The cathedral's light had gone cold, shadows stretching against shattered marble. The Saintess's words still lingered in the air — her entrustment of her daughter, her plea to Saphine — when the first monsters poured in.
They came like an endless hymn of despair: eyeless, jaw-split abominations screaming in fractured tones. The group fought them back — Cyrinth carving them apart with moonlight steel, Veyra guiding Lyssandra's strikes with slicing wind, Seloria chaining entire clusters with crystalline bindings. Eris, with nothing but his glowing arms, reduced horrors to dust with bone-snapping blows.
But the Hollow did not stop.
The second wave slammed into them: titans with glass halos and obsidian hides. They broke Seloria's chains with sheer strength, forced Veyra back with shockwaves, and pinned Lyssandra's spear. Eris hurled one aside, the ground trembling with its fall, but still more came.
And then the third wave arrived.
Dozens of winged monstrosities with bodies like shattered angels dove through the ruined roof. Each feather was a shard of light that cut through stone, and their shrieks filled the air like a choir from a broken heaven.
Seloria grit her teeth. "This is endless—!"
"It's supposed to be," Eris cut her off, voice calm as if lecturing in a classroom. His glasses caught the flickering light of burning wings as he struck another beast down. "This is not a fight to kill the monsters. This is a fight to see if we can outlast despair itself. That's the trial the Saintess left behind."
He adjusted his stance, shielding Saphine as the largest of the winged horrors dove toward her. His hand met its skull mid-flight — and with a twist, he drove it into the floor.
"Listen carefully. There's a way through this." His eyes narrowed, glinting with the calm precision of the Grand Gaze. "It's called Resonance."
The others glanced at him between blows, sweat streaking their faces, but he pressed on.
"When two beings resonate, they share more than just strength. They share sight, will, energy, even instincts. It's not multiplication." He sidestepped, snapping his fingers as his flare garment pulsed and a glowing shield wrapped around Saphine. "It's harmony."
Saphine stared at him, breath catching. "Harmony…?"
"You'll understand," Eris said simply.
Then he grabbed her hand and pulled her forward.
For an instant, the entire atmosphere shifted.
The monstrous choir still howled, but the oppressive aether fluctuations choking the cathedral suddenly stilled. Where Eris and Saphine stood, it was as if the world had gone quiet. Their movements overlapped, their breaths matched, and their energies bled into one another until there was no gap between them.
Seloria blinked mid-attack, startled. "Wait—what… what did they just do?"
Lyssandra gawked, nearly missing a parry. "They're… moving like one person—!"
The glow around Eris deepened. His plain arms, moments ago coated only in faint aether, now reshaped into sleek, radiant gauntlets of black-and-silver, runes shimmering across the metal like breathing stars. The fragment book at Saphine's side pulsed in time with the gauntlets, as if echoing their unison.
Eris's lips curved faintly. Saphine's breath synced with his.
Together, they muttered:
"Resonance: Domination."
The cathedral shook.
A wave of force rippled out, flattening monsters as if an unseen hand pressed them into the marble. The winged horrors crashed into the ground, their glass feathers scattering uselessly. Titans staggered under the sudden pressure, knees buckling as if bowing.
Seloria nearly fell flat on her face. "What—what was that?!"
Lyssandra braced her spear, eyes wide. "You can't just—! That's not fair!"
Even Veyra cracked a rare look of disbelief, muttering under her breath, "This is absurd…"
But Eris and Saphine didn't stop.
Every move they made flowed like a duet. Saphine's fragment projected barriers and blasts of light exactly where Eris struck, reinforcing his attacks. When Eris swung his gauntlet-clad fist, the fragment flared, amplifying the impact into a shockwave that tore through three monsters at once.
Seloria, stubborn as ever, gritted her teeth. "Tch—fine! If they can do it, so can we!" She yanked Cyrinth closer. "C'mon, resonance or whatever—share my chains!"
Cyrinth blinked. "…That's not how it works."
"Shut up and resonate!"
Lyssandra, not to be outdone, shouted at Veyra. "You, me, same wavelength—let's do it!"
Veyra deadpanned. "You're literally swinging a spear. How am I supposed to—"
"WIND-BOOST MY SWINGS, COME ON!"
The attempts were clumsy, chaotic, but undeniably effective. Seloria's chains surged larger when Cyrinth timed her strikes to their pulls. Lyssandra's spear arcs gained explosive bursts of wind. Not perfect resonance, but synergy nonetheless.
Saphine, flushed and wide-eyed, felt her heart pound in unison with Eris's calm rhythm. She didn't fully understand, but when he moved, she knew where to move. When she willed her fragment, it was already aligned with his strike.
The monsters, endless though they seemed, faltered. Wave after wave broke against their growing harmony. The hymn of despair turned into nothing but noise drowned by will.
Finally, the last titan crumbled under Eris and Saphine's united blow, the gauntlets flaring brighter before fading back into silence.
The cathedral fell still.
Seloria collapsed onto a broken pew, panting. "Never. Again."
Lyssandra leaned on her spear. "Resonance, he says. Easy, he says. I thought I was gonna break my arms trying to 'share instincts' with Veyra."
Veyra simply folded her arms, unimpressed. "You were off rhythm by five beats."
Seloria groaned. "Don't start—"
But the silence after the storm was unmistakable. The monsters were gone. The cathedral's oppressive weight lifted.
A soft, fading glow lingered in the air, the Saintess's voice whispering through the ruins.
"You have carried her truth through despair. The trial is passed."
The sealed chains around her daughter shimmered, loosening. The girl fell forward, into Saphine's arms, trembling but alive.
The Saintess's final light flared once more before dispersing, her wish carried forward.
And for a moment, in the broken cathedral of a kingdom long gone, they stood victorious.