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Chapter 11 - Echoes Unbound

The Hollow didn't stay quiet.

Once awakened, it pulsed through the Southern Marches like blood through a reopened wound. And at its center stood a boy with no title, no command, no allegiance—only a power that refused to be caged.

The Rumor

It began with whispers.

"A masked boy walked into the ruins."

"He made the dead Shards weep."

"He hears the Hollow sing."

Soldiers murmured it over campfires. Miners heard it echoed in crystal cracks. The desperate clung to it like a last chance.

And soon, it was no longer just a tale.

It was a symbol.

Auren didn't ask for that.

But symbols don't get to choose how they're used.

The Rift Grows

Darien watched the boy from the edge of the shattered temple, arms crossed, face unreadable.

"He's a danger," he muttered to Lys. "You see it too."

Lys didn't answer immediately. Her gaze was fixed on Auren, who knelt before the slivered shardstones, fingertips glowing faintly with silver. The melody of the Hollow drifted in ghostly echoes.

"I see a choice," she said softly. "The first real one we've had in years."

"His power isn't stable."

"Neither is the world."

The Crown Moves

Far away, deep within the obsidian halls of Vaelgard, the Crown's eyes turned.

High Arbiter Valen stood before the Midnight Court, where robed figures sat behind veils of light and crystal.

"He is not just a lost son," Valen said, voice calm. "He is a fracture. And fractures spread."

A voice, sharp and ancient, answered, "Then seal it. Before it becomes a wound."

Valen bowed.

"My agents are already en route."

Factions

Even before the orders reached the Marches, things began to shift.

Some soldiers requested reassignment away from the boy.

Others drew closer, watching him not with fear—but hope.

In the Hollow-blasted village of Shardmere, an old woman knelt before an altar of broken icons and whispered Auren's name in prayer.

In the camps, scribes debated whether the prophecy of the Echo-Bearer had finally come true.

In the ruined Choir tunnels, children who had stopped speaking began to hum again—softly, in rhythm with the Hollow.

Within the Group

It started with Caelen.

"You can't lead them," he told Auren bluntly. "You don't even know who you are."

Auren didn't argue. He just looked at him.

"I know what I feel. I know what this power is… and what it isn't."

Lys stepped between them before voices rose further. "This isn't about command. It's about survival. And he's the only one who's come out of that Hollow stronger than he went in."

Darien remained silent.

Watching.

Calculating.

The Encounter

That night, near the edge of the ravine that marked the beginning of the Hollow Spire, Auren stood alone.

Until a figure emerged from the darkness.

Cloaked in Crownsteel.

A Crown Whisperer.

They spoke without moving their mouth.

"You are not sanctioned."

Auren's hand instinctively moved to his side, but the voice continued.

"You are not a threat. Yet."

"What am I, then?"

"A ripple. One we were told to drown… quietly."

A pause. Then, almost reluctantly:

"But the Hollow marks you. And there are those who want to see what kind of tide you become."

Auren's voice was steady. "Tell your masters: I don't want war."

"You don't need to want it," the Whisperer replied. "You just need to exist."

Then they vanished.

The Rift Widens

In the days that followed, more came.

Not soldiers.

Not enemies.

People.

Shardless refugees. Choir-damaged survivors. Marchborn mercenaries with nowhere else to go.

They came not to fight—but to follow.

And suddenly, what had been a fractured expedition…

Became a movement.

Auren stood among them, still unsure.

Still afraid.

But the Hollow light in his chest no longer flickered.

It burned.

Elsewhere…

Valen knelt once again in the black chamber.

"The boy draws them," he said.

The cloaked figure across from him did not reply.

So Valen continued:

"If we strike now, we create a martyr. If we wait—"

"He will create himself," the figure interrupted. "Let him grow."

"But why?"

"So we can finally see," the voice said darkly, "what the Hollow chose."

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