The days after Sera's death bled into each other
silent, grey, unkind.
Kael didn't leave the wall. Not truly. He reported, trained, patrolled. His body moved through the routines like a machine still processing the error in its last command. But his mind…
It stayed in that second.
The one he hadn't seen coming.
The one that took her.
They buried Sera quietly.
as the coffin sank slowly into the ground with a hollow thud. No eulogy. No procession. Just the sound of shovels meeting dirt. Kael stood at the edge, unmoving, staring into eyes that once held fire. Now they held nothing—no light, no soul. Just a hollow vessel. Whatever made her had been ripped away, leaving only the shell.
Her burial was swift. Not out of cruelty, but necessity. Everyone was busy. Death was routine in Vanta's Edge. No one spoke. No mourning rites. Just another name etched into the Wall.
Sera Alryn.
May you rest in peace, your nightmare is over
Far off, the aether pylons hummed like low thunder. The metallic groan of machinery echoed through the district—creaking, clanking, gasping like tired lungs. As if the city itself was struggling to breathe. Kael sat on the edge of his bed, the knight chess piece clenched tight in his palm.
Much had changed since the breach. Pylons had been reinforced. Patrols doubled. Tension thickened like smoke. Every day brought more casualties, more blood. But humans were a stubborn breed. Adaptable. Resilient. You strike them once—they strike back twice. That was Vanta's Edge message to the horrors outside the seal:
We are not so easy to annihilate.
Kael stayed quiet. He trained longer than required. Sparred until his arms were lead. Patrolled farther than his radius. Anything to avoid thinking. Anything to avoid remembering. His hands bore the cost—blistered, raw—but at least pain was honest.
In the ring, he moved with ferocity, precision sharpened by grief. Every blow he delivered was a question without an answer.
"Why didn't I see it coming?"
He didn't want to hesitate. Not anymore. Hesitation had cost him everything.
"Strike first. Strike true," he muttered between clenched teeth, sweat pouring from his brow. "No second guesses. No looking back."
If pain was the price to never freeze again… he'd pay it.
One evening in the barracks, after another brutal session in the ring, Kael sat alone, unwrapping his bloodied knuckles.
"Hey."
A voice broke the silence—Joren, a patrol officer he'd trained with for years. He was younger, all nerves and humor, still clinging to the idea that they might live past thirty.
Kael didn't look up. "What."
"You're gonna lose your hands if you keep going at it like that," Joren said, sliding into the bench across from him. "You're not a Sleeper yet. We still bleed."
Kael didn't reply.
Joren leaned forward, tone shifting. "I know it hurts, Kael. I know what she meant to you. But beating yourself down isn't—"
Kael's eyes snapped up. Cold. Distant.
"She's dead because I hesitated."
Joren flinched slightly, but didn't leave. "That wasn't your fault."
Kael stood, wrapping his hand tighter. "Doesn't matter. Won't happen again."
There was something different in the way he said it. Final. Like he'd already carved the vow into his bones.
Kael left without another word.
Behind him, Joren muttered, "Yeah… and that's what scares me."
That night, the barracks were silent. But Kael swore he still heard her laugh—soft, distant, echoing from places she once stood.
He remembered the way she hummed while cleaning her blade. Tuneless, like it wasn't for anyone else. Just habit. A quiet rhythm before the storm.
He used to mock her for it.
Now he would've given anything to hear it again.