The silence after the throne shattered felt like a breath held too long—like the world itself was waiting for the next heartbeat to break the quiet.
Kael stood over the cracked jade, Threadcutter humming low against his palm. The sword no longer screamed rage; it thrummed with a strange calm—an echo of a promise kept, or maybe a warning not yet spoken.
Juno knelt, tracing the fractures. "That throne wasn't just a seat of power. It was a cage." His voice was rough with awe. "Binding Zeyrox and anyone who dared claim it."
Rin rubbed her arms, eyes sharp. "So, the throne fed on the sixth tether's power… turned strength into chains."
Mace spat on the ground. "And it wanted Kael next. Like a beast hunting fresh meat."
Kael's gaze drifted upward, to the violet thread twisting faintly in his skin. It pulsed slower now, but something deeper churned beneath it—a shadow tangled in light.
"Zeyrox wasn't the enemy," Kael murmured. "He was just another prisoner."
Juno nodded. "A prisoner who carries centuries of war and betrayal. A tether broken by rulers afraid of what he represented."
Kael's mind reeled with the visions: battles lost and won, gods severed by the very blade he now carried. The weight of that legacy wasn't a crown—it was a warning.
He looked at Threadcutter, its edge gleaming cold. "If Zeyrox was cast out for his power, what does that make me?"
Rin stepped closer, voice low but fierce. "It makes you the one who decides how that power's used."
Mace cracked his knuckles, smirking. "Or the one who breaks the cycle."
The wind outside the shattered vault whispered, carrying voices just out of reach. Echoes of other thrones, other tethers, and other wars waiting to wake.
Kael tightened his grip on Threadcutter.
The battle wasn't over.
It was only just beginning.