Ark 02

The alley was a tomb of jagged synth-stone and twisted rebar, reeking of ozone and the coppery tang of old blood. The glorious, burning vista of Eidolon was behind them, replaced by these choking, close-quarter ruins. Amani, Nia, and Adil moved in a tight, silent formation, the academy’s polished floors a distant memory under their boots. The distant screams and staccato bursts of energy fire were their only map.

They rounded a collapsed transit hub, and the world erupted into shadow.

A dozen shapes peeled from the gloom. Not the swift, organized Sinshades from the academy grounds, but something… needier. Sinshades. Their forms were less defined, a swirling, viscous darkness that constantly shimmered with fragments of half-remembered human features—a pleading eye here, a grasping hand there. They were the freshly Turned, their corruption a desperate, hungry void. A low, collective gurgle, the sound of mud swallowing bones, filled the alley as they surged forward.

Amani’s hands came up, the ghost of his Spiraling Bullet forming at his fingertips, but his Mythcore reserves were still embers. Nia stepped forward, her own energy still flickering uncertainly after his earlier attack. Adil cursed, fumbling for a combat knife.

Before the first Sinshade could lunge, the air above them screamed.

Two intersecting slashes of pure, violent violet energy ripped through the space in a burning ‘X’. They tore through the pack of Sinkshades not with fire, but with annihilating force. The creatures didn’t just die; they unraveled, their dark matter dissipating into foul smoke with shrieks that sounded almost like relief.

Silence, heavy and sudden, fell.

“Hey. You guys alright?”

The voice was calm, almost bored. They looked up. Perched on the jagged edge of a ruined building three stories up was a girl. The wind whipped through long, vibrant purple hair. She was clad not in academy attire, but in sleek, scarred warrior armor of dark grey and violet, pauldrons etched with fading runes. In her hand, resting casually on her shoulder, was a broadsword whose blade still hummed with residual violet light.

She looked down with eyes that glowed with the same unsettling purple energy, set in a face of dark, unreadable composure.

“Who are you?” Nia demanded, her voice tight. This wasn’t a instructor. This was a predator.

The girl didn’t answer immediately. She surveyed them, her gaze lingering on Nia’s silver hair, on Amani’s battered academy gear, on Adil’s defensive stance. A faint, almost imperceptible smirk touched her lips. “Not your business,” she said finally, her voice carrying easily. “Your business is trying to survive the next five minutes. I’d suggest you move faster.”

With that, she simply stepped off the ledge. Instead of falling, she vanished in a blur of violet, reappearing on the next rooftop over, then the next, leaving only a fading afterimage and a sense of profound, unsettling strength.

“Who… was that?” Amani breathed, awestruck and unnerved.

Before anyone could answer, a new sound cut through the ruin: the thin, terrified wail of a child.

Amani’s head snapped around. Thirty meters down a side lane, a little girl in a torn nightdress stood frozen, tears cutting clean lines through the grime on her face. Oozing from a sewer grate behind her, rising like a malignant tide, was another Sinshade, its form coalescing into a distorted maw.

Instinct overrode caution. Amani was moving before he thought, his exhausted legs pumping. “Hey! Over here!” he yelled, trying to draw the thing’s attention. It ignored him, fixated on the easier prey.

He was too far. He knew it. Despair clawed at his throat.

A streak of crimson and silver shot past him like a fired round. It was a blur of polished, high-tech armor—sleek, form-fitting, with glowing azure lines pulsing across its surface. In its hand was a weapon that was the antithesis of the purple-haired warrior’s broadsword: an Energy Rapier, a core blade of condensed, humming light.

The armored figure didn’t slow. It passed between the child and the Sinshade in a nanosecond. There was a sharp, clean tzum sound, like a wire being severed. The Sinshade’s head, such as it was, toppled from its shoulders, its body dissolving before it hit the ground.

The armored figure slid to a halt, scooped the sobbing child into one arm with shocking gentleness, and in two bounding strides was back before Amani, Adil, and Nia. The visor of the helmet retracted with a soft hiss, revealing the face of a young woman with sharp, earnest features and eyes the color of warm honey. She offered the child a small, professional smile before turning to Nia.

She snapped into a flawless, fist-over-heart salute. “Master Sergeant Baerdi Nia. It is a pleasure to finally meet you in person.” Her voice was crisp, formal. “I am Private First Class Zawadi Kito, here is your Core Unit: Emberborn. I am your assigned operational support for this sector.”

The world seemed to tilt. Amani stared, his brain struggling to process. Master Sergeant?

“Nia… what is she talking about?” Amani asked, his voice barely a whisper.

Nia closed her eyes for a second, a flicker of guilt passing over her face before it was replaced by her usual resolve. “Amani, I… it’s complicated.”

“Complicated?” Adil let out a short, humorless laugh. He wasn’t looking at Nia with surprise, but with a weary resignation. “It’s not that complicated. She’s a prodigy, Amani. The military’s been grooming her since she could channel Mythcore. ‘Master Sergeant’ is a battlefield commission. They fast-track assets they can’t afford to lose.”

Nia shot Adil a sharp look. “Adil, that’s enough.”

“Why? Because I’m blowing your cover?” Adil’s usual easygoing demeanor was gone, replaced by a flat, hard tone. He looked from Nia to the watching soldier, Kato. “Or is it because you’re not the only one with secrets?”

He turned to Amani, his expression grim. “I’m not just a student, Amani. I’m an intelligence operative for the Paragon Defense Directorate. My mission was to monitor the emergence patterns of the Sinshades near academies and… supervise high-potential candidates in the shadows.” He met Nia’s gaze. “Including her. And you.”

The betrayal hit Amani like a physical blow. His best friend. His rival. Both living lies while he trained in honest desperation.

Kito, sensing the tension, interjected with calm authority. “The operational details of your assignments are not the current priority.” She gently handed the now-quieting child to a dazed-looking woman who had emerged from a hiding place. “The priority is the preservation of civilian life. Reinforcements are inbound. Until then, we hold.”

As if summoned by her words, the guttural sounds of more Sinshades echoed from several adjoining streets. Their numbers were growing, drawn by the earlier energy signatures or the scent of fear.

Nia’s jaw tightened. She reached to her belt and unclipped a compact, crystalline device—her core unit. Without ceremony, she pressed it to her forehead. “Emberborn. Ignition.”

A blinding white light enveloped her. When it faded, Nia was transformed. Where Kato’s armor was light and agile, Nia’s Emberborn was a suit of majestic, winged power. Plates of burnished gold and deep blue formed a formidable exoskeleton. From her back, swept-back energy wings hummed, and mounted on her shoulders were heavy, multi-barreled cannons—Core Batteries. The air around her crackled with immense, stabilized power, a stark contrast to the volatile aura she’d displayed in the arena.

“Cover the civilians,” Nia’s voice came through a vocal modulator, layered with harmonic power. “Kito, with me. Scatter formation.”

Kito’s visor snapped shut. “Acknowledged, Master Sergeant.”

What followed was not a fight; it was an extermination. Nia didn’t move. She appeared. One moment she was a statue of luminous power, the next she was a streak of light thirty meters away, her Core Batteries unleashing sustained volleys of solar-bright plasma that vaporized clusters of Sinshades. She moved with a terrifying, graceful economy, each blast perfectly placed, each repositioning leaving a afterimage of light.

Kato was her shadow and scalpel. While Nia was the hammer, Kato was the needle. She darted through the ruins, her core blade a flicker of deadly light, precisely dismantling any Sinshade that tried to flank or slip through Nia’s barrage. Their coordination was seamless, wordless, the product of doctrine and raw skill.

Amani could only watch, his earlier victory ash in his mouth. This was Nia unleashed. This was the chasm between a talented student and a weapon of war.

Just as the tide seemed to turn, the sky itself answered. Dozens of streaks of light descended from the cloud of smoke—more armored figures, their designs varied but all bearing the same insignia: a stylized sun breaking through a dark circle. Division: 0 Lux. The military’s elite Mythcore combat division.

They fell upon the remaining Sinshades like a meteor shower. The ruin was illuminated by a kaleidoscope of energy colors—crimson lances, amber waves, verdant pulses. In minutes, the alleyways were cleared, the last gurgling shrieks silenced.

“They’re… amazing,” Amani murmured, slumping against a chunk of rubble, the adrenaline draining and leaving hollow awe in its place.

Adil sat heavily beside him, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “That’s maybe one-third of her full strength, my friend. When Nia’s Emberborn is fully synced and her reserves are topped up… she’s a real beast.” There was no jealousy in his voice, only stark fact.

Amani watched as Nia, her armor retracting back to its core unit, helped a group of shell-shocked survivors. He saw not a monster, but the weight she carried. His gaze then fell on the dissipating smoke of a fallen Sinshade. A glint of metal—a half-melted locket—lay in the ash. His stomach turned.

“It hurts,” he said quietly, not looking at Adil. “Seeing them die like that. They were all someone. A person. A friend. A parent. The Black Matter took them, but… there has to be another way. A way to save them, to reverse it. We can’t just… delete people.”

Adil was silent for a long moment, his own eyes on the fading embers. “Nope,” he finally said, the word heavy and final. “So far, no method exists to reverse the Turning. The corruption rewrites the soul on a fundamental level. What’s left… it’s a puppet made of pain and memory. The kindest thing we can do, the only mercy left, is elimination. Even if the face it wears used to belong to someone you loved.” He squeezed Amani’s shoulder, a gesture of shared, terrible understanding.

High above, hovering in a tactical formation, the Sol Lux troops regrouped. Kato, floating beside Nia, scanned the city. Her enhanced sensors picked up an anomaly. “Master Sergeant. Look.”

Nia followed her gaze. Across the burning city, the fires weren’t just spreading. They were… dying. Not being put out, but being sucked. Flames winked out in sequence, and the colossal plumes of smoke, instead of dispersing, were being drawn upwards, converging on a single point in the stormy sky above the city’s center, as if inhaled by a giant, unseen lung.

The sky, which had been a chaotic canvas of smoke and fire, grew unnaturally dark. The temperature plummeted.

“What is happening? Will it rain?” a Sol Lux soldier nearby asked, his voice tense over the comms.

“That’s not a storm front,” Nia replied, her blood running cold. “That’s a concentration. Something’s pulling all the energy—thermal, kinetic, corruptive—towards a single locus.”

Then, the world tore open.

With a sound that was less a noise and more the universe groaning in protest, a point of perfect blackness erupted in the sky where the smoke converged. It wasn’t an explosion of light and force, but an explosion of absence. A void singularity. It yawned open, a screaming wound in reality, and began to spin.

Storm clouds were ripped from the horizon and fed into it. Lightning, instead of striking down, was drawn upwards into the blackness. The very air howled as it was vacuumed into the growing abyss. Below, the ruins of the city center—buildings already shattered—were peeled apart, piece by piece, and swallowed. The singularity grew, spinning faster, until it wasn’t just a hole in the sky. It was a vortex that covered the entire capital district, a vertical tornado of pure annihilation.

The coordinated defense of moments before shattered into pure terror. Sol Lux soldiers, caught in the outer gravitational eddies, were yanked from the sky like insects, their screams cut short as they were pulled into the oblivion above. Evacuation ships veered wildly, engines straining against the inexorable pull, before being dragged, spinning, into the dark.

From their position on the outskirts, Amani, Adil, Nia, and Kato watched, helpless, as the heart of their world was consumed. The vortex raged for what felt like an eternity, and then, as suddenly as it appeared, it collapsed in on itself with a final, teeth-rattling thump of compressed air.

Silence, deeper than any before, blanketed the world. The sky was clear, scarred, and empty. Where the capital’s skyline had once been, there was now only a smooth, glassy crater, miles wide. Of the proud Sol Lux division, only scattered, terrified remnants survived—perhaps thirty-five soldiers in total, clinging to the very edges of the devastation.

Amani and Adil came to, their ears ringing, their bodies coated in fine, grey dust that had once been a city. They had been thrown behind a structural support, saving them from the worst of the suction.

“The… the whole city…” Amani stammered, pushing himself up on trembling arms. “It’s just… gone. How is that possible?”

Adil, his face pale, pointed a shaking finger upwards. “Look. There.”

Hovering in the center of the cleared, corpse-grey sky was a figure. It was humanoid, but wrought from living shadow and polished obsidian. It possessed a long, barbed tail that lashed slowly in the air, curved horns that speared backwards from its brow, and vast, membranous wings that blotted out what little light remained. An aura of such profound, absolute death emanated from it that the air for a hundred meters around it seemed to frost and wilt.

“A flying crater,” Adil whispered. “That’s not just a Sinshade. That’s the source.”

On the ground near the crater’s lip, Nia and Kito regained their footing. Around them, the few surviving Sol Lux soldiers formed a ragged, shell-shocked line. Nia’s face was set in a mask of hardened grief and fury. She activated her comms, her voice cutting through the stunned silence.

“All remaining units! Form on me! That creature is no ordinary Sinshade! It is a Void Harbinger! Prepare for close-quarter annihilation! We are not retreating. We are making our stand!”

The creature’s head slowly tilted downwards. It regarded the pitiful line of light against the vast darkness it had created. Then, it spoke. Its voice was not a sound, but a vibration that shook their bones and scraped against their souls, a chorus of screams filtered into words.

“I AM AN ABYSS APOSTLE. I AM THE UNMAKING. THE RETURN TO NOTHING. THAT IS WHY THE FATHER CREATED ME. MWAHAHAHA!”

The laugh was a psychic assault. Several soldiers cried out, dropping to their knees, blood trickling from their noses.

Then, it moved. It didn’t fly. It ceased to be in one place and re-existed in another, directly in the midst of the surviving soldiers. There was no blur, no speed. It was a teleportation of pure malice. Before even Nia could react, it moved.

A sweep of its tail shattered two soldiers into clouds of red mist. A backhanded swipe of its claw sent three more flying, their armor crumpled like foil. It was a slaughterhouse ballet.

Only Nia, with her preternatural reflexes, and Kito, with her enhanced agility, managed to evade the first killing blow, diving aside as the ground where they’d stood erupted into a miniature black hole that swallowed rubble and light alike.

Kito didn’t hesitate. Grief and rage fueled her. “I’m going to send you back to the hell you crawled from!” she screamed, launching herself forward. Her core blade flashed, and she detonated a series of throwable energy fragments—Core Scatters—that exploded around the Apostle from all angles in a dazzling display.

The smoke cleared. The creature stood unharmed, not a scratch on its obsidian hide. It looked at her, almost… amused.

Kato roared, pouring every ounce of her Mythcore into her rapier, making the blade swell into a giant, crackling spear of light. “CORE OVERDRIVE!” She thrust it forward, a lance meant to pierce a battleship.

The Apostle didn’t block. It caught the tip of the energy spear in its palm. The colossal power splashed against its hand, dissipating harmlessly. Its other hand shot out, a piston of darkness, burying itself in Kato’s stomach. The air left her lungs in a choked gasp. The creature lifted her effortlessly, then with terrifying force, slammed her down into the glassed earth, cratering it.

It raised a hand over her helpless form. A swirling sphere of devouring darkness—a miniature void—formed above its palm, ready to consume her utterly.

Nia moved, a streak of blue light. She wasn’t fast enough.

But someone else was.

From a cloud of distant dust, a violet streak intercepted. There was a colossal, gong-like clash. The void attack detonated harmlessly in the air. When the dust settled, Kato was gone from the crater. She reappeared, coughing and shaking, a few meters away, held up by the purple-haired warrior from the alley. They stood together, facing the monster.

The new girl let go of Kato, not taking her glowing eyes off the Apostle. “Hey, Sergeant-girl. Seems you could use a hand beating this overgrown shadow-puppet.”

Nia landed beside them, her Emberborn armor humming. “Master Sergeant. Get it right. You can call me Nia. And who are you?”

The girl hefted her massive broadsword, a fierce, wild grin spreading across her face. “Name’s Nasira. Nasira of the Unbound. And the pleasure,” she said, her violet eyes locking with the Apostle’s empty sockets, “is gonna be all mine.”

Amani and Adil, having sprinted towards the cataclysmic energy they felt, finally reached the crater’s edge. They skidded to a halt, taking in the scene: the glassy wasteland, the few remaining soldiers, Nia and Kato bruised but standing, and the new, formidable warrior facing the epicenter of darkness.

“We have to back them up,” Adil said, falling into a battle stance, his own modest Mythcore flickering to life around his fists.

Amani watched the Abyss Apostle, feeling its aura of nothingness sap the hope from the air. His own reserves were a guttering candle. His Spirit Bullet was useless against this. He had to be smarter.

“Okay,” Amani said, his mind racing, analyzing the creature’s movements, its arrogant stillness, the way it seemed to drink in the despair. “If they can’t handle him… we’ll need a plan. Not to fight it head-on. To find its flaw.” He looked at Adil, the ghost of his arena-smile returning, born not of arrogance, but of desperate focus. “We’ll imagine a strategy. And we’ll save everyone. That’s our job now.”

Below, Nia and Nasira stood side-by-side, their auras flaring—one a disciplined, blazing blue sun, the other a volatile, crackling violet storm.

“We are ready to end you, bastard,” they said in unison, their voices layered with power and defiance.

The Abyss Apostle merely spread its wings, the void around it deepening. The final battle for the soul of the ruins had begun.