The city didn't sleep. Not truly.
Even at its stillest hour, it throbbed—like a beast wounded long ago, its nerves refusing to die. Cracked neon signs blinked overhead, sputtering in and out of consciousness like a tired soul fighting the night. Every gutter, every flickering lamplight, carried the weight of stories no one ever told. Far in the distance, sirens cried, hollow and drawn, their echoes folding into the cold breath of the urban wind.
Kael Solhart walked alone through that breathless dark.
His cloak, ash-grey and frayed at the hem, flared behind him as if unsure whether it belonged to a ghost or a warrior. Beneath the streetlights, his shadow moved without noise—stretched, tense, and coiled like a blade wrapped in old cloth. His steps weren't hurried, but they carried weight. The kind of weight cities remember.
He had left Elira without a word.
Not from distrust.
No, Kael trusted her more than most. But something had clawed at the edge of his mind—an echo, faint but relentless. It hadn't come with words. It came with feeling. It came the moment he had touched the map Elira gave him, that strange parchment etched in faded markings.
They weren't just locations.
They were… triggers. Anchors. Remnants of places that had mattered before, to someone who no longer existed. Or maybe someone who still did.
Him.
Or the version of him that had died beneath stars older than this world.
And something—someone—was waiting.
He passed into the lower sectors of the city.
Here, everything changed. The high drones were gone. The artificial birdsong of surveillance static fell silent. No patrols. No neon ads trying to sell salvation. Just wet stone, iron doors, and air that carried the scent of rust and quiet threats. Every corner here had eyes, but none you could meet.
Kael's breath fogged slightly in the air.
"The Gathering Veil," he murmured under his breath.
That was the first name on the map. A place Elira had warned him about, though not in words. She didn't need to speak her warnings. Her eyes did it better. They always did.
The Veil was more than a location.
It was a convergence—where power slipped between fingers like quicksilver, where information wasn't sold but bartered with secrets. A place where exiled mages, disgraced relic-hunters, mercenaries, and whispering cultists gathered not out of unity, but out of mutual exile. It was a breathing scar beneath the city.
And Kael was walking straight into it.
He passed beneath an arch of rusted black iron. Sigils carved along the arch's curve shimmered faintly, shifting in form as he stepped through—as though unsure how to greet him. There were no guards. No signs.
Only a hum.
A vibration in the air, like unsung chants pressed against his skin.
Down the stairs.
Stone steps, weathered and fractured, spiraled downward into a void lit by sickly hanging orbs—imitation starlight flickering with old tech and older magic. The chamber opened beneath him like the belly of a forgotten cathedral.
Kael halted at the base.
The place was alive with whispers.
Figures cloaked in ash and oil moved through the shadows. One group circled a hovering relic—chanting in a tongue Kael didn't know but understood just enough to feel unease. Others argued in low tones, bartering over fragments of ancient tech and bone-blade weapons that pulsed with cursed enchantments.
His arrival didn't go unnoticed.
They looked, not out of recognition—but reaction. It was in the way the air curled around him. The way the hanging lights flickered once, like startled insects. The way the shadows shifted—not away, but deeper, cautious.
A voice broke through the tension.
"Another lost warrior seeking answers?" it croaked, laced with dry humor and a glint of something sharp.
Kael turned.
A man sat behind a stall fashioned from shattered alloy plates and gearwork etched in warding runes. One side of his face was metal—brass plating fused directly into flesh. His left eye had been replaced by a red lens that whirred softly, focusing as Kael approached.
Kael didn't need confirmation. The name came unbidden, like a memory triggered from bone rather than mind.
"Velkan."
The merchant tilted his head. The lens blinked.
"Hah. So she sent you." He leaned forward. "The blade girl."
"Elira."
"Of course," Velkan chuckled. "She doesn't trust easily. But when she does… there's always a reason. Sometimes not even she knows it."
Kael said nothing.
He reached into his cloak and placed the map on the table—folded, edges worn.
Velkan's mechanical fingers twitched.
His amusement drained like color from a bleeding canvas.
"You don't know what this is, do you?" he muttered. His voice dropped, like he feared the map would hear him. "These aren't just coordinates. They're remnants. Seals."
Kael frowned. "Seals?"
"Pieces of the Old Accord," Velkan whispered.
The room felt colder.
Velkan leaned back, metal fingers tapping the surface rhythmically. "Before this city rose—before the Age of Frames and Corelines—there was a pact. Between wielders of power and the keepers of balance. They called it the Accord."
"And it broke."
"Everything breaks," Velkan said. "But not everything gets scattered so carefully afterward."
He stood, slow and deliberate, reaching beneath the table. His movements, though stiff, carried precision. From the hidden compartment, he produced a small, blackened ring. It was cracked but whole. It pulsed faintly with violet light.
"This was found at one of the marked sites," Velkan said. "It's dormant around everyone else. But you?"
Kael reached for it.
The moment his fingers made contact, his body seized—not in pain, but in revelation.
His mind fractured.
—A tower swallowed by flames.
—A scream that wasn't his but tore from his throat.
—A field of countless eyes, and a single sword buried among them.
—A name spoken through blood and stars.
—Then darkness.
Kael staggered, his hand flinching away.
His breath rasped through clenched teeth. Sweat prickled along his spine.
Velkan said nothing.
For a moment, neither did Kael.
"…You're not just her pawn," Velkan whispered finally. "You're the key."
Kael stood straight. The ring disappeared into his pocket.
"Then I'll find out what I unlock."
He turned and walked away. The chamber behind him buzzed with renewed whispers. But none dared stop him.
As Kael ascended the stairwell, something had changed. It wasn't just the ring. It wasn't just the vision.
The path was no longer a journey.
It was a countdown.
Back on the surface, the city still breathed—but it felt quieter now. Like it, too, was waiting.
Kael pulled his cloak tighter.
He didn't know where the next marked location would take him. But he knew what he had felt.
The Accord was more than history.
It was unfinished.
And something wanted him to finish it.