The Silver-Wing screamed through a narrow gap between two derelict freighter hulls, the friction of the near-miss sending a shower of sparks cascading across the new Null-Iron plating. Behind them, the Crimson Typhoon loomed like a blood-soaked moon, its massive harpoons snapping at their wake.
"Kaelen! The pocket! Now!" Jax roared from the galley hatch. He was braced against the doorframe, clutching a pressurized canister the size of a beer keg, labeled with a skull and a crossed fork and knife.
Kaelen didn't ask questions. He leaned over the stern railing, his indigo veins bulging against his skin. He plunged his glass hilt into the air behind the rudder.
"Void-Style: Hollow Wake!"
He didn't just erase friction; he carved a literal tunnel of "nothing" into the atmosphere. The air rushed in to fill the hole, creating a violent, swirling vacuum directly behind their engines.
"Dinner is served, you vultures!" Jax yelled. He kicked the valve on the canister.
A pressurized jet of Super-Heated Ghost-Pepper Resin exploded into Kaelen's vacuum. Because there was no air resistance to slow it down, the spice-cloud didn't dissipate—it expanded exponentially, pulled forward by the Silver-Wing's wake and then instantly whipped into a blinding, orange-red vortex by the returning air pressure.
The pirate skiffs closest to them were swallowed instantly. Through the comms, Kaelen heard the muffled screams of men whose eyes, lungs, and skin had just been hit by a concentrated dose of liquid fire.
"I can't see!" a pirate shrieked. "The air is burning! It's burning!"
Three skiffs collided in the chaos, spiraling down into the Miasma like flaming leaves. But the Crimson Typhoon was too large to be stopped by a mere smokescreen. It plowed through the orange mist, its hull coated in the stinging resin.
Suddenly, a grappling hook—made of that same corrosive green acid-steel—slammed into the Silver-Wing's deck.
Captain Vesper didn't wait for her crew. She used the tension of the cable to launch herself across the gap. She landed on the railing with the grace of a predatory bird, her iridescent scales shimmering through the spice-mist. She was wearing a specialized breather mask, her eyes burning with a cold, emerald fury.
"That was a waste of perfectly good seasoning, Chef," she hissed, her acid-dripping saber humming as she leveled it at Kaelen's heart.
"Vesper," Kaelen said, his Void-blade flickering. "You're a long way from your hunting grounds."
"The whole sky is my hunting ground," she retorted. She lunged.
The duel was a blur of emerald and indigo. Vesper fought with a "Whirlwind Style"—her blade didn't just swing; it created its own localized currents, pulling Kaelen toward her strikes. Every time their blades met, a hiss of acid smoke rose as her corrosive energy tried to eat through Kaelen's vacuum-blade.
"You're fast, Crow," Vesper taunted, her saber dancing around his guard. "But you're leaking life-force. I can smell the rot in your chest."
She swung a wide, horizontal arc. Kaelen prepared to use his new Singularity Intake, but Vesper shifted mid-motion. She kicked a hidden lever on her saber's hilt, and the blade shattered into a dozen segments connected by a glowing green wire.
The "Snake-Sword" wrapped around Kaelen's glass hilt, locking his weapon.
"Got you," she whispered.
She pulled him close, her free hand drawing a flintlock pistol loaded with Null-Iron pellets. At this range, even his Void-power wouldn't save him.
"Nova!" Lyra's voice screamed from the helm. "The starboard engine is seizing!"
But Nova wasn't looking at the engine. She was looking at Vesper. The girl walked toward the duel, her footsteps silent. She didn't look afraid; she looked... curious.
"You have a hole in your heart," Nova said to the pirate captain. Her voice cut through the sound of the wind like a diamond through glass. "You hunt because you are trying to fill a space that cannot be filled with gold."
Vesper flinched. For a fraction of a second, her emerald eyes wavered. "Shut up, brat!"
That second was all Kaelen needed.
"Void-Style: Zero-Friction Burst!"
He didn't move his body; he erased the friction between the snake-sword's wire and his own blade. The acid-steel slid off the glass hilt as if it were coated in oil. Kaelen dropped low, swept Vesper's legs, and slammed his glowing palm into the deck.
The shockwave didn't hit Vesper—it hit the grappling cable still connecting the two ships.
The cable shattered. The sudden release of tension sent Vesper flying backward toward the edge of the ship. She caught the railing with one hand, dangling over the thousand-foot drop into Scrap-City's lower slums.
"Kaelen! Finish it!" Jax yelled, emerging from the galley with a heavy iron cleaver.
Kaelen stood over her, his indigo glow fading, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He looked at Vesper, then at Nova.
"We're not pirates," Kaelen said, his voice cold. He stepped on the grappling hook, snapping it off the wood. "And we're not the Consensus. Go back to your Gale, Vesper. Tell them the sky is changing."
He kicked her hand off the railing.
Vesper fell, but she didn't hit the ground. A pirate skiff dived out of the mist, catching her mid-air. She looked up at the Silver-Wing as it pulled away, her mask falling off to reveal a face twisted in a mixture of rage and something that looked dangerously like respect.
"Lyra! Full burn!" Kaelen collapsed against the mast. "Get us to the Iron Lung. Before I actually die of exhaustion."
"Already on it," Lyra replied, her voice steady. "We've cleared the city limits. Heading for the high-pressure currents. Jax, get back here—I need you to manually override the Aether-valves. We're going deep."
As the Silver-Wing angled its nose toward the dark, heavy clouds of the lower atmosphere, Nova sat beside Kaelen. She placed a cool hand on his glowing chest.
"The hole is getting larger, Kaelen," she whispered.
"I know, kid," Kaelen smiled weakly. "Just make sure we get to that Cathedral before it finishes the job."