The aftermath of the battle left Aetherhold scorched, but not broken.
Ash floated gently through the air, mixing with sparks of shattered aether. Healers moved quickly across the stone corridors, tending to wounded fighters. Engineers patched defense lines, and sentries recalibrated sensor towers.
But all Raon could see was Yuna.
She lay unconscious in the medbay, her body flickering between normal and unstable code patterns, her pulse irregular, yet steady.
> [Status: Coma – Core Link Disrupted]
[Fusion Signature: Azure-Null Resonance Detected]
[System Warning: Entity May No Longer Be Recognized By Evolution Grid]
Kira stood beside him, arms crossed, her own shoulder wrapped in gauze.
"She saved us," she muttered. "Again."
Raon nodded slowly. "And nearly killed herself doing it."
Han Ji-Woo leaned on the doorway. "Whatever that was… even the Dragonborn didn't see it coming. They ran like rats once she lit the sky."
Raon's jaw tightened. "Because it wasn't just an attack. It was a message. We changed something. We broke something."
He turned to face the others.
"I need answers."
---
The Archives Below
Buried beneath the ruins of Aetherhold was a sealed vault. Not part of the old military compound, but something older—much older. Yuna's system dive had triggered a breach in the encryption, revealing its existence.
> [Vault Classification: Origin-Class]
[Access Restricted: Azure Signature Required]
[Override Accepted – Welcome, Inheritor]
Raon, flanked by Kira and Han Ji-Woo, stepped into a long corridor made of obsidian and mirrored aetherglass. The walls pulsed with threads of light—red, blue, violet—like veins in a living being.
At the chamber's core, a structure hovered in stasis: a rotating cube of fractured metal, burning with inner flame.
A voice greeted them.
Not the System.
Not Kael'Rax.
Something else.
> "You who carry the twin path... have accelerated the Divergence."
> "The world you stand in was never meant to evolve."
Raon stepped forward. "Then why build the system?"
The voice hummed like thunder restrained.
> "It was not built. It was grown. Cultivated by the First Mind to delay the end."
> "Your fusion with the Null Spark has broken one of the last seals."
Han Ji-Woo raised a brow. "Wait. The System is a prison?"
> "No. A cradle. For something not yet born. But your interference may hatch it early."
> "To stabilize the Singularity, you must find the Origin Core."
A new interface opened in Raon's vision:
> [New Quest: Locate the Cradle of Origins]
[Objective: Journey to Vault Primordia – Coordinates Hidden]
[Warning: Success May End the Evolution Tree Entirely]
[Optional: Awaken Yuna Before Departure – Risk Level: Unknown]
Raon stepped back, mind racing.
"This system… it was never about levels. It's a cage, disguised as a ladder."
Kira muttered, "So the real evolution wasn't to get stronger. It was to keep something asleep."
---
The Voice of the Void
That night, as Raon meditated beside Yuna's bed, her fingers twitched.
A pulse of violet light spread across her skin.
And then—her eyes opened.
But they were no longer just violet.
They were mirrors.
"Raon," she said, her voice overlapping with something deeper. "I saw it. The other side of the system. The Void Codex. It's watching us."
Raon leaned in. "Are you still you?"
She smiled weakly. "Mostly. But I think something else is awake in me now. And it knows the way."
Suddenly, her eyes widened. "We have to go to the Daegu Spiral. There's a rift there. The Cradle left a map behind—but only the Azure and the Null can open the gate."
> [Side Mission Unlocked: The Daegu Spiral – Infiltrate a Council R&D Spire Hidden Beneath a Ghost City]
[Estimated Threat Level: Omega]
[Intel: Dragonborn Survivors Are Regrouping]
---
Elsewhere – The Enemy Evolves
In the obsidian fortress of Kael'Rax, Veyra knelt before her master. Her wings had not yet healed. Her pride had not yet returned.
"I underestimated them," she admitted. "Their fusion broke three of the Suppression Laws."
Kael'Rax was silent for a long time.
Then, he raised a hand—and from the shadows, stepped a new figure: a child-sized being, clad in robes of shifting color, eyes stitched shut.
"The Observer?" Veyra whispered.
The child smiled.
"No," said the creature. "The Observer was my sibling. I am the Warden. And I have come to unseal the other Singularity."
Kael'Rax bowed his head.
"The game has changed."
---
Preparation for the Cradle
Back in Aetherhold, Raon began rallying the new recruits. Not all were fighters—some were scholars, others code-divers, a few even former Council scientists who defected after witnessing the Dragonborn's fury.
One of them, an old man named Seong Gyu-Min, stepped forward during briefing.
"I once worked on the Cradle Project," he confessed. "Before I was exiled. You'll need an Aether Compass to even approach the coordinates."
Raon nodded. "Can you make one?"
"I can… but I'll need something from the Council Vaults. Something called Core Dust. Only found in Spire Level Sevens and above."
Kira smiled grimly. "We've been needing a reason to hit one of their main towers."
> [Mission Chain Updated: Heist at Spire 7 – Seoul Exclusion Zone]
[Party Limit: 6]
[Reward: Aether Compass Blueprint + Class Upgrade Token]
[Failure Penalty: Faction Location Compromised]
Raon looked around at the gathered squad—new faces, loyal ones, fractured ones. All burning with purpose.
"This is the next step," he said. "If we find the Cradle… we might learn the truth behind every evolution."
Yuna stood at his side now, her aura both familiar and otherworldly.
"And if we don't?"
Raon's eyes flared blue.
"Then we make our own truth."