The broken world did not want them to cross it.
Kael felt that truth immediately — not as a thought, but like a pressure in the air, a weight pressing on his shoulders every time he set a foot down. As he and Tova ran across the obsidian platform, the ground cracked beneath them, lines glowing faint silver. The sky above groaned, splitting further with every heartbeat.
Tova had to shout just to be heard above the chaos.
"KAEL—THIS ENTIRE REALM IS COLLAPSING!"
Kael didn't slow.
"THEN WE RUN FASTER!"
They sprinted toward the distant vortex — a swirling dark spiral in the far mist. The Fracture Gate. The one place in this dead realm still connected to something beyond.
But the world wanted it closed.
Silver mist thickened, tugging at Kael like invisible hands. The floating shards of land around them shuddered and drifted lower, like sinking stones. An entire island of carved crystal shattered in front of them and fell into the endless void below.
Tova pointed ahead, panicking.
"Kael! The path—it's breaking apart!"
And it was.
The obsidian causeway that had stretched across the realm was cracking open, splitting into chunks drifting apart like broken plates of glass.
Kael cursed under his breath. "Hold on to me!"
Tova grabbed his arm—
The ground exploded beneath them.
The shockwave threw them upward.
Kael twisted mid-air, catching Tova around her waist and pulling her tight against him.
The world fell away.
Beneath them, an endless abyss swirled. Not empty — full of faint, swirling lights drifting in currents like cosmic embers.
Kael felt gravity grab him and drag him down with sharp fingers.
Tova screamed.
"KAEL—FLY!!"
"I'M TRYING!" he yelled back.
The Seed inside him ignited in panic.
Blue-gold fire surged through his limbs.
Wind churned around him.
But nothing lifted him.
Not enough.
This realm's air was thin — it didn't behave like real air — and the fire inside him failed to grip it properly.
Kael's heart clenched.
"Tova… this is bad—"
The abyss reached for them—
Then the world itself pulled upward.
A floating landmass drifted beneath them like a massive raft.
Kael slammed onto its surface hard, rolling across smooth crystal until he crashed against a jagged pillar. Tova tumbled with him, caught by his arm again.
They came to a stop, panting.
Tova pushed hair from her face.
"Kael… if your fire doesn't work right here, we're going to die."
Kael shook the pain from his vision.
"No. If it doesn't work right, then I need to learn how to make it."
He stood, wobbling for a second before catching himself.
Tova followed.
"So how do you keep your fire from dropping us off a cliff?"
Kael didn't know.
But the Seed inside him pulsed — faintly, like a heartbeat muffled by layers of stone.
He closed his eyes and reached inward, searching for the core of his flame.
It flickered.
Strained.
Confused by the physics of this place.
Kael whispered, "I'm Kael."
The flame steadied.
A tiny bit.
He opened his eyes.
"This realm… the Seed remembers it. I think it's pushing against the fire, not helping it."
Tova frowned. "Why would it do that? You carry it."
"Because it belongs here," Kael said quietly. "And I don't."
The world rumbled violently, as if in agreement.
A piece of sky shattered overhead — fragments of silver crashing down like shards of broken glass. Kael pulled Tova behind a crystalline spire as the pieces slammed onto the floating landmass with deafening force.
Tova shouted, "This place is eating itself alive!"
"And us with it," Kael muttered.
They moved quickly, jumping to a second shard of land that drifted close. Then a third. The chunks were drifting toward the vortex — perhaps drawn by the same collapse pulling Kael and Tova forward.
But something else was moving toward them too.
Shapes in the fog.
Dozens.
Maybe hundreds.
Tova froze.
"Oh no… not again…"
Kael's eyes narrowed. "Are those—"
The figures stepped out.
The Harrowed.
Not the full Harrower — not yet.
These were its fragments.
Lesser forms.
Shadows shaped like twisted echoes of all the beings this realm once held.
Some crawled on too many limbs.
Some floated without shape.
Some were just burning outlines, like reflections of a dying flame.
Kael groaned. "Perfect. The Void-Between sent the welcoming committee."
Tova lifted her staff.
"I don't think they're here to welcome us."
The Harrowed surged.
Kael braced himself—
—and the fire inside him flickered violently.
"No no no—NOT NOW—"
The blue-gold flame sputtered like a wet spark.
Tova panicked. "Kael?!"
"I can't pull the fire properly — this realm is choking it!"
The Harrowed leapt.
Kael shoved Tova out of the way and met the front wave head-on. He grabbed the nearest shadow-form, expecting it to burn.
It didn't.
It felt like grabbing cold smoke.
The creature's body wrapped around Kael's arm like a liquid shadow, pulling at him, tugging at something deeper than muscle.
Kael gasped.
"My… my memories—!"
Tova swung her staff in a sharp arc, sending a burst of green energy that tore the creature off him. "They feed on memory! Don't let them touch you!"
"Trying!" Kael hissed.
Three more lunged.
Kael dodged the first.
Kicked the second.
But the third caught his shoulder—
—and suddenly he was nine years old again, crouching in a burning house, crying into his father's shirt as smoke choked the air.
Kael screamed.
Reality snapped back like a whip.
He staggered backward, dizzy.
Tova ripped him free, firing beam after beam, each one slicing into the Harrowed but barely slowing them.
"KAEL—WE CAN'T WIN THIS FIGHT!"
Kael shook his head sharply, forcing the world to stabilize.
"Then we don't fight—
we run."
He grabbed Tova's wrist and pulled her toward the next piece of drifting land — but the Harrowed were faster. They poured around the floating shards like black ink, crawling across the air itself.
Kael's lungs tightened. "They're cutting us off—"
Tova pointed toward the only path left.
A razor-thin piece of land, drifting toward the vortex but shaking violently.
"That way!"
Kael hesitated for half a second.
Then ran.
They sprinted across the narrow strip as the Harrowed closed behind them, shrieking in dozens of voices at once.
Kael tried to spark the fire again—
A faint flame flickered across his fingers, barely bright enough to light a candle.
He gritted his teeth.
"No. You're MINE. You LISTEN TO ME—"
The fire resisted.
Twisted.
Fought him.
Like the Seed was being pulled somewhere else.
Like it recognized this realm.
Tova shouted from ahead, "Kael, the vortex is closing!"
He looked up.
The Fracture Gate — once a wide spiral — was tightening, shrinking into a violent whirlpool of dark light. The closer they got, the faster it spun, crushing the air around it.
Kael grabbed Tova's hand.
They ran.
The Harrowed shrieked behind them, rushing forward like a tidal wave.
The vortex pulsed.
The land beneath them cracked.
The world split open.
Tova screamed as she slipped—
and Kael caught her by the arm.
But the ledge snapped.
They fell.
The Harrowed dove after them.
Kael held Tova tight. "KAEL! DO SOMETHING!"
"I AM DOING SOMETHING! PANICKING IS DOING SOMETHING—"
The vortex raced up to meet them—
The Harrowed were almost touching them—
Kael closed his eyes.
"MY NAME IS KAEL!"
The fire exploded outward.
The Harrowed were blasted back.
The falling land shattered.
The vortex swallowed everything—
And Kael and Tova were hurled into the dark.
Not falling.
Not flying.
Thrown.
Through a door that shouldn't exist.
Into the birthplace of the Harrower.
Into the Void-Between.