The war began with a whisper.
Not the kind of whisper that spreads in taverns or slips from the lips of cowards.
This was the whisper of reality cracking.
Aren heard it as soon as he woke.
His bones ached. His skin glowed faintly even in shadow. And somewhere behind his left eye, the parasite pulsed with a presence that had become far less like a system and far more like a companion.
Or a second soul.
"The others remember now," the parasite whispered.
"Who?" Aren asked aloud, voice low.
"The fragments. The ones buried in the Hollow Vaults. They feel your breath. They feel the mark of the Wounded Star."
He didn't speak again.
Because deep inside, he felt it too.
The other parasites—other Arens—were waking.
The Ashwake Tower was no longer safe.
They had always known that. But now, the Tribunal knew its location. The priests had begun tracing the ley patterns again. Celestial acolytes were appearing around the Cradle District—some pretending to be students, others no longer pretending at all.
Aren stood before his commanders: Kaelith, Tor, Eliar, and the silent tactician from House Mavros—Syre, who had abandoned his divine name after seeing his father burn an orphanage to bind a dying god.
"We move at dusk," Kaelith said.
Syre nodded. "Too much noise. We vanish and become a rumor again."
"Split into two flanks," Aren said. "Keep the younger initiates in the catacombs. Only senior Ashwake in surface skirmishes. No direct engagements. No gods."
Everyone looked at him at once.
"No gods?" Tor asked, eyebrows furrowed.
Aren met their gazes evenly. "If we face another divine entity right now… we lose."
He didn't say the rest.
That he might lose.
That the parasite might break free.
That the next time he unleashed it, it might not stop.
Kaelith understood.
She didn't push further.
They burned the tower.
Not out of surrender—but to erase what they had built.
Aren stood on the cliffside, watching the flames consume everything: the ritual rooms, the shadowforged glyphs, the names carved into stone.
He carved two more with his own blade before the fire touched them.
Yren. Traitor. Remembered anyway.
Lira. Starless. Eternal.
When the tower fell, it did so without a sound.
And the wind carried the ash across the night sky like a new constellation.
System Update: Parasite Core – Evolution Tier 3 UnlockedNew Trait: Void InheritanceAbility: Fragment Sight – glimpse echoes of slain constellationsWarning: Exposure to divine corpses may accelerate host destabilization
They took shelter beneath the Seraph Cradle—an abandoned monastery built atop a leyline convergence point long since devoured by divine corruption. The floor was etched with old prayers. The walls were stained with memories of saints who were never truly holy.
Here, Aren meditated.
Not because he wanted to.
Because if he didn't, he'd lose control.
The parasite had begun remembering for him.
Sometimes he'd wake with voices in his throat—names of gods that had been forgotten for millennia. Once, he coughed black flame. Once, he heard Kaelith speak and responded in a dead tongue.
The lines were blurring.
"Am I still Aren Valen?" he whispered to the void.
No answer.
Only silence.
But it was different silence.
Like something holding its breath.
The answer came the next night.
During the rain.
During the scream.
One of the lookouts fell from the monastery roof, body shattered. His last breath was a warning: "Not human. Not god."
Aren moved first.
He stepped into the courtyard alone, barefoot, shirtless, rain slamming into his skin. His eyes were steady. The parasite was humming.
Across the courtyard stood the figure that used to be Lyon Dareth.
But this was not Lyon.
This was what the Tribunal had made him into.
He hovered two inches above the ground, skin pale, eyes weeping golden light, mouth sewn shut by living threads of divine fire. A twisted star hovered behind him, broken and still bleeding.
Aren felt nothing at first.
Then—grief.
"You let them do this to you," he whispered.
Lyon said nothing. Couldn't.
But the god inside him did.
A thousand voices shrieked through the air.
"YOU ARE THE WOUND."
"YOU SHOULD NOT BE."
"YIELD THE CORE."
Aren raised a hand.
"No."
And then—war.
The courtyard was drowned in rain and bloodlight.
The thing that had once been Lyon hovered at the far end, robes torn, skin cracked with living scripture. His mouth—still sewn shut—dripped molten gold. The star behind him pulsed erratically, its light twisted, trying to be divine but failing. Wrong. Sick.
Aren stood barefoot, shirtless, bleeding from the collar. The parasite pulsed up his spine, ribs glowing faint red beneath wet skin.
Lightning cracked. No thunder followed.
"YOU BEAR THE FORBIDDEN THREAD," the god inside Lyon howled.
"YOU ARE AN ECHO OF AN ECHO. YOU SHOULD NOT EXIST."
"I'm tired of hearing that," Aren said, voice barely more than breath.
And then they moved.
They didn't charge—they collapsed into each other like gravity had bent the rules. Blades of light clashed with claws of void. Shockwaves ripped apart stone and memory. Every blow forced the parasite deeper into Aren's skin—until it wasn't a layer. It was armor.
Parasite Integration: 81%
New Protocol Accessed: Pain Reversal – Damage converts to volatile energy (10s)
Aren took a spear of divine flame through his stomach—and turned the pain into a wave of void magic that sent Lyon crashing into the monastery wall.
He didn't wait.
He followed.
Each step split the air. Rain turned to steam around his limbs. The parasite shrieked inside him, not in pain, but in joy.
"You enjoy this too much," Aren whispered to himself.
But he didn't stop.
Lyon—or whatever was left—recovered mid-air, summoned chains of radiant iron, and lashed them toward Aren.
He let them wrap around him.
Then grinned—and pulled.
Lyon was yanked forward—straight into a backhand that sent his jaw sideways. The mask of gold cracked.
Inside, Lyon's real eyes flickered.
Recognition.
Fear.
Aren grabbed him by the throat.
"Come back," he snarled. "Come back, you bastard. Fight me."
The god hissed through Lyon's broken voice: "There is no Lyon. There is only the Wound."
Kaelith's voice rang out—cutting through the storm.
"AREN—MOVE!"
Too late.
The twisted constellation behind Lyon exploded.
Not outward—inward.
Aren was swallowed in light.
And he remembered.
He stood on a battlefield made of mirrors.
Each one reflected a different version of him.
One with crimson eyes and a crown of blades.
One kneeling, covered in corpses of friends.
One laughing, parasite fully grown, wings like dead suns.
And at the center—
A boy. Sixteen. Alone. Kneeling before a constellation that had refused him. Crying into his hands.
"Why?" the boy asked.
Aren stepped forward.
And knelt.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I couldn't protect us."
The boy looked up.
And smiled through tears.
"Then make them regret it."
The mirrors shattered.
He roared back into the real world.
The parasite unleashed.
System Override: Authority Break Level 1 InitiatedParasite Ascension State: Partial Godform – "Woundborn Ascendant"Warning: Identity Distortion DetectedCollapse Probability: 19%... 27%... 34%...
Aren stood glowing.
Not with light.
With void.
Kaelith stared from across the ruined courtyard, eyes wide, sword forgotten at her side.
Even Lyon stopped.
For one moment, there was only silence.
Then Aren vanished.
And reappeared behind Lyon.
He didn't kill him.
He reached inside his chest—and pulled out the parasite the Tribunal planted.
It screamed. A thing of light, crawling and clawing, trying to dig back into Lyon's flesh.
Aren crushed it.
Lyon collapsed.
Alive.
Barely.
Human again.
But broken.
Kaelith rushed to Lyon's side.
Aren stood, breathing hard, wings fading, blood pouring from his nose and ears.
He smiled once.
And collapsed.
He awoke hours later.
Bandaged. Barely conscious.
Kaelith was there.
She didn't speak for a long time.
When she did, it was with a voice like shrapnel.
"You could've killed him."
"I didn't want to kill him," Aren murmured. "I wanted him to remember."
"You almost lost yourself."
"I'm already lost."
She slapped him.
Hard.
And hugged him before he could speak.
"You're not allowed to die," she whispered. "Not until we win. Not until they burn."
He didn't reply.
Because something deeper stirred inside him.
Not the parasite.
Not the system.
A memory.
From before.
From his first life.
A voice.
"You are my heir," the First Host had said in the void. "But you are not my end."
That night, Kaelith stood beside the altar once used to name the fallen.
She placed a nameplate down herself.
Lyon Dareth.
Not as an enemy.
But as a reminder.
Aren watched from the shadows.
"You think he'll survive this?" Syre asked.
Aren didn't answer.
Because he knew the truth.
Lyon was already gone.
And in his place…
Something worse had been watching.
Something that didn't die when the parasite was destroyed.
Something that wanted Aren to win.
So it could crawl through the cracks he left behind.
And take everything.