasped.
*"Now he's *awake*."*
The workshop trembled. The tanks shattered, releasing their grotesque experiments. Hybrids of man and machine lurched forward, their movements jerky, their mouths sewn shut with glowing wire.
Kaios lunged, his temporal dagger slicing through the first creature's neck. Time stuttered around the wound, freezing its body mid-collapsebut the tendrils inside *kept moving*, slithering toward Raine.
She reacted on instinct. The Fire Ember ignited in her palm, searing the tendrils to ash. *"Garr! Whatever they did to you"*
*"They didnt *do* anything!"* he roared, slamming his fist into a console. The void sphere pulsed, and the remaining hybrids *convulsed*, their bodies merging into a single, writhing mass of flesh and metal. *'
I volunteered! Someone had to control the Rifts growthsomeone who understood it!"*
The amalgamation lunged.
Raine barely dodged, its claws grazing her shoulder. Crystallized blood welled up, the shards in her skin reacting to the void energy*growing*. She gritted her teeth. *"Kaios, the sphere!"*
He was already moving, dagger aimed at the sphere' corebut Garr intercepted him, mechanical arm transforming into a blade of crackling shadow. Steel met void, and Kaios *screamed* as temporal energy backlashed, his silver hair bleaching further at the roots.
Elysa's hologram flickered, her voice desperate. *"The sphere's a beacon! It's calling *him*
The roof exploded.
A figure descended on wings of storm and shadowDermont, his body no longer human. His skin had split open, revealing a second layer of pure black crystal, his eyes twin voids. The air around him *warped*, as if reality itself recoiled.
*"Little sparks,"* he crooned, landing gracefully. *"Playing with fire."*
Garr fell to his knees, his mechanical arm twitching. *"I'm sorry... I couldnt stop it..."*
Dermont flicked his wrist. Garr' arm *detonated*, consuming him in a vortex of shadow.
Raines vision turned red.
The Fire and Wind Embers *erupted* in tandem, their energy fusing with her crystallized limbs. She didnt thinkshe*struck*, a whirlwind of flame and fury. Dermont barely flinched, catching her fist in his palm. The impact sent shockwaves through the workshop, toppling shelves of unstable machinery.
*"Youre stronger than the others,"* he mused, tightening his grip until her bones creaked. *"But still just a vessel."*
Kaios's dagger found his back.
Time *fractured*.
Dermont's form glitched, his edges blurringbut he *laughed*, reaching back to grab Kaios by the throat.
*"Ah, the broken key. Did you really think your curse was an accident?"*
Raine's gaze snapped to Elysa' hologram. Her lips formed a single word:*'Sphere."* She lunged.
Dermont moved to interceptbut Kaios *wrenched* himself free, slamming his dagger into the ground. A temporal shockwave rippled outward, freezing Dermont mid-motion for a single, precious second.
Raine reached the void sphere.
And *smashed* the Fire Ember into it.
The explosion was silent.
For a heartbeat, the world turned inside outthe workshop, the storm, even Dermont's snarl *unraveling* into streaks of light and shadow. Then reality*snapped* back, the sphere imploding into a singularity that sucked the void energyand half of Dermont's bodyinto oblivion.
He *howled*, his remaining form dissolving into smoke. *"This changes*nothing*! The Rift *hungers*
Then he was gone.
The workshop collapsed around them. Kaios grabbed Raine,dragging her toward the exit as the walls caved in. Elysa's hologram flickered one last time, her voice barely a whisper: *"Find the Earth Ember... before *he* does.."*
Then silence.
Outside, the storm raged on. Raine clutched her crystallized arm, the shards now threaded with veins of void-black, Kaios's breathing was ragged, his hair nearly all white.
*"Garr was right about one thing,"* he muttered. *"Were not just sealing the Rift."*
Raine stared at the horizon, where the sky bled into a familiar, hungry dark.
*"Were killing a god."*