Thunder cracked above a desert that had not known rain in a hundred years.
In the wastes of Vareth, near the tomb of forgotten kings, lightning split the sky—and something ancient woke.
A man with one eye and a crown of flame snapped upright from the dust. His heartbeat matched the rhythm of the storm.
"He's back," whispered the King of Cinders."The Dreamt Emperor… has claimed the Throne."
All across the world, the Weave trembled.
And in that trembling, the dead began to stir.
Cael stood atop a cliff near the edge of the Hollow Court's reach, the last traces of divine thread flickering around his wrist like embering runes.
Vyn remained silent beside him, her gaze fixed on the horizon. Cities burned there. Not from war—but from memory. The Weave was rewriting itself in real time, and some parts of the world resisted.
"This is what happens when the pattern shifts too hard," she said quietly."Reality pushes back."
"Then we push harder," Cael replied.
He wasn't arrogant. Just resolute.
The kind of resolve that comes when you've looked into the abyss and chosen to dream anyway.
As they descended into the nearest settlement—Rokhar, a bastion built inside the bones of a titan whale—they were greeted not with spears, but with awe.
The people of Rokhar were marked by tattoos made of sandglass. Their chief, an old woman with a bell-voice and cataract eyes, bowed low when Cael entered.
"Threadborn," she said. "The court sang of you in our sleep."
Cael didn't understand. But the woman offered him something.
A scroll wrapped in starlight.
"These are echoes," she said. "From before the Unmaking. The first map."
He took it. Unraveled it. What he saw made his pulse hitch.
It wasn't just a map.
It was a memory of the world before it broke.
Places that had vanished… Realms that had drowned in time…Names even the Hollow Prince hadn't spoken of.
—Sylthra, the Moon-Tomb.—Nethermire, the Lake of Voices.—Cindervault, where gods went to sleep.
This was a call to reclaim not just the throne—but the entire story.
"We start here," Cael said, pointing to the symbol of a spiral etched in crimson."Cindervault. If the gods are sleeping... I want to ask them why."
Vyn didn't flinch.
She simply tied her hair back and muttered, "Then let's wake the bastards."
Far away, in the catacombs beneath a ruined cathedral, a figure stirred.
Skin pale as pearl. Eyes blind yet all-seeing.
A priest of the Threadless Church.
"He moves," the priest whispered, sifting through bones that still pulsed with power."And so the Hollow Court breaks its oath."
In response, The Hollow Prince opened his mirror once again.
And in its depths, Cael's reflection changed.
Not corrupted. Not evil.
But divergent.
Because those who rewrite fate… eventually become it.