The storm had passed, but the city still smelled of rain and rust.
Lyra moved through alleys where light never touched the ground. Each puddle mirrored only shadows—no color, just echoes of what used to be. The air was colder than usual, wrapped in a silence that pressed against her ribs every time she breathed.
Yet the hum in her chest only grew stronger.
It tugged at her like a memory she never lived, a call threading through her veins, guiding her deeper into the spine of Monochrome City.
She followed it to the abandoned train lines—iron skeletons that stretched into the fog like broken ribs of a giant long dead. Down a spiral stairwell she had never noticed before, the undercity breathed warm and charged. The walls were lined with pipes carved with symbols—runes that pulsed faintly, flaring and fading like the slow, tired lungs of metal.
Lyra reached out. Her fingers brushed a rune.
The gate sighed open as though relieved to see her.
The tunnel widened into a chamber—part ruin, part cathedral, part forgotten monument. Machines hung from the ceiling like rusted vines, tangled and dripping with condensation. The floor glittered with shards of red glass—once light, now ash, remnants of something that had burned far brighter than the city had allowed.
"She heard it," a man whispered from somewhere within the chamber.
"No one hears anymore," another answered flatly.
"Then explain the pulse readings. The Red Echo's frequency is back."
Lyra quickly pressed herself behind a fractured pillar. Through its cracks, she saw them—a circle of figures draped in torn crimson cloth, their eyes glowing not with power, but with exhaustion and devotion. Their silhouettes flickered under the wavering lanterns, like ghosts refusing to leave the world.
At the center stood Draven Veyl.
The Crimson Memory.
Firelight skated across his coat, revealing scars etched along his neck—lines that looked like lightning frozen mid-strike. His presence filled the chamber, a storm contained within a single man.
"Silence was the world's surrender," he said, his voice calm but carrying the weight of fire. "And surrender is never peace."
He lifted his hand.A ribbon of red light coiled around his fingers—a heartbeat made visible, pulsing in a rhythm that echoed the hum in Lyra's chest.
"If one soul can still hear the Echo," he continued softly, "then the color isn't dead. It's waiting."
Lyra's pulse matched the rhythm.Her breath hitched.He's talking about me.
A flake of plaster crumbled beside her. She froze. The hum inside her surged in response. The shards of red glass around the chamber trembled… then glowed—matching her heartbeat, beating with her.
"What was that?" someone shouted.
All heads turned.
Draven's crimson eyes locked onto her hiding place with terrifying accuracy, as though he had been expecting her all along.
"Show yourself," he said.
Lyra stepped out, trembling but refusing to back away. "I didn't mean to intrude. It just… happened. The Echo called me here."
Several rebels reached for their weapons.
Draven raised a hand. "Wait."
He approached her slowly, each step measured, as though he were approaching a wild flame that could either burn him or save him. The glow around his body shifted, breathing with him.
"You heard the Echo?" he asked.
"It wasn't just sound," Lyra said softly. "It was… alive. And it felt like it knew me."
The ceiling above them groaned. A beam snapped loose, plunging toward them with a roar.
Crimson light exploded from Draven's palm.
The world blurred.
Lyra felt herself wrapped in spiraling heat as the light coiled around them like a living flame. Sparks burst against the falling beam, scattering into a thousand fragments of red that briefly illuminated the chamber with real, impossible color.
For a heartbeat, she saw the world as it might have once been—alive, vibrant, burning with memories.
Then the light faded, leaving them standing amid drifting ash.
Draven stared at her, breathing hard."You… amplified it."
Lyra shook her head. "No. The world reacted. It's like it remembered something it lost."
He looked at her as though she had just cracked open a secret that even he had been afraid to touch. His expression wavered between reverence and fear.
Then he extended his hand.
"Welcome to the remnants of the Rebellion, Radiance Girl."
Lyra swallowed. "And you? What are you really?"
His eyes softened—just barely. "The fire they couldn't extinguish. The memory they tried to erase. And now…" He glanced at her, voice lowering. "Possibly the spark that wakes the rest."
Around them, the hum softened into a fragile melody, weaving through the ruins like a forgotten lullaby. Somewhere above, the city stirred—as though hearing the song of ash for the first time in years.
Lyra looked at the rebels, at the crimson shards glowing like dying stars, at Draven standing before her like the echo of a forgotten color.
She knew now: she had been chosen by the Echo.
And Draven Veyl, the Crimson Memory, was only the first spark of a fire waiting to burn through the silence of the world.