Alexander was different.
His encounter with Beowulf had left something unseen and unresolved, something he may not have fully recognized as unresolved.
The mentality that had driven him external, the need to prove he could handle himself without relying on another, had been carrying that unresolved wound into every battle since.
The Existential Acedia Ordnances had not simply injured his foundations. They had found the existing fracture in his Way and pressed against it with the efficiency of a force that attacked what was already compromised.
The Enneagram was gone from his chest. He had given it up.
That was the clearest sign. The willingness to relinquish the core instrument of his Civilization, to hand it to someone else and ask that someone else to take responsibility for the beings within it, was not the action of someone whose Way was intact.
