The board trembled.
Kaelen could feel it in his bones—the Spiral Game itself was angry. By choosing the flame over the crown, he had broken its rhythm, its eternal pattern. The void did not forgive.
The tiles rippled like a storm-tossed sea, and the eye above narrowed into a slit of burning white.
"Choice against destiny. Choice against infinity. The board must balance."
Lyra grabbed Kaelen's arm, steadying him as cracks spread beneath their feet. "It's retaliating. Whatever you did—"
"I bought us time," Kaelen said through clenched teeth. "And it hates that."
The candle-bearer's flame flared higher, casting shadows across the tiles. But instead of comfort, the light drew new horrors. From the cracks rose shapes that had no form, shifting, rippling, bodies of mist and shadow, faceless yet endless. They didn't march like soldiers. They swarmed.
Lyra's face paled. "It's not sending pieces anymore. It's sending… itself."
The first swarm lunged. Kaelen slashed with the relic, light carving through the mist, but each shadow split into two, multiplying, filling the board with their shrieks. The relic pulsed violently, as though barely keeping up.
The eye laughed, a sound like splintered glass.
"Flames chosen. Crowns denied. Shadows unending."
Kaelen pushed forward, but the shadows slipped around him, reforming faster than he could cut them down. His heart pounded. This is punishment. A board without rules.
"Kaelen!" Lyra shouted, firing into the mist, her shots dissolving swaths of shadows only for them to reform again. "We can't hold them forever!"
The candle-bearer stumbled, shielding the flame with their body. The light wavered—and for the first time, Kaelen noticed something impossible. When the flame flickered, the shadows recoiled, shrieking, their forms tearing apart.
His eyes widened. "The flame… it hurts them."
Lyra caught it instantly. "Then we don't protect it from the shadows. We use it against them."
Kaelen's grip tightened on the relic, realization igniting. They had been treating the bearer like fragile glass, but maybe the board's punishment had revealed the truth: the flame wasn't just the key to survival—it was a weapon.
He turned to the trembling bearer, voice steady despite the chaos. "Don't hide it. Don't shield it. Let it burn."
The bearer looked terrified, but as Kaelen locked eyes with them, something passed between them—trust, desperate and raw.
Slowly, the bearer lifted the candle high. The flame stretched, roaring upward, no longer fragile but fierce. The shadows screamed, scattering as if the light itself was poison.
Lyra's jaw dropped, awe cutting through her fear. "Kaelen… you just rewrote the game again."
The eye above thrashed, its voice cracking into a howl.
"Unacceptable. Flame must flicker. Flame must fall."
But the board itself recoiled from the new blaze. For the first time, the hunters were hunted.
Kaelen stood firm, relic raised, the candle's fire at his back. "Not this time."