The stairwell quakes as we rise, but it's not from collapse—it's from *movement.* The Vault's power has shifted. Awakened. And now, it walks with us.
We breach the surface into the plaza. The sky is low and gray, streaked with ash and silent lightning. The air tastes burnt.
The rival stands in the center, calm, surrounded by Threadless bound in bone-thread and shadow. His gaze meets mine.
No words this time.
Just war.
I don't wait.
The stormlight around me coils, then lashes forward in a wave. The first three puppets vanish, unmade by memory and force.
Lira follows through the opening, her blade humming. Kett's threads snap and twist, catching two more. Branvel burns a path wide enough for Sov and Wren to rush through.
The rival doesn't move.
But his threads do.
They slither across the stone like roots, aiming for the seal-holders.
"Hold the formation!" I shout.
Voul slams his palms down, anchoring us in place with shifting sigils. Nera sings low and terrible. Fenn raises a barrier of light, and Jeral steps forward to strike—
—But a black thread pierces his shoulder.
He stumbles.
I reach him too late. The rival tugs the thread, dragging Jeral toward the edge of the plaza.
Wren reacts first. She dives forward, dagger flashing, and severs the line.
Jeral drops. Breathing. Barely.
"Pull him back!" I yell.
Sov grabs him, dragging him behind Voul's barrier. The seal wavers, but Voul roars and plants it again.
We return fire.
Kett sends her threads directly at the rival now—twelve, then twenty, then more. I layer stormlight behind them, each a burning memory from the Vault. Every time he cuts one, another takes its place.
He's fast.
But *we're* unrelenting.
The city begins to pulse beneath our feet. The ancient energy from the Vault rises, spreading through the stone, the air, the *threads.*
The rival tries to pull them.
They pull *back.*
He stumbles.
That's all Lira needs.
She dives in, blade slicing through his cloak. It tears—not bone this time, but something thinner. Woven.
His disguise breaks.
And beneath it—
He wears no face at all.
Just a blank, bone-carved surface where identity should be.
A mockery.
A warning.
And now, a *target.*
I raise my hand.
The ring flares.
Vellidra's silence behind me.
My truth in front.
"Unmake him," I say.
And the city answers.