The Debt Auction hadn't ended.It had echoed.
For three nights after leaving the Owed Layer, Kairos couldn't sleep. Not because of nightmares—but because of the silence that followed. An eerie, deliberate stillness that seemed to settle across the Unyielding Trust, as if even the ship itself were afraid of something unseen.
The Sovereign Ledger flickered with residual energy.
And on the last night, a single phrase appeared across its mirrored surface.
"You have seen what you were not meant to.""Now you are marked."
No origin. No trace. No known encryption signature.
Just five words, and the chilling certainty that the Debt God's warning had only scratched the surface.
The Mark Appears
It started with whispers.
Crew members reported strange dreams—visions of unwritten contracts, of marketplaces that spoke in screams, and doorways that didn't lead to anywhere, but forgotten things.
