The bells rang too late.
By the time the first horn blared across Vel'Thara, the breach had already torn open the eastern wing. Spiral glyphs flared like veins splitting across the stone, vomiting twisted shapes into the corridors.
Students screamed. Instructors barked orders. And the walls bled light.
Kael was already moving. Flame leapt from his skin as he crossed the main courtyard, orders snapping from his mouth faster than he could think.
"Form two squads, east and south! Seal the armory vaults! Anyone under third year falls back to primary shield rooms!"
The ground shook underfoot, not from breach shock. From footsteps. Large. Measured. Inhuman.
Lira slammed a Spiral-warped entity against the wall—an ex-instructor whose body had bloated and twisted into glyph-etched armor.
"Kael!" she shouted across the courtyard. "Lower wings are already gone!"
"I know!" he roared back. "Hold center hall!"
She nodded once, spun, and drove her dagger into the creature's throat. not to kill it, but to stall its Spiral energy from bleeding outward.
Tiv and Jace dragged fallen students behind shield wards, glyphs shaking against the rising pressure.
Then the Shepherd whispered. Not in words. Not with threats. With A question. "Are you ready to be rewritten?"
Every flame guttered once. Kael gritted his teeth. "Stay awake! Stay alive!"
The courtyard cracked. Out of the breach, shapes rose, half-built memories.
A boy wearing three faces. A girl with hands made of mirrors. They walked toward the living like they had always belonged.
Sylva led the west defense. She caught two Spiral-warped first-years mid-conversion, slicing their glyph roots before they could take.
Her team set controlled fires to halt Spiral blooms but the glyphs adapted, crawling through smoke like snakes.
"Keep moving!" she barked. "Burn the glyphs, not the bodies!"
At the rear, a team of shield bearers held the last stairwell. two already down, blood blackening their armor where Spiral corruption had kissed through seals.
The infirmary breach tore at sunset. No warning. No battle roar. Just a slow unraveling. Like a sheet of paper curling toward flame.
And out of that silence, Claire stepped. Not running. Not falling. Walking.
Her uniform was scorched. Her hands bloodied. Her Ki aura flickered like a heartbeat out of rhythm. But she was alive.
Jace spotted her first. "Claire?!"
She turned slowly, eyes focusing on him through exhaustion.
"Took you long enough," she rasped.
Then she dropped three unconscious Spiral-touched students at his feet. "Save them," she said. "I'll hold the next wave." And she did.
The battle was chaos and it was beautiful. Kael's flame expanded beyond form. It coated the courtyard, forcing Spiral entities to recoil. His movements blurred into afterimages, each step burning Spiral corruption where he passed.
When he moved now, it wasn't rage. It was memory. Like Raka had taught him. only rawer. Sharper.
The Shepherd watched. Not interfering. Just… watching.
Judging.
Tiv triggered a ward collapse, buying time to seal the east hall. Coren and Sylva cornered two Spiral-borns in the west garden, flames spiraling in slow death matches.
Jace laid sigil bombs at choke points, his hands bleeding from overdraw. Lira rallied a group of second-years, her voice never shaking once.
And Kael, he faced a choice. The breach flared again. A new creature emerged.
Twisted limbs. Mouths in wrong places. Glyphs blooming like disease.
It wasn't a monster. It was an instructor. Once. Still wearing a half-torn academy badge.
Kael hesitated.
A half second. The instructor spoke without lips: "We are free." Then attacked.
Kael burned him down. Not with anger. Not with cruelty. With sadness.
The flame ate the creature clean. No body remained. Only a spiral ash mark on the ground.
Above it all, the Shepherd smiled. And stepped forward.
The world folded inward. Not breaking. It's Turning.
The academy's walls bent like wax in heat. Doors led nowhere. Stairs turned into rivers of ash. Reality forgot where it ended.
Students clutched at each other, trying to anchor themselves. Those who couldn't, they vanished. No screams. No struggle. Just… folded away.
Claire grabbed Jace's shoulder hard. "Stay awake," she snapped. "Stay angry. The Spiral eats doubt first."
He nodded, blinking tears.
Together, they fought back toward the inner core.
Kael stood alone at the top of the main stair. The Shepherd—cloaked, masked, impossible—approached with steps that didn't leave sound.
Kael's flame flickered wildly around him. Yhe Shepherd raised a hand. It Spoke. "Bridge."
Kael didn't understand. But part of him—deep, ancient—remembered. He raised his flame like a sword. And the Shepherd laughed.
The battle for Vel'thara was only beginning.