Lowwater did not sleep the night after Marra. It paced. It shifted weight from one foot to the other. It coughed dust and called it weather. The ovens stayed cold. Hook Street merchants stood with hands empty because their anchor had been pulled up by the roots. The Slums whispered louder than they meant to.
Evan ran anyway.
His ribs burned. His storm hissed, softer now, tighter, compressed. It clung to him like an animal waiting for the leash to slip. Every stride set cobbles humming, every breath pulled the Domain threads taut.
Path Evolution — Ghost Current (Active).Effect: Vector Compression unlocked.Effect: Fear → Momentum Conversion (cap: 12%).Passive: Domain Weighting +15%.
The panel burned bright as his arcs sank into walls and made them hum low, steady. The city had learned his name by pipe. Now it learned his shape by storm.
He cut corners that weren't there yesterday. He threaded lanes that hadn't admitted being lanes. He slipped into alleys like water finding cracks in stone. Ghost Current lived in the spaces between.
And the city followed.
Pipes hummed without knocks. Doors shifted open with less fear. Even the Towers rang their bell on time, ashamed to be late in a city that was finally catching its breath.
But breath wasn't free.
At the edge of the Docks, Aelira met him with Silver squad. Her braid was looser today, strands breaking discipline, her eyes sharper for it.
"You killed Cross," she said. Not praise. Not blame. Just ledger.
"He killed Marra," Evan answered. The words dragged knives behind them.
She nodded once. Cairn spat iron into the sea and watched it sink.
"Then the city owes you nothing," Cairn said. "And everything."
The panel agreed without mercy.
Public Trust: Volatile.Hook Street Morale: 68% (fractured).Slums Morale: 72% (stubborn).Net Stability: Unstable.
Aelira's slate buzzed. She glanced down, lips thinning. "Registry reports something new. Outer districts. Multiplicity anomaly. Codename—Chorus."
"Multiplicity?" Evan asked.
"Copies," Cairn said, yellow arcs crackling. "One becomes two. Two becomes a crowd. A crowd becomes a wall that doesn't move."
Evan flexed his hands. His storm buzzed tighter, like it knew the word already.
"Then I'll cut through the wall."
The first sight of Chorus was wrong music.
Pipes didn't knock three–two–three. They rattled in chaos. Too many rhythms at once. Shutters banged without order. The Docks shouted with voices layered on top of each other, none of them belonging.
And then they stepped out.
One man. Two. Four. Six. All the same face. Blank. Mouths moving with no sound. Then all at once:
"Ghost."
The word slapped the air from every mouth, multiplied until the alley bent under it.
Anomaly Detected — Chorus (Multiplicity).Threat Level: Severe.Trait: Self-Replication (limit unknown).Directive: Contain before spread.
The copies rushed.
Evan moved.
[Ghost Current] — Vector Compression Engaged.
He folded space into himself. Steps snapped tighter. The storm shrank close, condensed, and then burst outward when he struck. His first punch tore through three at once, arcs chaining between them like water finding roots.
The copies screamed in unison. New ones peeled from the sound, bodies tearing from air.
"Not enough," Evan hissed.
He ran the lane. Fear poured from windows and eyes. His storm drank it, turned it into fuel.
Fear → Momentum Conversion: +9%.
He hit again. Thunderstep low, Vector Break narrow. Copies fell in halves, their mouths still trying to say his name. More spawned from the halves.
The alley choked with them.
Silver squad joined. Cairn smashed one into the ground, arcs flaring yellow, but two more climbed out of the corpse. Aelira's braid cracked like a whip, her own storm flaring white-blue, but her blade cut only echoes.
"We'll drown!" she shouted.
"Not if we burn," Evan answered.
His storm climbed higher.
Arc Ascension (Stabilized) Activated.Warning: Conduction strain 46%.
Violet swallowed the lane. He became lightning in walls, in pipes, in cobbles, everywhere at once. The copies tried to swarm, but his arcs found them all. Every strike chained, every ghost of him striking twice, three times.
Vector Compression Critical — Area Cleave achieved.
The Slums roared back, pipes hammering, people screaming three–two–three until their throats broke. The city gave him more.
Domain Weight Surge — +12%. Overflow: 34%.
The copies faltered. The song cracked. Their mouths moved but no sound came.
Evan punched through the last one, arcs ripping it apart like cloth. Silence dropped so hard the alley shook.
The panel hovered.
Anomaly Chorus — Neutralized.Reward: Level Up (Lv. 16 → 17).Reward: Stat Increase (+30 Speed).Reward: Technique Upgrade — Ghost Current (Phase II): Vector Cleave unlocked.
The copies were gone. The lane smelled of dust and burnt lightning. Silver squad stared, half in awe, half in fear.
Cairn wiped blood from his cheek. "You're getting heavier."
"Good," Evan said, voice raw.
Aelira studied him like a problem she couldn't decide to solve. "Cross was one kind of hunger. This is another. They're not waiting their turn anymore."
The panel agreed again, merciless.
Registry Alert: Anomaly frequency rising.Projection: 3–5 days before Domain collapse if unchecked.
Evan's storm whispered against his ears, low and angry.
He looked at the city. The city looked back, waiting.
"I told you," he said, lightning sparking his teeth. "I don't stop."
The pipes answered, but this time the rhythm was different—fast, frantic, like a heart that knew too well what was coming next.