Midnight settled over Ashthorne with the weight of a closing tomb.
The academy's towers loomed like jagged fangs against a restless sky, each window flickering with unstable sigil-light as wards struggled to recover from the earlier tear. The air tasted metallic—sharpened by the remnants of fractured reality.
Caelum walked through the silent corridors with measured steps, shadows sliding away from his presence as though they recognized what lingered within him.
The Threadbond pulsed faintly beneath his ribs.
A second heartbeat.
A second soul-thread.
A fragile line reaching from him toward Lira's room.
She was sleeping now—fitfully, her mind disoriented by the dream-ritual she'd been pulled into—yet her thread thrummed with fear, confusion, awe.
He hadn't intended for this bond.
But the entity beneath Ashthorne had touched her through him.
That was unacceptable.
The moment Caelum sensed it, something cold and ancient stirred within his chest. It wasn't anger—he had long since evolved beyond such crude impulses. It was clarity.
A quiet line of logic:
If the entity believes it may claim what is connected to me…
It needs correction.
He descended the stairs toward the lower seals.
The academy slept uneasily above him.
Threads trembled in the air like cobwebs disturbed by a predator's footsteps.
Artheon had warned him to stay away from the seal chamber for at least a week after the last stabilization—something about "recovery cycles" and "soul resilience."
Caelum ignored the advice.
Artheon feared the seals.
Feared the entity.
Feared him.
Caelum was not bound by fear.
He pushed open the stone barrier at the bottom of the stairwell. The obsidian door groaned but yielded more easily this time, almost… welcoming.
A thin current of cold air brushed across his cheek.
"…bearer…"
The whisper rolled through the passage like an intimate breath.
Caelum didn't slow.
The First Seal Chamber
The chamber was darker than before, as though the torches themselves refused to burn near what lay within. Sigil rings glowed faintly on the floor, their runes flickering, unstable.
The massive corpse in the center of the chamber had shifted again.
Not by much.
Just enough.
Its enormous head was tilted slightly toward him.
The threads woven across its body pulsed with a languid, sleepy life.
Its sealed eyes trembled beneath layers of stitched sigils.
The corpse was not dead.
It had never been dead.
It simply waited.
Caelum stepped closer, hands loose at his sides, posture relaxed—yet every thread around him tightened in acknowledgment.
The entity spoke.
Not aloud.
Not with sound.
With thread-pressure—a conceptual weight pressing against his mind.
"…you return…"
Caelum kept his voice calm.
"There's a matter we must clarify."
A faint rumble shivered through the cavern.
Not anger.
Not threat.
Interest.
Caelum continued.
"You reached for someone connected to me."
Silence.
No—more than silence.
The chamber stilled so completely that even the fractured particles of reality paused in the air.
"…connected…
therefore…
mine…"
"No."
Caelum stepped closer.
Each word precise, unshaken.
"She is not yours."
A ripple traveled along the entity's sealed form—like a mountain exhaling.
The corpse's eye-socket glowed faintly with threads awakening.
"…you bear the mark…
the path…
the inheritance…"
"I bear my mark," Caelum corrected. "Not yours."
The corpse shifted—chains tightening, sigils flaring, stone grinding as if ancient mechanisms protested awakening.
"…you carry what I was…
you follow what I began…"
"Perhaps," Caelum allowed, "but you misunderstand something fundamental."
He stood at the edge of the primary sigil ring.
White threadlight pulsed behind his eyes.
"I am not your continuation."
Another ripple.
Deeper.
Older.
"…you are…
chosen…"
"No," Caelum said again.
Softly.
Coldly.
With the tone of someone correcting a foolish child.
"I am not chosen. I choose."
A tremor ran through the entire cavern—
more violent than before—
enough to shake dust from the ceiling and crack a pillar along its seams.
The entity's voice deepened, bleeding through the walls.
"…you carry the path…
the Thread of the Unfolding…
the future…
the shape…"
"And I will decide where that path leads."
For a long moment, the cavern fell into tense silence.
Then the entity's voice shifted.
Not angry.
Not hostile.
Curious.
"…you resist…"
"I define myself," Caelum replied.
"And everything connected to me belongs to my will alone."
Threads stirred across his arms—thin, white, shimmering. They responded to his words like loyal hounds responding to a master's quiet command.
The entity felt it.
"…you grow…"
Caelum walked closer—past the outer seal, stopping just outside the inner circle.
"You will not touch my connections again without consent."
The entity's threads tensed.
"…she felt the call…"
"She felt your intrusion."
"…necessary…
bond forms…
through you…"
"That bond is mine to manage."
"…you deny instinct…"
"I deny ownership," Caelum corrected.
"Especially over someone who cannot defend herself from you."
The corpse's chest plates shifted slightly, metal groaning like bones waking from centuries of sleep.
"…you are…
protective…"
"Of my autonomy," Caelum said.
"Not hers."
Another tremor rippled through the chamber.
"…bearer…
your path differs…
from mine…"
"Of course," Caelum said smoothly.
"I am not you."
He lifted a hand.
Threadlight spiraled upward—
white strands twisting through the air like smoke.
The entire seal thrummed in response.
The entity's sealed eye flickered open a fraction—
just a slit—
a razor-thin slice of glowing threadlight revealing a gaze that had seen civilizations rise and burn.
"…your threads…
flutter…
like mine once did…"
"They are mine," Caelum said.
"And I will use them differently."
"…ambition…"
"No."
He stepped closer still.
"Purpose."
The entity's breathing shifted—
slow, rumbling, thunderous.
"…you wish to step…
beyond…"
"I intend to," Caelum said.
"And if you hinder me—if you interfere with my connections—if you attempt to direct my evolution—"
He spread his fingers.
Threads snapped outward in a soft fan, slicing the air like blades.
The chains binding the entity rattled violently.
Artheon's words echoed faintly in his memory:
"You are no longer a student."
No.
He was something older.
Sharper.
More dangerous.
The cavern vibrated with pressure—entity against inheritor, Transcendent against Proto-Sigil.
A low sound pulsed through the chamber.
"…show me…"
It wasn't a challenge.
It was a request.
A command.
A test.
Caelum didn't hesitate.
He extended his hand toward the inner seal ring, threads coiling along his wrist.
White light flared—
not explosive,
but focused,
like a needle piercing the fabric of reality.
Thread-Sense expanded.
The entity responded instantly.
Millions of threads ignited across its body, lighting the cavern like a collapsing star. The chains binding it shuddered, runes sparking, some cracking, some repairing.
A vast pressure bore down on Caelum—
trying to crush him,
test him,
see how much of the Thread he could endure.
It felt like standing beneath an ocean made of time.
The weight of a civilization's last breath.
The death-spasm of a Transcendent.
Caelum didn't flinch.
He let the pressure wash through him.
Thread-Sense flared into overdrive.
He saw:
—his own soul-thread, cracked but resilient.
—the entity's core-thread, massive and frayed.
—the seal threads, strained to breaking.
—the entire academy above, trembling.
—the Council's panic in their tower.
—Lira's nightmare-thread pulsing faintly.
—the path forward unfolding like a map.
He took a step into the inner circle.
The entity spoke once more.
"…you are ready…"
"For what?" Caelum asked.
The entity's sealed eyes opened fully for the first time—
two vast orbs of white threadlight staring into Caelum's soul.
"…unfolding…"
The chamber erupted.
Threadlight exploded outward—
swallowing the sigil rings,
shattering stone,
turning the floor to luminous dust.
Caelum's body lifted from the ground, weightless.
Threads wrapped around his limbs, spine, heart, skull—
not binding,
but teaching.
A flood of memory surged into him.
The final rituals of the Threaded Path.
The way Transcendents rewrote fate.
The method to sever destiny itself.
The conceptual root of the Threadbearer lineage.
The truth of the Great Stitching.
The reason the world feared them.
Caelum saw it all.
He absorbed it.
Not as dogma.
Not as inheritance.
As knowledge.
Finally, the entity whispered:
"…she is tied…
because you allowed her close…"
A beat.
Caelum opened his eyes.
Threadlight burned behind them.
"You will not touch her mind again."
"…then guide her yourself…"
Caelum didn't answer.
He descended slowly as the threadlight faded, settling back onto the cracked stone floor.
His body thrummed with new power.
Not a new stage.
Not yet.
But something approaching it.
A step toward the conceptual.
He turned to leave.
But before he reached the stairs, the entity murmured:
"…you will return…
and when you do…
your path will split…"
Caelum paused.
"How many paths?"
The entity answered:
"…three…
and only one…
leads upward…"
Caelum nodded once.
"Then I will take that one."
"…beware…
your bond…
threads bring strength…
but also weakness…"
Caelum's voice was quiet.
"I do not have weaknesses."
A soft rumble—almost amusement—echoed through the corpse.
"…you will learn…"
Caelum left without looking back.
The Academy Above
Lira jolted awake again, clutching her chest.
The thread-mark pulsed.
And for a brief moment—
She felt someone touch the bond gently.
Caelum.
She froze.
Not in fear.
But in something else she couldn't describe.
Marenne watched her carefully.
"You felt him, didn't you?"
Lira swallowed hard.
"Yes."
"What did it feel like?"
Lira's face flushed a deep crimson.
"…warm."