Midnight in Lorne was a soundless, black-bellied thing.
Ash drifted through the sky like lazy snow, muting even the crackle of distant torches. Caelum walked alone toward the eastern ridge, his steps light, heart heavy. He carried no blade. No talisman. Just breath and blood and something hollow beneath his ribs.
Serapha Vale waited at the edge of the caravan circle.
Her blue coat shimmered faintly under the moonlight, the silver etchings catching every flicker. Her crystalline staff floated beside her, orbiting like a moon caught in her gravity.
"You came," she said. No surprise in her voice.
"I don't know what this is," Caelum said. "But I want to know."
"Curiosity is dangerous." She turned. "Follow me."
⸻
They moved beyond the treeline, into the ruins of an old watchpost—a stone clearing wreathed in the bones of a long-dead tower. The ground here was scorched, and the trees around it leaned like they had once fled something that burned too hot.
"A battle was fought here," Serapha said, answering his silent glance. "An Ascendant fell. One of the last."
Caelum frowned. "I thought the Ascendants were myths."
"They were flesh and fire once. Beings who mastered both Vein and Core. But even gods burn." She stepped to the center of the ruin. "That's why the Arcanum exists. To prevent another rise."
"And people still die powerless," Caelum muttered.
Serapha turned, eyes narrowed. "You think the world owes power to all?"
"I think the world takes without caring. So I want to take something back."
Something sharp flickered in her expression—approval, maybe. Or understanding.
"Then let's see what the world buried inside you."
She lifted her staff.
A pulse of Lux Vein energy flared—cool, blue light that sizzled against the stone. Caelum felt the pressure immediately. It pressed against his skin, not like wind, but like judgment. A force that tasted him and found him lacking.
"Stand in the circle," she said.
He did.
"Close your eyes."
He hesitated. Then obeyed.
"What do you feel?" she asked.
Silence.
Then—
"Cold," he said. "But not just cold. It's like the air's thinning."
"That's your body rejecting ambient mana," she said. "You have no Lux Vein or Vira Core signature. You don't absorb. You erase."
His eyes opened.
"What?"
Serapha paced slowly around him. "The relic wasn't broken, Caelum. When you touched it, it didn't detect nothing. It detected silence. A field of negation."
He stared at her. "So I'm… cursed?"
"No. You're Nullform."
The word hit him like a bell in deep water.
"I've never heard of that."
"Because it shouldn't exist. Every living being resonates with one Current. Internal—Vira Core. Or external—Lux Vein. But you?" She stopped in front of him. "You are a third path. One that the Arcanum considers a myth."
"And you're not reporting me?"
"I am the report." Her voice was cool. But not unkind. "That's why I'm still here."
Caelum swallowed. "What does it mean?"
Serapha raised her hand. Mana flared—threads of pure blue light weaving into a lance of Aether.
"Strike me," she said.
He blinked. "What?"
"I will attack. You will strike back. If I'm wrong, you'll be ash in seconds. If I'm right…" Her eyes narrowed. "We'll learn something new."
She moved faster than thought.
The air split as the lance shot forward.
Caelum threw his arms up on instinct. There was no time to dodge.
But—
The moment the Aether touched him, it blinked out.
Gone. Dissolved mid-flight.
Serapha's eyes widened. "You didn't block that."
"I didn't do anything," he gasped.
"You unmade it."
A pause. Then she gave a rare nod, as if confirming something deeply dangerous.
"I've seen one other like you," she murmured. "A long time ago. Before the war. He erased armies by walking through them."
"What happened to him?"
She met his eyes.
"The Arcanum erased him."
⸻
Caelum didn't sleep that night.
He sat beneath a broken tree near Marek's hut, watching the sky for stars that never came.
Power. Real power.
But it wasn't fire or strength. It was silence. Absence. The ability to undo what others were born to wield.
Nullform.
He whispered the word like it might shatter if spoken too loudly.
Not a warrior. Not a mage.
Something in between. Or outside.
The next morning, Marek found him at the stump again.
"You look like you saw the end of the world," the old man said.
"I think I'm just starting to see it."
Marek grunted. "That noble girl still hanging around?"
"She says I'm not sparkless. Just unreadable."
"Is that better?"
Caelum looked down at his hand.
"I don't know yet."
⸻
Meanwhile, deep in the third wagon of the caravan, Serapha knelt beside a black vault etched with Arcanum runes.
She pressed her hand against it.
It opened with a hiss.
Inside: a glass orb filled with swirling ink. A relic reserved only for high Seeker operations. One that sent messages not across distance—but through sealed memory.
She placed her fingers on it and whispered:
"Designation: Nullform confirmed.
Subject: Caelum Thorne.
Recommendation: Watch. Do not report to High Seat.
Reason: Containment through proximity.
Personal override code: Vale-Aurion."
She closed the vault.
And sat very still.
Because what the Arcanum didn't know was that she had seen the last Nullform once before.
Not on a battlefield.
But in the eyes of the man who once tried to save her.