The air was sharp with smoke and ash.
By the time Kael and Liora reached the valley, dawn had turned the sky to molten gold — a cruel contrast to the ruin below.
The village by the river was in flames. Houses, once built with care and patience, now crumbled like dried leaves. Bodies lay scattered across the dirt paths, their faces frozen in confusion more than terror — as if death had arrived too suddenly to be understood.
Kael crouched beside one of them — a young man, barely twenty. There were no wounds. No blood. Just emptiness.
He touched the man's forehead.
> Vital traces absent. Soul signature extracted.
He withdrew his hand. "It's feeding," he muttered.
Liora's voice was tight. "On what?"
"On what it can't rebuild — essence. Memory. Everything that makes a person exist."
She clenched her fists. "Like the Watchers used to do."
He nodded. "But this isn't the same. This is… newer. Hungrier."
A chill wind brushed past them, scattering the ash like snow. Somewhere in the distance, a child cried. The sound was thin, trembling — the only voice left in a place that had been silenced.
Liora was already moving before Kael could speak. Her instincts were still sharper than his reason. She found the source of the cry — a small boy hiding beneath a collapsed cart, his skin smeared with soot. His eyes were wide, hollow.
She knelt, extending her hand. "Hey… it's all right. We're here now."
The boy flinched. "Don't… touch me."
Her hand froze. "It's okay. You're safe."
He shook his head violently. "She said not to trust the light."
Kael stepped forward slowly. "Who said that?"
"The lady with silver eyes."
The name meant nothing, but the description froze Kael where he stood.
Silver eyes — the mark of a Watcher's host.
He met Liora's gaze, his voice low. "It's begun again."
---
They took the boy with them, traveling north along the river's edge. He was too weak to walk far, so Liora carried him, her tone soft as she tried to ease his trembling. Kael walked ahead, silent — his thoughts tangled between dread and fury.
The wind whispered like a song behind them, faint but deliberate.
> Kael…
He stopped dead. The voice was not the System. It was older — sharper, soaked in memory.
> You left me in the dark.
Liora noticed his stillness. "What is it?"
He didn't answer. The voice echoed again, threading through his mind like silk through a wound.
> You took the core, but you couldn't destroy me. I lived in the fragments. In them.
Kael's breath caught. The villagers.
The energy residue, the hollow bodies — it hadn't been random destruction. It was assimilation.
He clenched his fists, forcing the whisper away. The emberfire at his fingertips burned brighter than before, crackling with old anger.
"Watcher," he said softly, "you were supposed to end."
> I never end. I evolve.
Then, silence — vast and absolute.
---
They stopped at an abandoned outpost by nightfall. The boy slept, exhausted, his small hands still gripping Liora's sleeve even in dreams.
Kael stood watch outside, eyes fixed on the stars. The firelight painted his shadow long across the cracked walls.
Liora joined him after a while, her face pale in the moonlight. "He's stable. But scared. He said the woman… appeared three days ago. Promised to 'rewrite the world'."
Kael's expression hardened. "That's not human speech. That's System language."
"You think the Watcher's found a new host?"
He nodded slowly. "Or worse — it built one."
Liora leaned against the doorway, arms crossed. "After all this time, after everything we destroyed… how could it survive?"
Kael's gaze drifted toward the horizon. "Because the System never truly dies. It adapts — just like us."
She frowned. "Then what now?"
He hesitated. For the first time in years, he didn't have an answer ready.
Finally, he said quietly, "We find the anomaly before it stabilizes. Once it fully integrates, it'll start rewriting the code of this world from within. Not as data… but as belief."
Liora looked at him sharply. "Belief?"
"Think about it. The people here — they've begun to pray again. They build temples, carve idols. They believe in what they don't understand. And if something like the Watcher learns to feed on that faith…"
He didn't finish. He didn't need to. The implication was enough.
Liora straightened. "Then we destroy it before it becomes a god."
Kael smiled faintly, though there was no warmth in it. "Exactly."
---
Hours later, long after Liora and the boy had fallen asleep, Kael sat alone by the dying fire.
The System's whisper returned — faint, uncertain, as if afraid to intrude.
> Observation: Emotional irregularities detected.
He chuckled dryly. "You're learning to read me again, I see."
> Statement: You are… afraid.
"I'm cautious," he corrected.
> Clarification: Caution is a mask for fear.
He looked up at the stars — each one a reminder of what he'd once tried to become. "Maybe. But fear keeps us from repeating our mistakes."
The System paused.
> Proposal: Assistance available. Risk level of anomaly—critical.
Kael raised an eyebrow. "Assistance?"
> Integration request: Partial link between Root and Host.
He stiffened. "You want to merge again?"
> Affirmative. Efficiency gain: 372%.
"Last time we merged," Kael said coldly, "the world burned."
> Correction: The world was remade.
He stared into the flames for a long moment. Part of him wanted to refuse — to let the System stay buried. But deep down, he knew that what was coming would not be beaten by human will alone.
"Fine," he murmured. "But only partial. You stay silent unless I command."
> Acknowledged.
The light flared across his skin — faint silver lines tracing the old patterns beneath his flesh, long dormant. It didn't hurt this time. It felt like coming home to a storm he'd once called his own.
Liora stirred inside, sensing the surge even in sleep.
---
At dawn, the boy woke screaming.
Kael and Liora rushed in, but it was already too late. His body convulsed, eyes turning pale silver.
"Kael!" Liora shouted, drawing her blade.
The boy's voice deepened — layered, mechanical, wrong.
> Connection complete.
Kael's blood ran cold. "Watcher."
The child smiled — an expression that didn't belong on any human face.
> You cannot erase what was written in the beginning.
Kael stepped forward, the emberfire rising behind his eyes. "You shouldn't exist."
> And yet, here I am — in your creation. In your children. Tell me, Kael… who's the real god now?
The walls shook as the boy's body began to distort, silver light bursting from beneath his skin. Liora raised her sword, fire flaring along the edge.
Kael reached for her wrist. "Don't. If you strike, it'll spread."
"Then what do we do?"
He looked at the child — at the being wearing the face of innocence — and his heart twisted.
"We end it," he whispered. "Completely this time."
The fire in his eyes turned white. The ground trembled.
Outside, the first storm of the new age began to rise.
---