Semua Bab The Blood Bound Legacy: Bab 131 - Bab 140

The wind bit against our skin as we emerged from the ruins, the ground behind us still humming with aftershock. Maxwell and I stood at the ridge above the broken conduit, staring into the plume of light that hadn’t faded. It shimmered like a wound in the land, refusing to close.“She didn’t lie,” I said, voice low, even. “She manipulated, yes. But she didn’t lie.”Maxwell looked at me, his jaw tight. “Do you believe what she said? That the seal is more than just a barrier? That it held back something from beyond this world?”I didn’t answer right away. My mind was still spinning, layering everything I’d ever been taught against what I had just heard. The seal had always been presented to me as a shield—a sacred pact designed to contain ancient forces. It wasn’t supposed to be a door. But if what Liora said was true, then it was never just about protection. It was about containment on a far more cosmic scale.“She said it would come as a promise,” I murmured. “And that I’d have to choo

The message hadn’t settled. It haunted the air like a ghost, clinging to every breath we took. Even after the messenger disappeared and the tension in the clearing began to fade, none of us truly relaxed. Not because we didn’t believe what he said, but because we did. Deep down, we had all sensed it: something was coming.And it would not ask for permission.That night, I sat alone by the low fire outside the circle’s boundary. Maxwell had insisted on keeping watch from the perimeter, giving me space even though I knew he hated leaving me unguarded. Nima lingered nearby, pretending to study the stars, though I knew she was watching me from the corner of her eye. The others had gone quiet for the evening, perhaps retreating into their own thoughts, their own doubts.The seal pulsed quietly inside me, not in alarm but in awareness. Like it was stirring with anticipation, echoing a tension I couldn’t name.I ran my fingers along the edge of a stone, grounding myself. “They’re going to se

The storm arrived without rain.No thunder cracked the sky. No lightning forked across the clouds. But we all felt it—a pressure rolling in across the ley lines, so deep it bypassed sound altogether. It didn’t scream or shake the trees. It settled, low and dense, like grief that never left the bones.I was already walking toward the edge of the circle when Nima caught up to me.“It’s another test, isn’t it?” she asked, her voice calm but tight.“Yes,” I said. “But not like the first. This one’s heavier. It’s not coming to offer a dream. It’s coming to remind me what I couldn’t save.”Maxwell fell into step on my other side, silent as ever when I needed him most. His presence didn’t ask questions, didn’t press. He simply walked with me, my anchor in a sea of things I couldn’t name.We reached the northern path, where the trees were thinner and the ley lines were knotted, tangled with age. The moment I stepped beyond the boundary of our circle, the world changed.Not drastically. Not vi

We stood in the wake of that light, hearts pounding, silence clinging to the air like fog. The figure that had worn my face—my perfect mirror—was gone, but its presence lingered. Not just as memory. Not just as a threat. As residue. The ley lines around us had twisted, not fractured but reformed. Like the very pattern of reality had shifted to accommodate that presence.No one spoke for a while. Even Maxwell, always the first to break tense silences, had nothing. Maybe because there were no words big enough to contain what we’d seen.Finally, Nima said quietly, “It didn’t disappear. It just… stepped back.”I looked at her, not answering. Because she was right. That version of me hadn’t been defeated or banished. It had retreated. Like it had learned something. Like it was waiting.Barin exhaled hard, pacing. “That thing—— whatever it was—— it wasn’t just a projection. It carried intention. It believed what it said.”“And it felt,” Maxwell added, his voice low and rough. “That’s what s

The nights had been still lately—too still. Even after the encounter with my doppelgänger, even after the fire and the whispered threats in ash, the silence that followed felt wrong. It wasn’t peace. It was the pause before an avalanche, the long breath held before a scream.And then the seal pulsed.Not like before—not a flare of warning or fear. This was different. It was deep, rhythmic, almost like a heartbeat. It throbbed through my chest, echoed in my bones, and I knew—whatever had awakened within me during the merge with my other self, it had reached the other side.Something had seen it.Something had responded.The pulse spread through the ley lines like a ripple, invisible to most, but I could feel its journey. It traveled through roots and rock, through the thin air above mountaintops, through the marrow of the oldest bones buried beneath our feet. And everywhere it went, it left doors ajar.By morning, the world had changed.The first signs came quietly—messages from nearby