The city never truly slept, but tonight it felt like it was holding its breath. Eren stood on the balcony of the safehouse, the glow of streetlamps below spilling into the fog like melted gold. His reflection in the cracked glass door looked foreign, more like a specter than a man. The news channels had gone silent, broadcasting only carefully curated images of calm cityscapes while every major government in the world scrambled in the dark.
He lit a cigarette he didn't need and exhaled slowly, watching the smoke drift into the night. The voice was back, faint, threading through the static in his head like whispers stitched into radio waves. They're moving, Eren. They're coming for you.
He wasn't sure anymore if it was the same presence that had haunted him since the Bloom, or if it was something new—something born from the bleed between realities. The distinction didn't matter. What mattered was that it was right.
Across the street, a black van idled longer than it should have. Its engine barely hummed, but Eren's skin prickled. They were here. CIA, maybe, or something even deeper. He flicked the cigarette over the railing and turned back inside.
The room was dim, only a desk lamp buzzing faintly. Maps lay spread across the table—circles drawn around places where "anomalies" had flared in the last two weeks: Mumbai, Berlin, São Paulo, Lagos. Each one coincided with whispers of disappearances, footage erased from cameras, families swearing loved ones had been erased rather than taken.
And now, his name was beginning to circulate in the classified cables. Asset? Threat? Variable? Nobody knew where to place him, which made him the most dangerous piece on the board.
The door clicked. Bell entered silently, her boots leaving wet prints on the floor. She'd been tailing the van. "Three inside," she said simply. "Two more around the block. Military posture, but no flags. They're waiting."
Eren nodded. "They won't wait long."
Bell's smirk was sharp, wolfish. "Then let's not disappoint."
But before either of them could act, the room pulsed. The desk lamp flickered wildly, shadows lashing across the walls like broken shutters in a storm. The maps fluttered as though an unseen wind had cut straight through the building. For a heartbeat, Eren saw another version of the room layered over this one—a darker twin where the walls bled black veins, where something vast pressed against the edges of reality, watching.
And then it was gone.
Bell's hand hovered near her blade, her face pale. "It's bleeding through more often."
Eren clenched his fists. "And the world can't ignore it much longer."
A sound broke the tension—boots on stairs. Heavy, disciplined. The van wasn't waiting anymore.
Bell moved to the shadows, blade drawn. Eren stayed in the light, facing the door as it burst open. Black-clad operatives stormed in, weapons trained. Their faces were hidden, but the precision of their movement screamed elite. The leader's voice was calm, cold.
"Eren Vale. By order of the International Security Accord, you're coming with us."
Eren's laugh was low, bitter. "You think you can contain this?"
The lights shattered at once. Darkness swallowed the room, and with it came the voice—louder, clearer, everywhere at once. Choose, Eren. Stay bound to their chains… or open the door.
He felt the air split, reality tearing at the seams just behind him. A faint glow seeped through, like a sunrise glimpsed through fractured glass. The operatives cursed, fumbling with their visors. Bell's eyes locked on his, daring him to move, to decide.
And for the first time, Eren wanted to.
He stepped back. The glow intensified, humming with a power that felt alive, ancient, and utterly wrong. The leader raised his rifle—too slow. Eren's hand stretched into the light, and the world convulsed.
The floor cracked. The operatives screamed. Bell's blade sang in the chaos.
And then, silence.
When Eren opened his eyes, half the room was gone—burned away into a void that writhed and pulsed as though it was breathing. The operatives were nowhere. Only Bell remained, standing rigid, her blade trembling in her grip as she stared at him.
"You opened it," she whispered.
Eren turned, the glow still clinging to his skin like embers. For the first time, the voice wasn't just in his head. It was in the room. It was everywhere.
This is only the beginning.
The sound of helicopters roared overhead, searchlights sweeping across the street. Governments weren't the only ones watching anymore. The entire world had just felt the rupture.
And somewhere, in some locked war room in Washington, Beijing, Moscow, New Delhi, alarms screamed red. Files marked classified beyond top secret were dragged out of vaults, men and women who thought themselves untouchable suddenly pale with fear.
Because the bleed wasn't hidden anymore.
And Eren Vale had just torn it wide open.