CRACK—

  Smoke rose the wrong way, pouring back into the sky.

  The ceiling beam snapped, the fire reversing, splinters flying backward into place.

  Flames folded into themselves.

  Ash became wood.

  Wood became walls.

  He was back there again.

  Brock staggered through the doorway, blood dark at his ribs.

  He caught Lior’s eyes and tried to smile, his breath thin—the sound echoing like it had been trapped inside stone.

  “You are the light…”

  The last word stretched and kept stretching, vibrating through the ruined house.

  You are the light. You are the light. You are—

  “No—” Lior reached, but the scene lurched as if the world tugged the reel in reverse.

  The ceiling beam righted itself.

  Then it wasn’t right at all.

  Anya lay under it, eyes open and glassy.

  She shouldn’t be speaking.

  She did anyway.

  “You weren’t strong enough to save me.”

  Lior’s throat locked. No. Anya—I—

  Her face drifted away like smoke being pulled by a tide.

  The world snapped to the back of the van, rain beading on steel.

  Kalu sagged in Lior’s arms, a neat hole at the temple. The warmth leaving.

  “You couldn’t protect me.”

  “I tried,” Lior whispered. I tried. I tried—I tried—

  The rain stopped.

  Silence pressed in.

  Bodies appeared in a broken circle around him—Ayasha, Cael, Rei, Carter, Titan, others—blood on their collars, eyes dim, skin ash-pale.

  “You can’t protect us,” they said together. “You’re too weak.”

  Lior shook his head.

  “Stop.”

  “Please stop.”

  “Stop!”

  A new sound walked into the hush.

  CLINK!

  The sound of a revolver spinning.

  Trigger strolled out of the smoke, left hand twirling the cylinder like it was a toy, his right hand palming a single red round, aura bleeding heat along his arms like fresh-cut iron.

  “It’s only a matter of time,” he drawled, brim low over his eyes. “Before I take the rest.”

  The cylinder snapped home.

  BANG!

  Rei folded like a cut line.

  “Rei!” Lior lurched forward.

  BANG!

  Carter’s body jerked and crumpled.

  Lior’s scream tore his throat raw.

  “No!”

  A gloved hand tapped the rim of a monocle.

  Polished shoes clicked over stone.

  Then Gallows stepped out—posture pristine, blade angled, impossibly clean in a filthy world.

  His voice rolled like a lecture hall turned gallows yard.

  “My, my. How consistent you are. They survived so much until you entered the equation.”

  He smiled without warmth.

  “The common denominator, dear boy—is you.”

  A deep violet aura flared across his body, streaked with veins of cold silver.

  The air rippled faintly, arcs shimmering over his skin like glass bending under invisible weight.

  He lifted the obdurate blade—its edge catching the dim light like liquid glass.

  Steel whispered.

  SHFF!

  Titan staggered.

  A narrow line opened at the center of his chest.

  He dropped to one knee, then collapsed fully.

  “Stop,” Lior rasped.

  “Take me. Not them. Take me.”

  The light thinned to a corridor.

  A shape stood at its far end—only a silhouette, cut out of night.

  Two crimson eyes opened in that dark like a verdict.

  The figure’s footsteps made no sound.

  Its voice seemed to overlap itself—one tone human, one not.

  Lior took a step back before he knew he’d moved.

  “You’re nothing without their shield,” the shadow said, voice cool as winter glass.

  “And for them, you bring only death.”

  Lior turned.

  “Ayasha—Cael—”

  They were there, reaching for him.

  “Lior!”

  Their voices hit him like home.

  He ran—he ran because he had to be faster this time, had to be enough—but halfway to them, their irises bled crimson.

  The color flooded from the pupil outward, slow and cruel.

  He stopped so hard his knees jolted.

  Breath gone.

  He bumped into someone behind him and spun.

  “Thank God—Titan—”

  Titan lifted his head.

  Crimson eyes watched Lior from a face that should have been safe.

  Lior staggered back.

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  The circle around him closed.

  Every face he loved turned toward him.

  Every gaze went crimson.

  The ring tightened, silent and sure, until their breathing was all the air left.

  “Lior,” they said. One voice. Many mouths.

  “Lior.”

  “Lior.”

  LIOR—WAKE UP!

  He jerked upright, sheets sticking to his back.

  The room swam, then steadied into gray morning.

  Ayasha’s palms hovered an inch from his shoulders, as if she’d just decided not to shake him.

  Cael crouched beside the bed, glasses fogged at the edges like he’d run here.

  Lior’s stare went to Cael’s eyes first. He couldn’t help it.

  He waited for the red.

  Green.

  Calm.

  Human.

  He forced a breath in, then another.

  “You okay?” Cael asked, voice low.

  “You were yelling—Brock, Anya, Kalu…”

  Ayasha’s mouth was a tight line.

  “You were fighting in your sleep.”

  Lior swallowed.

  His throat tasted like smoke that didn’t exist.

  It was just a dream, he told himself.

  The lie thudded in his chest.

  He looked down at his hands.

  They were shaking.

  “It’s nothing — just a dream.”

  Neither of them believed him.

  He didn’t, either.

  He opened his mouth.

  Then let it close again.

  This is mine to carry.

  ?

  The Training Hall thrummed with morning discipline.

  Dozens of cadets drilled in separate rings—Niches flaring, instructors barking—but in the center, all eyes drifted now and then to Team Edge.

  They had always been the standard: motion without wasted sound, precision without pride.

  Until today.

  Captain Kaito stood beside the boundary line, coat still, voice sharper than air.

  “Formation Delta. On my mark.”

  Sync inhaled once, the faint blue ripples of his Neural Sync spreading through the air like invisible sonar.

  Mirage steadied her stance, her outline shimmering faintly—ready to phase on cue.

  Valor rolled his shoulders, aura pulsing red-blue under his skin, breath short and hot.

  “Start.”

  They launched.

  For a moment, they were poetry—shared rhythm, phase feints, and detonating muscle surges moving as one.

  Then Valor surged early.

  Mirage, mid-phase, reappeared half a meter off rhythm.

  Sync’s focus flickered—the pulse pattern in his mind collapsing out of rhythm, feedback snapping through his nerves like static.

  A shockwave cracked through the chamber—

  FWOOOM!

  Mirage stumbled out of the distortion, eyes wide.

  “You jumped too soon!”

  Valor snapped back.

  “I led the tempo! You were lagging—”

  “You don’t lead a Sync pattern!” Sync barked, frustration leaking through the precision. “You broke the link!”

  Valor’s jaw clenched.

  “Maybe your link can’t keep up with someone actually pushing it!”

  Mirage stepped closer, voice low but cutting.

  “You’re not pushing it, Valor. You’re breaking it—like always.”

  That word always detonated harder than any Niche burst.

  Valor’s aura exploded red and blue, air bending around him.

  Mirage’s shimmer answered, body half-phased—one eye visible through a veil of distortion.

  Sync’s pulse field rippled between them, arcs of energy circling like warning rings.

  Across the hall, training slowed.

  Snapback’s team stopped first.

  Team Null followed—heads turning toward the sound of the perfect squad coming apart.

  Even Kaito’s shadow felt heavier.

  “ENOUGH.”

  The word froze the room.

  Every Niche died at once—like someone cut power to the world.

  Kaito walked forward through the haze.

  There was no rage in his voice. His pace stayed steady.

  Just a man whose authority was forged on silence.

  “This hall is sacred,” he said, tone colder than steel. “It exists for refinement—not pride.”

  His eyes moved from Mirage, to Sync, to Valor.

  “You’ve turned discipline into noise. And worse—you’ve done it before witnesses.”

  Not a soul in the building breathed.

  “You will leave this hall until you remember what it means to be worthy of it.”

  He paused at Valor—the one still trembling, aura faintly bleeding at the edges.

  “You shame not the form, but the name. Edge was meant for precision—not fracture.”

  Dismissed.

  The word landed like judgment.

  Mirage phased backward, vanishing before her footsteps began.

  Sync turned away, pulse still faintly thrumming under his skin.

  Valor stayed until Kaito’s gaze broke him completely—then walked out, jaw tight, eyes burning.

  As the three left, whispers rippled through the watching cadets.

  The team they’d all once envied had just fallen out of sync.

  Kaito remained, eyes locked on the training ground as if his team was still in motion.

  “A blade that forgets alignment,” he murmured, “cuts its own hand first.”

  ——-

  Training had ended, and teams had dispersed to their rooms before lunch.

  The door swung open to Team Pulse’s dorm.

  Perma, drained from drills, headed straight for the nearest bed — and dropped onto it without thinking.

  It was Speedy’s.

  Speedy reacted instantly.

  “Whoa—hey—hey—hey—wait—”

  He rushed over, arms out, hands hovering like she’d set off an alarm.

  Perma stood again, expression flat, used to this reaction—but only here.

  Only in this room.

  The sheet was barely wrinkled where she’d sat.

  Speedy smoothed it.

  Once.

  Twice.

  Four times.

  Hands careful.

  Precise.

  “There,” he said, voice bright. Too bright. “Perfect.”

  Perma and Blueprint exchanged a look.

  Blueprint sat back in his chair, elbows braced on his knees, voice low.

  “I don’t get it. You don’t slow down anywhere else… but here you do.”

  Perma didn’t cushion the question.

  “Why do you go from cartoon to soldier the second we walk in here?”

  Speedy’s smile flicked on — fast, practiced.

  “Easy. I’m adaptable.”

  Perma didn’t return the smile.

  “I wish you would adapt out there. During trials. During fights.”

  Speedy’s grin held.

  Then tightened.

  His hand drifted toward the lamp.

  The warm dorm light caught the glass.

  The shine shifted.

  Soft glow becoming sharp reflection.

  White.

  Cold.

  Hard.

  Speedy’s fingers stopped just short of touching it.

  Not hesitation.

  Memory.

  ?

  Harsh white lights glared overhead, reflecting against concrete floors painted to look clean.

  The Potestas facility for niche subjects always smelled like metal and bleach.

  A boy—maybe six—stood beside his bunk with his chest puffed, hands locked behind his back the way he had practiced.

  His smile was bright. Too bright.

  Trying so hard to shine in a place that killed brightness.

  “All clean, sir! Just like the drills! Perfect corners!”

  The Potestas soldier walked the room slowly.

  Bootsteps heavy.

  Uniform crisp.

  Face unreadable.

  Sheets flat.

  Pillow precise.

  Shoes aligned.

  He stopped at the lamp on the nightstand.

  Perfectly centered.

  Perfect… enough.

  Speedy kept smiling.

  He needed the smile.

  Smiling meant he was useful.

  Smiling meant maybe today wouldn’t hurt.

  The soldier reached out—no expression, no sound—and turned the lamp just slightly.

  Just enough to break the line.

  He waited until Speedy saw it.

  Then looked down at him.

  “Perfect huh?”

  Speedy blinked.

  “But—I didn’t—”

  The kick landed center-chest.

  Speedy hit the floor hard, small body folding against cold concrete.

  The soldier crouched, his voice low and calm—almost gentle.

  “You think noise makes you worth keeping?”

  “You think that smile hides what you are?”

  Speedy tried not to cry.

  Breath hitched in his throat.

  The soldiers beating continued for the next 5 minutes.

  “We don’t allow noise in Potestas.

  And we don’t keep failures.”

  With one last hit landing on Speedy’s already bruised and bloodied face—

  —The soldier stood.

  Walked out.

  No more words.

  Speedy lay where he had fallen.

  Still.

  Quiet.

  Then he got up.

  He straightened the lamp.

  And smiled at it.

  “Perfect.”

  ?

  Back in the dorm, Speedy fixed the lamp on the stand.

  By instinct.

  By training.

  By memory.

  It was already perfect.

  He straightened it anyway.

  Speedy blinked once.

  Perfect.

  Then his whole body snapped back into motion like a spring releasing.

  CLAP!

  “ALRIIIIIGHT, TEAM PULSE! MISSION: LUNCH!”

  Blueprint closed his eyes.

  Perma groaned.

  Speedy was already pointing dramatically at the door.

  “To the cafeteria, my comrades! Where the laaaadiessss wait in despair, longing for a hero to save them from boredom! Fear not—”

  Perma shoved him toward the hallway.

  “Walk. Before I end you.”

  Blueprint opened the door, tired already.

  “Lunch it is I guess.”

  Speedy shot finger guns on the way out.

  “Team Pulse. Unstoppable. Unbreakable. And devastatingly attractive.”

  Perma didn’t answer.

  She just punched his shoulder on the way past.

  He laughed.

  Loud.

  Alive.

  Behind them, the lamp remained perfectly straight.

  ?

  As the cadets filtered into the cafeteria below, laughter and plates clattering filled the hall, the upper floors of Veritas were quiet.

  Above them, where the lights were dimmer and voices carried weight, another meeting was already beginning.

  The President stood before the wall of screens, each feed reflecting green-blue light across her face. Red satellite bands pulsed over continents. Potestas frequencies spiked and dipped. None of it was steady. None of it was good.

  She didn’t turn when the door opened.

  She didn’t need to.

  The soft, rhythmic tap of a cane crossed the floor.

  “Hiroshi.”

  Her voice was composed steel.

  Hiroshi Gozan came to a stop a few paces behind her. Cane angled lightly in his right hand. Posture relaxed, like the world only ever moved at the pace he allowed.

  “Seraphina.”

  She exhaled once.

  Her shoulders dropped a fraction.

  “You called for me,” he said.

  She nodded, still watching the screens.

  “Yes.”

  Silence.

  But not empty.

  She spoke again, voice quieter.

  “…Why did you turn down this Director’s position, Hiroshi?”

  He smiled, the kind that warmed without softening.

  “Seraphina, I know you didn’t bring me here to ask about that. You have filled that seat, and are much more qualified then I am to hold that position. And we both know I was never much for desks.”

  Her eyes closed—not in annoyance. In acknowledgment.

  “They didn’t believe a woman could do this position. You changed their minds.”

  Hiroshi’s lips curled upward into a soft smile.

  She finally turned to face him.

  Her expression—strong, always—had a flicker of something else beneath.

  Burden.

  “I asked for you first,” she said, “because you have been here the longest. Longer than any of us standing now. You have seen Veritas through the years as our enemies have tried to erase us.”

  Hiroshi leaned slightly on the cane, but his gaze was steady.

  “And now you are the one leading us.”

  Her breath shook.

  Barely.

  “Hiroshi…” she began, voice low. “I fear the world is nearing a point of no return. Potestas has made moves I can no longer read ahead of. Their influence… their reach… the way they move through governments now—”

  She looked back to the screens.

  “I believe what happens next will not only decide the future of Veritas… but the fate of the world itself. If we misstep even once… Potestas will gain a position we may never recover from.”

  Her voice thinned.

  Hiroshi’s answer came without rush. Without fear.

  “That is why you brought me.”

  Her eyes lifted to his.

  “Yes.”

  Hiroshi smiled—soft, knowing, unshakable.

  His gaze softened—not with pity, but with remembrance.

  “Seraphina,” he said, voice steady, “you were placed in this position because you see the board clearer than any of us. If the world shifts again, you are the only one I would trust to shape it.”

  A small breath escaped her chest—quiet, almost invisible.

  He tapped the cane once.

  Then he turned, steps slow and measured as he headed for the door.

  “I’ll follow you every step of the way.”

  The door eased halfway closed behind him.

  Seraphina’s gaze lowered, her voice barely more than breath.

  “…You always have.”

  There are battles that begin long before the first strike is ever thrown.

  Fought in thought, in memory, in the quiet places no one else can see.

  And in days like these—when laughter still filled the halls and routines still held—no one realized how precious the stillness truly was.

  Not yet.

  Because no one ever knows they are in the last calm until it’s gone.

  End of Chapter 39