"The dead do not disappear in the Veil. They whisper. And sometimes… they answer."– Graffiti found near Sector 9, etched in bone
[The Veil – Undercore Depth 2.1]
Kael hadn't slept.
Not really. In the Veil, rest was more like a descent into visions — and not all of them were his own.
He sat with his back against a pillar, its surface pulsing faintly with warm green sigils, remnants of whatever technology the Empire had buried here centuries ago. His body still ached from the fight with the ash-mimic. The echoes of his Aith surge could be felt beneath his skin.
And then came the voice.
"You're bleeding wrong."
Kael's eyes snapped open.
A girl stood at the edge of the chamber, her hair short and ash-colored, as if the dust had settled into each strand. Her eyes shimmered — not with light, but with weight. Like looking into memories trapped in the ash.
"You're leaking guilt," she added, kneeling near him. "You'll draw attention. Even the old ones feel it."
Kael stiffened. No footsteps. No approach. She was just… there.
"Who are you?"
"Sarai," she replied simply. "You passed the mimic test. That makes you marked. It also means you're close to breaking."
"Breaking what?"
"The mirror. The one between your Aith… and your name."
She didn't speak like anyone from Vandral. Too still. Too exact. Kael was suspicious and ready to flee.
"I didn't invite you," he muttered.
Sarai just smiled faintly.
"Didn't need to. You screamed. Not with sound — with regret."
He wanted to lash out, but something held him.
There was something wrong about her presence — not threatening, but fragile. Like touching her too hard would make the entire chamber collapse in on itself.
She reached into a pouch and dropped a small item into his hand: a shard of glass, smooth on one side, burned on the other.
"This belonged to you," she said.
"No it didn't."
"Not in this thread."
[Meanwhile – Vandral, Intelligence Division Gamma]
"Kael Verrin has breached containment."
Agent Lurien stood at the edge of a war table deep beneath Vandral's capital tower. Around him, flickering projections of Kael's vitals — heart rate, Aith resonance, neurological spikes — spiraled up and down.
Across from him sat General Esra Velk, the same man Kael had sworn to kill. His right eye was artificial, pulsing with violet light. His left hand was missing entirely — amputated after the "Taldeth Uprising."
"The mimic let him live?" the general asked.
"It didn't just let him live," Lurien replied. "It adapted. Reacted. This was not a survival.
It was a… recognition."
Velk said nothing. Just exhaled slowly and tapped the screen.
"And the Aith pattern?"
"Hybrid signature. Exsor-dominant. But we're seeing Primordia drift."
Silence.
Then, finally:
"Don't kill him."
"...Sir?"
"Bring him in. Quietly. If he's already resonating at that level, he may be the only one who can survive what's waking in the Veil."
"What is waking?"
"We don't know. But it remembers our sins."
[Back in the Veil]
Kael studied the shard. The reflection on its surface didn't show the chamber — it showed the Warden's office. The place where his best friend had been executed.
He gripped the edge tightly — until it bit into his palm.
"What are you?" he asked.
Sarai looked at him softly.
"I'm Edras."
His breath caught.
She extended a hand, and a faint glyph lit up in her palm — a contract seal, flickering with worn energy.
"I bind myself to memory. I give up my future so others remember their past. That's my Aith."
"And what do you get?"
"A name. One that doesn't fade."
The light above them dimmed.
Far down the tunnel, a distant, echoing sound rippled through the dark.
Sarai's expression hardened.
"They've noticed you now."
"Who?"
"Those who sleep under ash. The Unbound."
She turned and walked into the corridor.
"Come, Kael Verrin. Your fire burns too loud to stay hidden anymore."