Rain hammered the world into grayness as Jin fled the keep.
Every step carried him deeper into the wilderness beyond his family's ancestral walls. A darkness without torches. A silence broken only by the wind wailing in the black pines.
His breath came ragged. Each inhalation tasted of moss and ozone. Every heartbeat throbbed with the Sovereign Circuit's cold fire.
[Integration: 33%.]
He did not know how far he had come when he finally paused to rest.
He only knew the keep was gone behind him, and the storm had become something almost gentle—fine drizzle drifting through the trees like ash.
He leaned against a broad-trunked pine, rain trickling down his face. A chill settled into his bones, yet the lightning beneath his skin burned hotter than ever.
His mind reeled.
Flashes of memory—his, and those he did not recognize—crowded behind his eyes:
—Renji's silhouette framed in lightning—
—The vault's door opening with ancient thunder—
—A woman in dark robes, raising her hands over a sea of kneeling soldiers—
—A throne of white iron—
He squeezed his eyes shut. The images did not fade.
Integration: 34%.
He drew a slow breath, trying to separate the sensations. His awareness had become something vast and unmanageable. He could feel each drop of rain before it touched him, track the faint static charge that lingered in the air after every gust.
The Circuit was merging with his nerves, his perception—rewriting him cell by cell.
He did not know if he could stop it.
He pushed away from the pine. Standing still only made it worse.
Keep moving.
He followed a deer trail that wound downhill, half overgrown with brambles. The darkness pooled between the trees, and for long moments he saw only the brush of wet leaves and the flash of lightning in the clouds.
Every step reminded him of the price he had paid.
He had left Renji alive, but that had been strategy, not mercy. The Arashi would hunt him now. There would be no reconciliation. No returning home in triumph.
The thought should have sickened him.
Instead, he felt something he could not name. Relief.
For the first time in his life, there was no pretense left. No illusions.
Only survival and the cold promise of conquest.
Integration: 35%.
He climbed a narrow ridge where the trees thinned to scrub. Below, a pale river glimmered in the dark. The old trade road cut across its shallows—a crossing known as Yurei Ford.
In childhood, he had heard it called cursed.
Because no one returns unchanged.
He almost laughed.
He was already something unrecognizable.
Carefully, he descended the ridge, boots sinking into wet loam. When he reached the riverbank, dawn had begun to tinge the clouds pink. Steam rose from the water in ragged veils.
He froze.
A figure stood on the far shore, watching him in perfect stillness.
The hood concealed everything but a pale chin and the suggestion of high cheekbones. A wind stirred the edges of the cloak, revealing glimpses of silver-threaded embroidery.
He reached through the Circuit's new senses, probing for any sign of qi.
Nothing.
It was like touching a mirror.
"Show yourself," he called.
A long pause. Then the figure lifted slender hands to lower the hood.
A woman's face emerged. Sharp, elegant, ageless. Eyes so pale they seemed almost colorless.
"I have no quarrel with you," Jin said.
Her gaze traveled over him—taking in the scorched fabric at his shoulder, the faint flickers of lightning still crawling over his skin.
"You are mistaken," she said softly. "You carry something that concerns everyone."
He did not answer. Rain trickled across his brow, cooling the heat that built in his chest.
"What do you want?"
"For now? To see if the stories were true."
Her eyes narrowed slightly, as though she were examining a specimen. "Tell me, Jin Arashi—how does it feel to bear the last Sovereign's curse?"
He swallowed, his throat raw.
"I don't answer to you."
"No," she agreed. "Soon, you won't answer to anyone."
She lifted one hand. A sigil flared across her palm, bright blue in the gloom.
He knew it instantly.
The Seal of the Sovereign Pact.
His breath stopped.
"You were waiting," he rasped.
"Waiting?" She tilted her head. "I was preparing. The world has not known a true Sovereign in centuries. But prophecy does not slumber."
"Prophecy." He almost laughed. "I have no use for prophecy."
"Yet it has use for you."
A long silence stretched between them.
Finally, she let her hand fall.
"You cannot run from what is waking inside you," she said. "Nor can you smother it. The Circuit will remake you as it remade all who wore it before. That is the nature of dominion."
His jaw clenched.
"I will not be remade."
"Then you will be consumed."
The wind tugged her cloak around her legs. Slowly, she drew the hood back over her face.
"When the time comes," she whispered, "I will be there to see whether you kneel…or burn."
She stepped backward. Mist coiled around her form. One moment she stood clear against the dawn. The next, she was simply gone.
He exhaled shakily.
Integration: 37%.
He crossed the shallows with slow, deliberate steps. Water soaked his boots and chilled the cuts on his shins. Each motion felt unreal, as though he watched himself from a distance.
When he reached the far bank, he paused. The Circuit pulsed in his heart—steady, inescapable.
He turned to look back across the water. The path was already disappearing into rising fog.
Let them come, he thought. Let the world come.
He would not kneel.
And he would not burn quietly.