The rift spat Avery and Kael out into a Veil that seemed alive.
The sky above was bruised purple and black, streaked with threads of pale lightning that hummed faintly, like veins of some unseen creature. The ground beneath their feet was uneven, a shifting mosaic of shattered stone, ash, and faintly glowing cracks that pulsed like weak hearts. Shadows stretched long and jagged, moving against the grain of physics, curling toward the air as though reaching for prey. Avery swallowed. Their palms burned with the sigil’s fire. Every line pulsed in time with their heartbeat—or maybe it was their heartbeat. The tether pulled toward something faintly glowing in the distance: their mission target, the corrupted soul. Kael stepped beside them, scythe balanced across their shoulders, eyes scanning the horizon. “Focus,” they muttered. “It’s already drawn attention. Wraiths will smell it. They’ll come, and they’ll come hungry.” Avery nodded, stomach tightening. Their legs trembled, but they forced themselves forward, each step crunching against stones that didn’t entirely exist. Mist curled around their ankles, thick and cold, smelling faintly of burnt ash and wet soil. Shadows slithered across the ground, whispering faintly, voices like fingernails on metal. There, just ahead, pulsed a faint glow. A soul, corrupted and twisted, hung midair, wrapped in threads of black smoke. Its shape was humanoid but warped—arms too long, eyes hollow pits that flickered with pale green fire. It thrashed weakly, emitting a faint wail that scraped against Avery’s ears. “Do you see it?” Kael asked, crouching slightly. “That’s your target. Keep your tether steady. You pull, you don’t flinch. You hesitate, it’s gone. Again.” Avery swallowed hard. Their hands shook as they reached toward the soul. Threads of light extended from their sigil, tangling gently around the corrupted form. The tether pulled, delicate but insistent. The soul resisted, writhing violently, and Avery felt it tug back like a living weight. “Steady,” Kael murmured. “It’s like wrestling a storm. Feel it. Don’t fight it too hard, or it’ll snap.” Avery swallowed hard. Their hands shook as they reached toward the soul. Threads of light extended from their sigil, tangling gently around the corrupted form. The tether pulled, delicate but insistent. The soul resisted, writhing violently, and Avery felt it tug back like a living weight. “Steady,” Kael murmured. “It’s like wrestling a storm. Feel it. Don’t fight it too hard, or it’ll snap.” Avery focused, teeth clenched, sweat stinging their eyes. The threads glowed brighter as the soul’s light flickered, pulsing with an unstable rhythm. A sudden scream tore through the air. Shadows exploded upward—Wraiths, dozens of them, jagged and spindly, eyes white-hot with hunger, claws scraping the air. Their howls shook the Veil, making the stones shiver beneath Avery’s feet. “Move!” Kael shouted, spinning the scythe in a lethal arc. Shadow and fire collided with a screech. The Wraith lunged, recoiling only slightly as the blade tore through its form, but more surged forward. Avery stumbled backward, tether stretching dangerously. The corrupted soul flared, its threads snapping against Avery’s palm. The sigil burned white-hot. Pain shot up their arm, threatening to knock them off their feet. “I-I can’t!” Avery gasped. “Yes, you can!” Kael snapped, eyes blazing. “Pull! Now! Or it’s gone!” Avery gritted their teeth, digging deep. They visualized the soul’s light, imagined it as something human, something alive and begging not to be lost. They yanked, tugging with every ounce of strength they could muster. The threads flared, wrapping the soul tighter, drawing it toward them. For a moment, hope. The soul’s chaotic form began to solidify, glowing steadily, as if recognizing Avery’s pull. Victory seemed close, so close they could taste it. Then the Wraith’s clawed hand shot out from the shadows, catching the soul in a violent swipe. It twisted, black smoke enveloping the tether, and Avery felt the pull jerk sharply. The soul screamed—shrill, desperate—and disappeared into the darkness of the Veil, snatched from their grasp. “No!” Avery screamed, falling to their knees, chest heaving. Kael’s scythe flashed, slicing a Wraith in half, sending shards of shadow scattering. “Damn it!” Kael hissed. They lunged forward, cutting a path through the remaining predators, their movements fluid, precise, merciless. Avery’s hands shook, the sigil still pulsing faintly, as though scolding them. The Veil felt heavier now, darker, suffocating. The corrupted soul was gone, and the echo of its wail lingered, twisting into the wind. Kael turned to them, eyes blazing, pale fire in their gaze. “Do you see what hesitation costs?” Avery swallowed hard, tears stinging their eyes. “I tried…” “Tried doesn’t matter!” Kael snapped. “Almost doesn’t count. That soul is lost. You want to survive here? You do. Not might, not almost—you do.” Avery’s hands clenched into fists, sigil burning painfully. “I… I understand. I won’t—” Kael’s expression softened slightly, just for a heartbeat. “Good. You better. Because this is only the beginning. There’s more waiting in the Veil, and they’re not forgiving.” Avery’s stomach dropped. They forced themselves to stand, shoulders trembling, heart hammering. The Veil stretched endlessly ahead, alive with shadow, light, and hungry whispers. Somewhere within it, the corrupted soul—and countless dangers—waited. And Avery knew, with a clarity that cut through fear, that they were already in too deep.Avery’s eyes opened to nothing.No sky, no ground, no familiar horizon — only light. A living light, pulsing and shifting with a rhythm that seemed almost conscious. It wrapped around her, coiling and flowing like molten rivers, brushing against her skin and sinking into her bones. Her mark — the tether seared into her chest — throbbed with warmth and urgency, syncing with the Vein’s heartbeat.Beside her, Kael appeared, a figure of smoke and shadow, tethering the currents of gold and black that spiraled between them. His presence was a steadying force, but even he seemed dwarfed by the sheer vastness of the Vein.“Delan?” His voice cut through the hum, rough and low, carrying across the currents.“I’m… here,” she whispered, awe-laden. Her voice barely felt real. In this place, even sound was strange, stretching and dissolving before it reached her ears.The Vein shifted. Threads of light, thousands of them, coiled toward her hands like curious snakes. Each carried a pulse — fragments
The Vein roared. Not in sound — sound couldn’t exist here — but in vibration, in the tremor of light against the edges of perception. The portal shimmered in the center of the chamber, a vortex of living energy that stretched through mirrored dimensions. Ryn Hale stood before it, helm tucked under her arm, her expression carved from focus. Behind her, the retrieval squad prepared in silence. Five of them — all reapers of rank, each bearing the sigil of the Council burned into their breastplates. Their scythes thrummed faintly with resonance, reacting to the pulse of the Vein ahead. Soreth’s voice crackled over the ether-channel. “Team Alpha, your objective is clear. Find Varyn and Delan. Secure the anchor point. Do not engage any entities beyond containment protocol. If instability exceeds threshold, abort immediately.” Ryn’s reply was steady. “Understood, Commander.” “May the current guide you.” The portal flared white — and they stepped through. --- Light folded. Space inv
Silence. Avery floated through it, weightless, her body a ghost among ghosts. The pulse that had carried her through the Vein had slowed to a whisper, its current flickering like the heartbeat of a dying star. She didn’t know how long they had drifted—hours, years, or lifetimes—but time didn’t mean anything here. In this place, memory was the only constant. Kael’s voice broke through the hum, rough and steady. “Stay with me, Delan.” She blinked, vision sharpening. Kael was just ahead, dark energy rippling off him like smoke. The light of the Vein wrapped around him in slow ribbons, revealing glimpses of his human self beneath the spectral armor — a flicker of who he once was. “I’m here,” she breathed, though her voice sounded distant, carried on echoes rather than air. They stood — or perhaps floated — on a stretch of translucent ground, a crystalline corridor carved through the Vein’s living core. Around them, ghostly silhouettes drifted in the current: fragments of souls, memo
The Council Chamber had never felt small before. For eons, it had been a cathedral of eternity — marble white and shadow-black, suspended between realms, lit by the glow of the Vein itself. But now the light that filtered through the mirrored walls was dimmer, sickly, uncertain. The hum beneath the floor — the heartbeat of the world they’d built — had grown uneven. Edran stood at the center of the dais, one hand gripping his staff hard enough to crack the obsidian beneath it. “Reports confirm the current has slowed by eight percent. The Vein’s rhythm is faltering.” Murmurs rippled through the gathered reapers and lesser councilors — a sound of restrained panic. Aethren, standing at his left, glanced at the data-stream hovering above the soul mirror. The numbers pulsed faintly in pale blue script, symbols of the Vein’s flow translating into patterns of energy and decay. “That should be impossible,” he murmured. “The current has never wavered in recorded history.” Veyra’s voice dri
There was no sky in the Vein — only light. Endless, pulsing, breathing light. Avery floated in its glow, her body weightless, her senses stretched beyond the limits of flesh. The world around her thrummed like a heart too large for comprehension. The sound wasn’t sound, but vibration — resonant, omnipresent, alive. When she opened her eyes, she saw Kael. He drifted not far away, bound to her by the tether — a ribbon of gold and shadow that shimmered and twisted between them. But he wasn’t moving. His form flickered, dissolving in pulses of black smoke and silver light, his face unreadable, his essence fraying around the edges. “Kael…” Her voice was small against the Vein’s hum. She reached for him — her fingers brushing the tether instead of his skin. The contact sent a shudder through her entire body. It wasn’t just a link anymore. It was a wound. The tether burned. She gasped and pulled back as heat flared through her chest, the mark over her heart igniting in gold. The teth
The command chamber reeked of ozone and fear. Retrieval squads stood in formation beneath the Council dais—shadows against the silvery light cast by the suspended soul mirrors. Each warrior wore reaper black, their scythes burning with pale runes that marked them for sanctioned descent. At the chamber’s center, Soreth paced like a caged beast, his armor humming with restrained fury. “They fell through the Vein,” he growled. “That’s not containment breach, that’s an existential threat.” Across from him, Veyra stood perfectly still. Her cloak was white, in defiance of the chamber’s gloom, her eyes a cool storm-gray that revealed nothing. “And yet they still exist. That alone warrants study.” “Study?” Soreth’s voice cut through the room like a blade. “One of our reapers is corrupted, the other compromised. They’ve entered the heartstream. We should burn it out before it spreads.” Veyra’s gaze flicked briefly toward him—measured, amused, dangerous. “You speak of annihilating the