Part III — The Goddess and the Shadow
He stood at the river's edge when she came again.
The Moon hung low, bruised and red, as though the world itself bled light.
Her reflection rippled across the water — the Moon Goddess, pale and eternal, eyes colder than prophecy.
"Kai," she said, voice echoing through every current. "Do you know what you've done?"
He didn't bow this time.
"I saved one of mine."
"You endangered the balance of worlds."
"Balance?" He laughed softly. "You call oppression balance?"
She looked at him — not with anger, but something deeper. Regret.
"When I made you, I feared what I was. You've become what I hid from."
The river's surface trembled between them — divine reflection meeting mortal shadow.
"Then maybe," he whispered, "you should've loved what you feared."
For the first time, she hesitated. The goddess's light dimmed — a flicker of humanity breaking through the divine mask.
"You are my son," she said finally. "My mistake… and my hope."
He stepped closer, the water parting beneath his feet, eyes glowing like split suns.
"Then watch, Mother. Watch what your mistake becomes."
The moon darkened — an eclipse blooming in slow motion.
When light returned, she was gone.
But the world wasn't quiet anymore.
Every being who'd ever been cast out — every hybrid, every orphan of faith — felt it: a pulse, calling them north, toward the sound.
Toward him.
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> "We don't rise to destroy gods.
We rise to remind them
what they were afraid to feel."
— Echo, during the Eclipse Broadcast