As they walked, Cain felt it again—faint, distant, but undeniable. The pressure of divinity shifting somewhere beyond the horizon. Not converging. Repositioning.
The board was being reset.
Whatever had happened here hadn't ended the conflict. It had merely erased a piece of it. Cain tightened his grip on his blade.
The Celestials would adapt. Their followers always did.
And so would he.
Ahead, through the rain, a faint light flickered—artificial, unstable. A signal. Steve, most likely, trying to stitch order back into a world that kept refusing it.
Cain picked up his pace.
The story wasn't over. It had just shed another layer of skin.
Rain followed them all the way to the river.
By the time Cain reached the eastern embankment, the ground had softened into thick mud that clung to his boots and dragged at every step. The river itself was swollen and violent, carrying debris—metal, broken stone, fragments of things that had once been buildings—downstream in a relentless churn.
