The Saints advanced.
Gold stepped forward, his boots leaving scorched impressions in the frozen dirt. Beside him, Kane lowered into a stance, her sword humming faintly — unstable, like it too had questions.
The air cracked — then roared. Saint of Chains, Veylos, was first. He darted low, metal fangs erupting from the earth in a fan of writhing chains. Gold lifted a hand. The sigil on his side of neck burned, and a pulse of violet light slammed outward.
The chains slowed — but only for a breath.
Then they tightened. Around his ankle. His ribs. His neck.
Kane dashed in with a shriek and cleaved two of them, but three more took their place.
"You are wielding power you barely understand," Elavar said calmly from behind, his robes untouched by the battlefield's fury. "Even among Saints, Pactum cannot be tamed easily."
Gold gritted his teeth. His hands shimmered, light and shadow both fracturing off his fingertips. His own thoughts began to scatter — memories fraying like loose threads. A name surfaced, but he couldn't tell if it was his own.
He roared and pulled — a burst of Pactum energy freed one arm — and with it he struck. The blow sent a ripple into the air, hurling Veylos back across the field.
But Gold dropped to one knee.
Blood trickled from his nose.
He didn't remember why he was angry anymore. Or who he was defending.
Kane turned toward him. "Stay with me," she said. "Just hold the shape of who you are."
Then she turned — too late.
Saint of Silence, Myrae, stepped from the veil of soundlessness. She walked like a phantom, no footstep ever meeting the earth. Her eyes held no pity — only duty. She raised two fingers.
Kane tried to move, but her limbs were gone. No — sound was gone. Her body couldn't hear itself move. She stumbled, staggered — struck once in the side by a blast of silence so deep it rattled her soul.
Both rebels collapsed.
And the Saints, victorious, stood above them.
"Take the boy," Elavar said. "And execute the girl."
Chains writhed around them. Myrae raised her hand. The world began to dim, the air pressed in — and Gold felt nothing.
Until—
A coin dropped.
It clinked on the ground between them, and the sound rippled like thunder.
All three Saints froze.
A man stood behind them. Unannounced. Undetected. Unbothered.
His eyes shimmered with divine color — violet, gold, and black — like a broken dawn.
His coat fluttered in a wind that didn't exist.
He looked straight at Gold, and his smile was tired. Familiar.
"You made it," the man said softly. "I was beginning to wonder."
Kane stirred. Her eyes widened in horror and awe.
Gold blinked. "You… gave me the coin."
The man nodded once. "And now I'm here to collect."
A sigil burned into existence behind him. But it wasn't like Gold's — it was older. Larger. It stretched into the sky like a scar across the world.
Elavar turned fully to face him. "Who are you?"
The stranger looked past him, into Gold's eyes.
"Another pact bearer," he said. "But unlike him…"
He stepped forward.
"I remember everything."
The earth shivered as the man's sigil continued to spread across the battlefield, roots of divine energy spiraling beneath the soil like veins in the skin of a dying god. For the first time since descending, Elavar's expression changed. His calm cracked, just slightly.
"Aether Pactum…" he muttered, eyes narrowing. "Impossible. Only sanctioned Saints are allowed such power."
The stranger stepped calmly between Gold and Kane. "And yet, here I am."
Saint of Chains, Veylos, moved first — the sharp flick of his wrist sending a barrage of spiked chains toward the intruder.
The man didn't blink.
He moved his hand in a slow, spiral motion.
The chains froze mid-air. Then they rattled violently — not breaking, but unraveling into threads of light, each strand whimpering as if in pain. They crumbled into ash.
Veylos staggered. "What… what did you do?!"
"I unbound them," the man replied. "Your power is borrowed, Saint. Mine is paid for."
He turned slightly to look at Gold, who was kneeling, eyes wide, breath shallow.
"You've opened your Pact too soon. You've tasted the edges of power without setting the core."
Gold gritted his teeth. "I had no choice."
The man's smile was faint. "No, you did. But you chose her."
He pointed to Kane. She was trying to stand, her legs trembling, but her eyes sharp. "And that makes you worth saving."
Gold didn't respond — but his fist clenched tighter.
Myrae made her move.
No sound. No flash. Just sudden nothingness.
A void erupted around the stranger — a silence so complete it erased existence for a moment.
But then it cracked.
The air snapped back, and Myrae was on her knees, blood seeping from her ears. Her silence had been turned against her — devoured by a deeper quiet.
The stranger stood unshaken.
"There's always someone who thinks silence is power," he said, gently tilting his head toward her. "But silence is just the space between choices."
Elavar finally stepped forward. The Saint-Regent's robe unfurled into spectral wings behind him, feathers made of light and prayer.
"You act outside the Empire's bounds," he said. "You interfere in matters of divine consequence. This is heresy."
The stranger's gaze sharpened. "The Empire is the heresy. And you're not the first Saint I've buried."
Gold felt it before he saw it — a pulse in the air. Aether Pactum magic, but older, more precise. The stranger wasn't just wielding his power. He was writing with it.
Then—
"Enough!" Elavar shouted.
The sky split open, and a spear of radiant fire descended.
Kane screamed.
The blast hit——But the smoke cleared.
The stranger stood, one hand raised. The fire dissolved in his palm like sugar in water.
He looked at Gold.
"You want to live?"Gold nodded.
"You want to fight?"
Gold's voice was rough. "Yes."
"Then follow."
The stranger took a step back into his own sigil. The ground twisted.
"Take the girl and walk with me," he said. "Or stay and die as an echo."
Gold staggered to Kane, helped her up. She was barely conscious, her blood mixing with ash.
He looked at Elavar — fury burning in the Saint's eyes.
Then he followed the stranger into the spiral of light.