Shock & Shift
The air cracked with molten fury.
Nyx dashed sideways across a crumbling platform, her coat a black arc against the searing light. Cindral's molten whip sliced past her, kissing the steel behind her with a hiss so loud it made one of the Shadowsworn flinch. The metal buckled and folded like paper soaked in flame.
They were everywhere—fire and null pulses, clashing in bursts that shattered debris and warped air. Nyx blinked out mid-step, reappearing behind him in a burst of void. Her foot struck low—Cindral staggered. A rare misstep.
He countered, spinning with a molten uppercut that carved a half-melted scar into a concrete column beside her. The ground beneath them glowed orange, then cracked. It wasn't a battlefield anymore—it was a foundry.
Sky, crouched near a broken wall, watched with his breath shallow and Core humming in his ribs. This wasn't a duel. It was a maelstrom of force and skill. Nyx wasn't just teasing anymore. And Cindral—he was heating up past reason.
"Die already!" Cindral roared, launching a spiraling lance of liquefied fire. It twisted like a serpent mid-air, hurling toward Nyx with the shriek of boiling air.
She didn't dodge.
Her palm raised—null energy bloomed outward, the lance folding in on itself with a sound like air collapsing. She stepped through the vapor it left behind and swung her hand across his face. A clean hit.
Cindral staggered.
And then—
A sound split the sky.
No warning. No pulse. Just a blur.
Something slammed into Cindral with such force it launched him off the raised platform—crashing him through a melted wall with a shockwave that silenced the entire plaza.
Sky blinked, jaw tensed.
Where fire had reigned—she landed.
A single figure. Robes like poured ink, trimmed in silver thread. Hair sleek, armor-laced boots gleaming faintly with gravitic frost. Eyes unreadable. Expression neutral.
Thalra Elarion. The Pale Flame.
She stood where Cindral had just been, leg extended from the finishing kick. She slowly retracted it, coat settling behind her like the final stroke of a blade.
And then—she turned her head.
Her gaze fell on Sky.
Just a flick.
A flick with enough weight to make his cheeks burn instantly.
The Pale Flame
The molten silence that followed was louder than the clash that came before it.
Cindral's body crumpled in a collapsed archway thirty meters away, steam rising from where he'd hit. Even molten fire didn't hiss this loud unless something was very, very wrong.
And it was.
Thalra didn't move.
She stood where she had landed, one boot angled forward, arms relaxed, eyes lowered ever so slightly. Her presence unraveled the atmosphere—not violently, but with such natural gravitational authority that even the Shadowsworn adjusted their stances without realizing it.
The air bent around her—not in waves, but in reversals. Heat recoiled. Light dimmed. Her Core didn't flare like Nyx's. It compressed everything.
Sky felt it in his lungs first. The way each breath had to push harder. Like the space around him didn't want to be breathed in her presence. Like it was hers now.
Nyx had taken a step back, her hand slowly falling to her side. She didn't look afraid.
But she did look caught.
Thalra finally lifted her eyes. They swept over the steaming wreckage of the fight, past the whimpering steel and warped concrete—
—and landed on Sky.
A single, sharp glance.
Nothing more.
But it hit like a blade drawn halfway across a cheek. Calculated. Icy. And just slightly amused.
Sky blinked, and he was already blushing. He hated it, but he couldn't stop it. His breath caught; his Core fluttered in response.
She saw that. He knew she did.
Then she turned to Nyx, and the air got colder.
"This was a simple trade, Nyx," she said. Her voice didn't rise—it didn't need to. "We did not send you to fight."
Nyx straightened, lips tight. "I know."
"Do you?" Thalra's tone cut deeper. "Because I see four melted walls, three scorched rooftops, and a Core-bearer who now thinks he matters."
Nyx didn't answer.
But the color that hit her cheeks wasn't from heat.
Sky looked between them, suddenly unsure if he should be flattered or very, very quiet.
The Pale Flame had arrived.
And nothing was hers to spare.
Commanded Silence
No one moved.
Not even the wind dared press too close to Thalra Elarion.
The plaza felt frozen, but not from cold—from control. Like her presence alone had pressed the entire world between invisible fingers and whispered, stay still or be broken.
The Shadowsworn stood in full posture now—blades low, eyes locked forward. Even they, hardened as they were, didn't speak.
Nyx took a small breath. Her shoulders lifted like she might argue, might explain, might justify—
Then she let it go.
There was no point. Thalra's voice didn't ask for reasons. It carved reality to fit expectation.
"I was protecting the trade," Nyx said softly, gaze lowered.
Thalra didn't respond immediately. Her eyes were sharp enough to shave bone. "You protected nothing. You just invited conflict with fire you weren't authorized to extinguish."
Sky winced.
He was pretty sure he had started that fight, technically. But now didn't feel like the time to raise his hand.
Nyx's jaw tensed. "Cindral was a direct threat."
"And if he was truly worth our time," Thalra said calmly, "I would have been sent."
Oof.
Sky couldn't even look at Nyx. He saw her posture shift—barely, but enough. That stiff, almost military stance she took when she was trying to look unaffected.
He knew it wasn't anger. It was embarrassment.
And something else too—something like disappointment curling beneath her skin.
She wanted to prove something.
And she got caught trying.
Sky's fists tightened against the cracked wall behind him. His Core had settled now, pulling gravity around his ribs like a heartbeat made of weight.
But it wasn't just watching anymore.
It was waiting.
And it wasn't the only one.
Across the plaza, the rubble stirred.
A low hiss escaped the heap of melted steel and broken rock where Cindral had fallen.
Heat pulsed again.
Then—he rose.
Predator Stance
The rubble shifted.
Then cracked.
A molten hand gripped the edge of a broken steel beam, steam hissing from the flesh like blood boiled into breath. Cindral hauled himself up slowly, shoulders hunched, molten streaks burned deep into his back and ribcage. His jaw was scorched, lip split, one eye flickering red beneath a burned lid.
Still burning.
Still alive.
But not without cost.
The molten lines along his arms pulsed erratically now—no longer the steady current of power he carried before. They surged in bursts, uncontrolled, like a furnace losing shape. His fire wavered. His stance dipped. His Core was struggling to stabilize.
And still… he grinned.
"You Elarions," Cindral rasped, his voice lower, rougher. "You always come late… and act like you owned the moment all along."
Thalra said nothing.
She stood a few meters ahead, hands still at her sides, eyes unreadable. Her aura didn't expand. It tightened, folding around her like an eclipse drawn inward. The color of the world near her robes had dimmed—less saturation, less heat. Like her very gravity was filtering reality.
Cindral limped one step forward, dragging a molten trench behind his foot.
"I've shattered fortified positions," Cindral growled, struggling to push himself higher. "Fought my way through worse than this."
"Then why did Vulkran die to someone else?" Thalra asked softly.
Cindral's jaw clenched. Steam curled from his knuckles.
Thalra stepped forward—no Core flare, no motion wasted. Just presence. A void in motion.
"You reek of desperation," she said. "And old smoke."
Cindral lashed forward with a burst of molten heat—but it flickered at the edge of her aura. Like a match suffocating in space. He stumbled to one knee, Core spasming under pressure.
Sky watched, heart hammering, eyes locked on the tremble in Cindral's fingers.
He's breaking, Sky thought.
It's happening.
And behind his eyes, the shadow coiled.
Fire Fails to Rise
Cindral's breath came shallow, each inhale flaring steam between his teeth. He was back on his feet—barely—but the molten lines across his body pulsed unevenly now, flickering like a fire trying to relight in wet ash.
He charged again, unwilling to fall without leaving a scar.
The ground scorched in his wake, molten slag trailing behind his boots. He swung with a snarl, his entire arm elongating into a whip of pure liquefied flame—meant to slice, burn, and collapse all in one sweeping arc.
Thalra didn't blink.
She raised her hand—elegant, slow—and space itself folded around it.
The flame met her aura… and bent backward.
Not extinguished. Not blocked.
Inverted.
The molten fire recoiled, its trajectory reversed by an unseen force. The lash of heat curled back on Cindral mid-strike, wrapping around his own arm like a vengeful serpent. It sank into his skin, burning not with fury, but with betrayal.
He screamed, staggering backward. His arm smoked, flesh blistering beneath the strain of his own Core.
Sky's jaw clenched.
He'd seen Core failures before—but this wasn't failure. This was something worse. Deliberate unmaking.
Cindral summoned another blast out of sheer instinct—a flare of molten fire arcing in a rising wave.
Thalra stepped through it.
Literally.
The fire parted around her like water around stone. Her Core Inversion Field didn't deflect the heat—it robbed it of purpose. The molten arc dribbled to the ground behind her as harmless glowing liquid.
Cindral stumbled again, panting. His knees hit cracked concrete. His fingers clawed at the ground as if trying to hold on to it—to anchor himself to anything.
"You never mastered the fire," Thalra said as she approached, her voice calm, low, echoing. "You've been borrowing from a force that was always waiting to devour you."
She stood before him now. Silent. Sovereign.
Cindral looked up, sweat pouring from his brow, molten blood dripping from his forearm.
And for the first time—
He looked afraid.
Shadow Forged
Sky moved.
There was no sound—no warning. One moment he stood beneath a shattered archway, wrapped in gravity and silence—then he was gone.
No flash. No blink. Just a folding of space too fast and precise for the eye to track.
Shadow Step.
He reappeared behind Cindral—air bending around him as he landed mid-slide, knees low, hand glowing with blackened pressure.
Cindral didn't sense him.
Thalra hadn't moved yet. She was mid-step, her hand rising for what would've been the final blow.
But Sky wasn't waiting anymore.
His palm dropped to the ground as he triggered his second move—
Time Slow.
A gravitational shell snapped outward in an instant, enveloping Sky and Cindral within its curved edge. The world outside blurred—Thalra's motion, Nyx's breath, the flicker of collapsing fire.
Inside the bubble?
Silence.
Cindral began to turn. His head jerked halfway toward Sky, molten flame still licking his shoulder—but his motion crawled like syrup, locked in the pull of the slowed field.
Sky stood tall.
This was his moment.
He raised his arm, palm open, fingers curled—
And the shadows followed.
Dark Matter curled from his Core like coiled wire, shaping, thickening, splitting at the edges with unnatural sharpness. It formed into a wolf's claw—long, curved, brutally precise, as if the pressure of his will had been waiting for this shape all along.
Each joint of the construct bent with quiet gravity, tendrils of dark energy spiraling off the tips like flickers of ink suspended in slow water.
Cindral's eyes met his.
They widened—but they could not move fast enough.
Sky's Core beat once, heavy as a falling star.
This is mine, he thought. Not stolen. Not borrowed. Taken.
The claw ignited in black light—
And then it drove forward.
Wolf-fang Singularity
The claw sank in.
There was no clash. No explosion. Just a sound—low, slow, wet—as Sky's dark construct pierced through Cindral's back, sliding between ribs, through flame, through will.
And into the Core.
Time held still—not because of the ability, but because of the moment.
Cindral's body convulsed inside the slowed field. His spine arched. His molten veins flickered violently—pulsing with pressure and disbelief. His jaw opened in a half-scream that couldn't quite finish forming.
Sky felt it.
The Core—raging, resisting. Not a flame anymore, but a dying furnace begging to reignite. It tried to push back, to erupt one final time, to take Sky's arm with it.
But Sky didn't flinch.
His Core surged, gravity folding inward. The wolf claw pulsed black, its edges trembling as pressure layered within pressure.
Consume.
The molten energy shuddered—
Then broke.
It didn't explode. It collapsed.
Cindral's flame didn't detonate—it folded. Pulled inward, compressed by Sky's Core like a dying star swallowed into something deeper, heavier, hungrier.
Cindral gasped, the last breath caught in his throat. His molten light flickered down his limbs like retreating fireflies.
His knees buckled.
His molten form dimmed.
And for one last second… he looked over his shoulder at Sky.
There was no rage.
Just realization.
He never stood a chance.
Sky let the body fall.
The Core was gone—devoured. The Time Slow field blinked out. Sound rushed back in. Heat. Wind. The smell of molten blood in the air.
Outside the shell, Thalra's hand still hovered mid-strike, Nyx frozen mid-step—
Until the scene caught up to them.
Sky didn't stay.
Before anyone could speak, before Thalra could finish turning, before Nyx could reach for him—
He vanished.
One last blink—and Sky was gone, shadows curling inward as his teleport carved him free of the battlefield.
Only the gravity remained.
And a husk cooling in the dirt.
Core Absorption
The body still steamed where it fell.
No one moved right away.
The molten glow that once shimmered beneath Cindral's skin was gone, replaced with the dull grey-black of scorched, lifeless flesh. His body lay half-curled, the final moment of resistance frozen in a posture that now meant nothing.
Thalra lowered her hand slowly.
Nyx stepped forward, her eyes narrowed, locked on the empty space where Sky had stood just seconds ago.
The imprint of him lingered in the atmosphere. The warp in gravity. The last echo of dark matter pressure that hadn't quite diffused yet.
He had blinked out of existence without a sound.
And yet… he had left the loudest statement.
He absorbed the Core.
He outmaneuvered Thalra.
He ended Cindral.
Nyx didn't say it out loud.
But her expression said everything.
Even the Shadowsworn, hardened as they were, exchanged the barest glance of disbelief.
Thalra finally exhaled, sharp and soft, like someone sealing a box.
"That Core was supposed to be unstable," she said.
"He made it his."
Footsteps approached—measured, steady, boots over fractured steel. From a melted corridor at the far end of the ruined plaza, Neyra Flint stepped into view. Her coat was dusted with ash, jaw tense, eyes scanning the wreckage. Two of her guards stood behind her with weapons drawn, though they were clearly too late for anything.
Her gaze landed on the still-smoking corpse. Then slowly rose to Thalra.
"What the hell happened here?"
Thalra looked toward the cratered ruin where Sky's final strike had landed.
She didn't smile. But her voice was quiet with weight.
"A Core-hunter picked the wrong shadow to chase."
Gone Like Smoke
Nyx stood at the edge of the scorched crater, arms folded loosely over her chest, eyes fixed on the space where Sky had disappeared.
She hadn't seen him move. Not exactly.
One moment Thalra had been stepping forward, ready to strike. The next… everything had bent. Slowed. Folded inward. Like time had slipped just far enough out of rhythm to let a single act slide through the cracks.
And then Cindral fell.
Not from Thalra's hand.
From his.
Nyx's Core still vibrated slightly, null-threads twitching from where they'd felt the pull of Sky's gravitational shell. It hadn't just slowed time—it had warped the entire tempo of the field, like a heartbeat out of sync with the world.
"That pressure…" she murmured. "It was his."
She narrowed her eyes, searching the sky as if he might still be hiding in some ripple of shadow.
"But how?"
Thalra stepped past her, cloak whispering over debris.
"Gravity is a quiet teacher," she said without turning. "It rewards those who learn without waiting for permission."
Nyx blinked, mouth slightly open. "You… let him?"
Thalra paused beside Cindral's corpse. Her voice was soft, almost indifferent.
"I didn't let him. I just didn't stop him."
Nyx looked down, lips pressing into a tight line—caught somewhere between flustered and impressed. She'd fought alongside Sky. Felt his strength. Teased him, tested him. But she'd never seen that.
Not like this.
She wasn't angry.
Just… possessive.
Thalra glanced sideways at her, expression unreadable.
"You're fond of him."
Nyx's stare hardened. "He's mine."
Thalra didn't challenge the claim. She just walked on, the fireless wind parting around her with casual grace.
"Then you should start asking yourself one question," she said over her shoulder.
"How long can you hold on to someone who keeps slipping through time?"
Sparks and Silence
The plaza was quiet again.
Not peaceful—quiet. The kind that came after something unnatural had happened. The kind that made the world seem unsure of itself. Like reality was still adjusting to what Sky had done.
The last of the molten pools had begun to cool, steam curling lazily through the broken rafters. Chunks of liquefied stone hardened into glass. The reek of scorched metal and carbon hung over everything like a curtain no wind could lift.
Cindral's corpse hadn't moved.
And no one was speaking.
Thalra stood at its side, arms crossed now, her eyes cast downward—not with pity or curiosity. Just finality. A surgeon reviewing the severed rot of something that never belonged in the first place.
Behind her, Neyra Flint was crouched low, studying what was left of the Core's signature. She reached down and touched a faint black burn spiraling outward from the point of impact. It wasn't from fire. It was from pressure.
"That's gravitational compression," she muttered. "I've seen that in zero-pressure weapon sites… but this is too refined. Too focused."
She looked up at Thalra.
"That boy… Sky. He's not with you, is he?"
Thalra didn't answer.
Didn't need to.
Nyx remained standing near the edge of the battle, arms folded, her eyes still fixed on the spot where he had vanished. Not with longing. With a smirk growing at the corner of her mouth.
You're mine, she had said.
But now, the air whispered back something else.
Prove it.
Far away, in the shadows of his half-ruined shelter, Sky collapsed to one knee, breath ragged, body trembling, Core screaming to stabilize.
But he smiled.
Just a little.
Because for the first time since Vulkran…
He wasn't running.
He was beating them.