The last of the smoke drifted toward the crater rim like forgotten breath. Blackridge stood in stillness—walls darkened with soot, trenches hardened into scorched canyons, every spear and scaffold layered in ash. The third Blood Moon was ending, and with it came a silence no one trusted.
Riku sat alone in the forge hall. The walls hummed faintly with residual heat, the sound of a beast asleep rather than dead. Papers lay scattered across the workbench—map updates, scavenged fragments from the Ashen Tide, and a single folded cloth holding the oldest of the fire-root seeds. He hadn't touched it since Sira had placed it there.
A soft chime cracked across the room. Not loud. But distinct.
He turned toward the far wall, where the relay crystal flickered for the first time in days.
[Global System Update: Third Blood Moon Event Ends.]
[Top 20 Sovereign Rankings Recorded. Rewards Delivered Discreetly.]
[Fourth Cycle Begins in 30 Days.]
There were no names. No identities. Just one line, quiet and absolute.
[Ash Veil – Rank 8.]
Riku didn't move. Not even as the glow faded.
Kael entered a few minutes later, wiping his hands on a cloth streaked with black grease. "We're reinforcing trench three. Alloy from the Ashen Tide's good. Real good. We can graft it straight into the pressure veins. Might even double vent duration."
Riku didn't answer. Not at first.
Finally, he said, "No new expansions. Lock all outer construction. Pull the scouts back in."
Kael frowned. "You want to wait? Now?"
"Yes."
Kael folded his arms. "We just showed them we can win. Now you want us to vanish?"
"I don't want them to know what we're doing next," Riku said. "They've seen our strength. That's enough."
"And the Ashen Tide?" Kael asked. "We let them stay?"
"For now. But they don't get inside the forge. Not unless they build something of their own."
Kael didn't argue further. Just nodded and walked out.
Sira appeared before the hour passed, as though she'd sensed the shift from a distance.
"Retreat?"
"No," Riku said. "Hibernate."
She raised a brow. "That's a different kind of silence."
"It's the kind that keeps us alive."
She studied him a long moment, then dropped something on the bench. A heat mirror. The surface showed a flickering trace—tiny clusters of movement. Sovereign units. One was Iron Veil. Another unknown. Both skimming the crater's northern flanks, moving not toward Blackridge, but past it.
"They think we're gone," she said.
"They need to think that."
Riku rolled the heat mirror up carefully and stowed it beneath the bench. Then he crossed the forge floor to the central console and deactivated two external vents and the rear tunnel light. The forge dimmed. The signal lines blinked out one by one.
No light from the outer towers.
No messages sent.
Nothing to mark where they were.
By dusk, Blackridge vanished from the world again.
The tribe accepted the silence without question.
Spearmen resumed quiet drills beneath torchlight. Wyrmlings were fed in low, steady intervals, their breath training now included alongside their bonding rituals. Engineers closed up the broken steam tunnels, not rebuilding, just sealing.
The Ashen Tide stayed in their corner of the outer field, making no demands.
And the sovereigns beyond?
They fought.
The chat stirred with faint signals—trading posts reactivated, taunts whispered under false names, alliances announced with fire and boldness.
But none came from Ash Veil.
Riku returned to the forge tower one final time before the cycle ended.
The new hatchling had grown fast—faster than the others. It still bore no name. But it followed him now, quiet and sharp-eyed. It didn't roar. It simply watched.
Like he did.
He sat at the edge of the wall with his back to the basin, letting the quiet settle.
And after some time, he opened the global interface.
He didn't scroll. Didn't speak.
He just typed a message, slowly.
[Ash Veil]: The forge cools. For now. Let others burn.
He pressed send.
Then turned off the relay.
And the world moved on.
Blackridge did not.
Beneath the crater's fractured skin, power stirred like coals beneath a long-doused fire.
They would forget him.
That was the point.
Let them.
Because next time, he would not rise to defend.
He would rise to conquer.