The shards pulsed in the cathedral's ruin like the hearts of fallen gods.
Light bled from them in jagged fragments, fractured and restless, spilling through the cracks of broken stone and splashing across our faces in ghost-fire. I staggered toward them, chest burning, every breath tasting like iron. The crowbar slipped slick in my hand, sticky with my own blood.
Lysander moved beside me, blade still dripping with black ichor. His shoulders heaved with ragged breath, his silver eyes too bright, almost feverish in the ghost-light. Even through the bond, I could feel the strain radiating off him—like steel about to snap but refusing to bend.
Behind us, Kade's laughter rumbled through the ruin. It wasn't human laughter anymore. It was jagged, broken glass in sound, rattling the air with something wrong.
"Yes. Yes!" Kade's voice cracked as if something inside him had already shattered. "Take them. Become like me. Break."
Every hair on the back of my neck lifted. The bond screamed in warning, even before the System carved its voice through my skull.
[ Claiming Sequence Initiated. ]
[ Warning: Candidates must sacrifice to stabilize. ]
[ Sacrifice may include: Memory, Sanity, or Humanity. ]
The words struck like cold knives. My stomach twisted.
The shards rose higher, hovering, humming like a choir made of blades. Their whispers pressed against my skull, voices layered and endless. Claim. Claim. Claim.
My hands trembled as I reached out. The heat building between the shards and the bond tightened so fiercely it hurt to breathe.
Then Lysander's hand brushed mine. Just the lightest touch, anchoring me, even though I felt the tremor in his fingers. His silver gaze caught mine, and for a single flicker of time, I saw something unspoken there—fear, defiance, and something he would never say aloud.
We reached for the light together.
And the world burned.
Pain detonated through me, white-hot and merciless. It wasn't pain meant for flesh—it was meant for souls. Knives drove into bone, fire poured into my veins, eating me alive from the inside out. I screamed, or Lysander screamed, or maybe both of us together until it became one voice.
The bond tore wide open. Everything spilled through—his fear, my rage, his agony, my desperation. No walls left, only raw bleeding edges tangled into one unbearable storm.
[ Sacrifice required. ]
[ Candidate: Select. ]
The System's demand carved through me, cold and merciless.
Memories flared. My mother's face laughing in the kitchen. The tug of a childhood friend's hand pulling me toward mischief. The smell of rain on old rooftops, home cradling me in its arms. All of it flared so vividly that my chest ached.
The whisper came again. Choose.
Then Lysander's scream ripped through the bond, and his memories bled into mine. A battlefield drowned in ash. His brother's lifeless eyes. A name whispered like a prayer before being swallowed in blood. His grip tightening on his blade until his knuckles cracked, because if he let go, he would be nothing.
He was losing them. We both were.
[ Sacrifice Confirmed. ]
[ Memory Severed. ]
Something broke inside me.
My mother's laughter flickered, stuttered—then was gone. Torn out by the root. A hollow opened in its place so sharp I couldn't breathe. My knees struck stone, the air tearing out of my lungs.
But through the void, power surged.
Molten. Relentless.
The shards sank into bone, rewriting me. The crowbar groaned in my grip, warping as silver-black veins spread across the metal, stretching it into something sharper, hungrier. The bond roared louder than blood, pulling me so deep into Lysander that I couldn't tell where I ended and he began.
Kade's grin twisted, his silver eyes snapping between me and Lysander. For the first time, his laughter faltered. Rage cracked through his voice.
"You think you can steal from me? That was mine. Mine!"
Black ichor spilled from his mouth like tar, bubbling down his chin as his body convulsed. Bones snapped like dry branches, skin tearing open as claws lengthened into something monstrous. The air thickened, every breath burning like smoke.
The System's voice tore through my skull.
[ Rival Threshold Reached. ]
[ Aberration Ascension Imminent. ]
Lysander's voice was hoarse, scraped raw by pain and fury. "We end this now."
The new weight of my weapon hummed in my hand, alive, hungry. The whispers of the shards pressed against my mind, clawing at the edges, demanding, hungering. But the bond steadied me. His fire was my fire. My fear was his fear. Together, they hardened into something unbreakable.
Kade lunged.
The world exploded into motion. My blade met his claw with a burst of silver sparks, the impact rattling bone and muscle, but I held my ground. Power surged through me, molten and relentless. I shoved back, forcing him a step off-balance. Lysander was already there, his blade a streak of silver fire carving into Kade's chest.
The Rival roared, his claws lashing out, tearing through stone and shattering pews. The cathedral trembled, air splitting like thunder. But we moved as one—bond guiding us, weaving our strikes into a single rhythm. My swing ripped his arm open. Lysander's strike drove silver flame into black ichor.
For the first time, Kade screamed—not in triumph, but in pain.
[ Rival Stability: 31% ]
[ Warning: Aberration fully manifesting. ]
The System's words pulsed in my skull, but I refused to stop. Every strike was survival. Every movement was defiance. Blood pounded in my ears, heat boiling in my veins, body screaming with every breath. Still, the bond dragged me forward, even when my legs faltered.
Then his claws caught me.
Agony ripped through my side, fire bursting under my skin as blood spilled hot across my ribs. The world lurched. My vision blurred. Lysander's scream tore through the bond, a fury so sharp it burned my chest. He caught me before I could fall, silver fire erupting from his blade as he drove it into Kade's shoulder.
The Rival howled, ichor spraying in thick streams, his body convulsing as the cathedral walls split with cracks. The roof groaned above us, threatening to collapse.
[ Rival Stability: 12% ]
Lysander pressed his hand against my wound, his voice raw, breaking. "Stay with me."
The bond shook, frantic and wild, his terror flooding me. I grabbed his wrist with blood-slick fingers, forcing the words past the pain. "Finish it."
Kade staggered, his body unraveling, ichor pouring like rivers. His silver eyes fractured like broken glass, but he still grinned, a ruin of teeth jagged and sharp.
"You think you've won?" His voice was a rasp, half-human, half-monster. "You've only begun to fall."
And then his body erupted outward.
Black shards exploded from him in a storm, tearing through stone and light, ripping the cathedral apart.
The System's voice struck, merciless and final.
[ Rival Evolution Complete. ]
[ Aberration Born. ]
And the world cracked open.