The horizon cracked open as the Shardspire came into view—an obsidian spire that pierced the sky like a dagger through heaven itself.
It was ancient. Crooked. Covered in veins of glowing crystal and jagged rune scars that pulsed with forgotten energy.
Kai stood at the ridge overlooking it, wind pressing against his cloak.
Ayaka and Ren joined him, their gazes heavy.
"It's beautiful," Ayaka whispered. "And cursed."
Kai nodded. "It's said the sky once fell here. That the first cultivators who defied the heavens bled their truth into its stones."
Ren scanned the area. "Then it's not just a spire. It's a grave."
A low hum traveled through the air—distant, but not faint.
Kai closed his eyes.
He heard it again.
> "He comes. The boy who bore the Root. The Heaven-Breaker… must fall."
Dozens of voices. Then hundreds.
From the forests. The skies. The ruins beyond the stone cliffs.
Figures were gathering. Cultivators cloaked in madness. Clanless wanderers. Broken sects reformed in vengeance.
They had come.
For the seed. For power. For Kai.
Ayaka drew her blade. "We're surrounded."
Kai breathed in deeply, then smiled.
"No. They are."
The orb floated above his hand once more, pulsing as roots of light cracked the ground beneath his feet. The mountain itself stirred—awake, aware, ready.
This time, the war wasn't to survive. It was to shape the future.
And Kai was done running from destiny.