The night after the Nexus collapsed, no one slept.
Not from fear. Not from exhaustion.
But from change.
The entire camp felt it—like the world itself had blinked. Time stuttered. Lights flickered for hours. Echo storms pulsed across the sky, painting the ruins in deep crimson waves. Even the scavengers, usually bold at night, kept their distance.
Something had awakened.
And it was watching.
The Mark Burns
Valen sat alone in the war tent, the flickering glow of his Echo casting long shadows behind him. His hands trembled, not from fatigue—but from the mark now burned across his chest.
It had changed.
No longer just the remnant of Blackfire or his rebirth—it pulsed with its own rhythm now. As if echoing a heart that wasn't his.
Each beat made him feel closer to something far beyond flesh.
Across the room, Lira watched in silence, her arms crossed, eyes narrowed.
"You're not sleeping again," she said.
"I can't," Valen answered. "It's not letting me."
She stepped closer. "What happened in the Nexus… it wasn't just power, was it?"
He met her eyes.
"No. It was an invitation."
Council Confrontation
By morning, the rebel council had assembled.
The camp's senior leaders stood in a loose circle—Kira at Valen's side, arms folded and face unreadable.
They'd seen the signs. The air itself felt thinner. Their Rift sensors had shattered without cause. Something old was stirring—and all eyes turned to the man who'd walked into the heart of the Nexus and returned alive.
"What are you now, Valen Creed?" asked Commander Juno, the eldest of the rebel officers.
Valen didn't answer immediately. He stepped forward into the center, his black coat trailing, the light of his Echo gently smoldering around him.
"I'm still me," he said. "But I've seen what's coming."
"More than war?"
He nodded. "A convergence. They called it a Nexus Event. It's not just an invasion—it's a rewriting. The Riftborn want to collapse this timeline and overwrite it with their own."
Gasps filled the room.
Juno stepped back. "And you… you think they chose you?"
"They marked me," Valen said. He pulled open his shirt, revealing the radiant eye now burned into his flesh—a Riftborn symbol, but twisted, altered by his Echo and the Blackfire.
Half-mortal. Half-something else.
"I didn't accept it," he added. "But I didn't reject it either."
The Riftborn Lord
That night, the Rift opened.
A tear split the sky above the camp, jagged and burning with impossible light.
Alarms sounded. Defenders rushed to their posts. The air warped with static.
Valen stood at the center of the courtyard, unflinching as the tear widened.
Then, it stepped through.
Not a soldier.
Not a beast.
But a Lord.
Twelve feet tall. Robes of liquid shadow. A face of glass, fractured with stars behind the cracks. Its presence bent gravity. The ground blackened beneath its feet. Even Echo-users felt their power flicker.
Kira raised her rifle. "Is that a god?"
"No," Valen whispered. "That's who the gods fear."
The Riftborn Lord extended an arm. Its voice didn't echo in the air—it pressed directly into every mind.
"We see you, Harbinger."
Everyone froze.
The Lord's gaze never left Valen.
"You touched the core. You survived the flame. The Eye recognizes you."
Valen stepped forward. "I'm not your Harbinger. I'm your mistake."
The Riftborn Lord tilted its head, glass cracking as it smiled.
"You think you are free? You carry our voice already."
Valen's Echo surged—flames black and silver erupting around him. "I carry fire. And if you come again… I'll burn you from every corner of this world."
The Lord didn't flinch.
Instead, it bowed.
"Then burn well. Your war begins now."
It vanished.
The Rift closed.
But the sky didn't heal.
The Camp Rallies
After the Riftborn Lord disappeared, something shifted.
The rebels no longer looked at Valen with fear.
They looked to him as a beacon.
He had stood face-to-face with the impossible—and spoken back.
People began forming around him—defenders, medics, Echo-users. Not a cult. Not a rebellion.
A resistance.
Lira approached him that evening, watching the dark clouds curl in the distance.
"You feel it too?" she asked.
He nodded. "The timelines are merging. The Riftborn want to bring their future here."
"You think we can stop them?"
Valen looked at the burning mark on his chest.
"I think we have to try."
The Eye Opens
That night, Valen dreamed again.
Not of the past.
Of what was to come.
He stood on a ruined battlefield, cities hanging upside down in the sky, Riftborn pouring from cracks in the stars. Beside him were people he hadn't met yet—warriors, survivors, strangers.
And at the center of it all… stood himself.
Older. Scarred. Radiant with raw Echo. His eyes burned with the fire of ten worlds, and his shadow stretched into infinity.
This future self turned to him.
"Remember this," he said. "You are the last thread. Cut it… and everything unravels."
Then the sky cracked open above them.
The Eye opened fully.
And it looked at him.
Not with malice. Not with kindness.
But with expectation.
Valen woke in a cold sweat, breath ragged.
Kira was waiting outside.
He didn't say a word.
Just nodded.
"It's coming," she said.
Valen looked to the horizon, where a fresh Rift now pulsed in the sky like a heartbeat.
"No," he said. "We're going to it."