The city never truly slept, but tonight, it felt quieter.
Elias stood alone on the rooftop of his apartment building, the night sky stretched above him in a deep, endless black. The rain had washed the air clean, and the stars, though faint, peeked through patches in the cloud cover. Below, the hum of distant traffic whispered upward, a constant reminder of the restless world he lived in.
In his hand, the Crane pendant glowed faintly, pulsing with a rhythm that matched his heartbeat.
He hadn't planned to come up here. Some instinct, something deeper than thought, had pulled him onto the rooftop after the events of the past few days—the confrontation with Mason, the unraveling of Sterling's quiet plot, the realization that the world he had quietly lived in was beginning to shift around him.
It was time.
Slowly, deliberately, Elias lowered himself to one knee, setting the pendant before him on the cool concrete. He closed his eyes and exhaled a long, steady breath, feeling the night air rush into his lungs, filling every corner of his chest.
The Crane blood stirred.
The hidden techniques buried in his very bones—instincts honed by generations before him—rose like embers fanned into flame. His body moved almost on its own, shifting into a stance that balanced strength and flexibility, grounding him into the rooftop like an ancient pillar.
The pendant pulsed once more—and then something cracked open inside him.
A rush of warmth spread through his limbs, not burning, but awakening. His senses sharpened—the sound of individual raindrops striking far below, the faint hiss of tires across wet asphalt, the heartbeat of a pigeon roosting on a neighboring building.
Everything was clearer, deeper, realer.
He could feel the energy—the breath of the world—rushing through him, a thousand unseen threads weaving into the marrow of his bones. He moved his hands slowly, tracing the forms that had come to him the night before, but now each motion drew silver trails through the air, shimmering faintly before fading.
He wasn't just remembering.
He was becoming.
Breath is strength. Breath is will. Breath is life.
The words echoed inside him, not spoken but imprinted on his very being.
He opened his eyes slowly—and gasped.
Hovering before him in the darkness was not just the pendant, but a faint silhouette—an image woven from starlight and memory. A man stood there, cloaked in tattered robes, silver eyes burning like twin moons.
"You are late," the figure said, his voice both ancient and familiar.
Elias stood slowly, never taking his eyes off the apparition.
"Who are you?"
The figure smiled, something sorrowful in it. "I am a memory. A shard of those who came before. You, Elias Crane, are the last breath of a dying line."
The wind stirred, carrying a low whisper through the air: words Elias could barely catch, yet they carved themselves deep into his heart.
"Rise. Reclaim. Restore."
And then the figure faded, leaving only the pendant—now cool and silent once again—resting at Elias's feet.
For a long moment, Elias simply stood there, the city buzzing far below, the stars blinking slowly overhead.
He had crossed a threshold tonight.
No longer a man trapped by the weight of forgotten blood.
Now—he was a Crane awakened.
And the world, whether it knew it or not, had just gained a force it wasn't ready to reckon with.
Elias picked up the pendant, feeling its familiar weight, but now sensing something more.
A responsibility. A calling.
He would not rush. He would not roar.
He would rise slowly, steadily.
And when the time came, those who had mocked him, those who had tried to erase the Cranes from memory, would realize:
The legacy they thought had died…
Had only been sleeping.