The First Fracture pulsed like a dying star.
No — like something waking up.

It hung suspended above a basin of jagged stone, cradled in twisted roots of black crystal that pulsed with the same rhythm. Every beat echoed through the Underfold — a sound felt more than heard, like the heartbeat of something ancient and hungry.

Elian stared up at it, jaw clenched.

"That’s not just a fracture," he said.
"It’s a womb."

Behind them, the Root entity descended silently, its long body gliding through the void like smoke pulled by gravity. No wings. No limbs. Just tendrils and a face without features — a stretched, eyeless mask that smiled with no mouth.

Calen stumbled back instinctively.
"It followed us—"

"It was always coming," Lysara said, raising her hands again, summoning fresh glyphs.
"I just didn’t think it would be smiling when it did."

"Technically, it’s not," Cray muttered, backing into formation. "But I get your point."

The Root finally spoke.

"This world bled so easily. You wish to seal the wound?"

Its voice was colder now, steadier — less like oil and more like steel dragged through bone.

Elian stepped forward, blade gleaming.

"We’re not asking permission."

"Good," the Root replied. "Because I am not offering it."

The Core stirred.

Cracks deepened across its glowing surface — violet light bleeding from within, lashing outward in threads that began reaching toward Elian and the others.

The fracture didn’t just pulse anymore.
It reached.
Like a thing being born.

"Talk later," Cray growled. "Fight now!"

He unleashed a barrage of sigils — fire, ice, and kinetic force colliding into the Root’s trailing limbs. The entity absorbed it without a sound. Not immune — but vast. It shook slightly, then reconfigured its limbs into blades of memory.

Then it struck.

Elian met it mid-strike, Memory Blade glowing white-hot as he parried a tendril of raw memory. The clash split the air, sending a ripple of displaced time outward — a temporal shockwave that aged the nearby stone a thousand years in an instant.

The Root recoiled.

"You can bleed," Elian muttered.

The Root hissed.

"And you can die."

Meanwhile, Calen sprinted toward the basin beneath the Core.

"Just buy me time!" he shouted, dragging a glowing crystal from his satchel.

"What are you doing?" Lysara called.

"Cartographer told me this might work — I'm going to invert the anchor!"

Elian bought him time.

He and Lysara danced around the Root, glyphs flying and blade flashing. Tendrils sliced the void, warping the very space they crossed — one nearly caught Cray, tearing a strip of time from his shoulder.

He screamed — the flesh where it struck turned to withered dust.

"Still alive!" he growled, clutching the wound, "but I really hate this guy."

Calen reached the Core.

The glowing crystal in his hand pulsed to life — and for a moment, the Fracture shuddered.

From deep within, a voice called out.

"Don’t."

It wasn’t the Root.
It was something else.

Something inside the Fracture.

Something trapped.

Calen hesitated, sweat pouring from his brow.

"It’s not just a wound… it’s a prison."

Lysara turned sharply.
"What?"

Cray’s face drained of color.
"You mean we’ve been trying to seal shut something that’s holding something worse inside?!"

Elian’s heart thundered.

"Calen. Look at me. Can it be done?"

Calen’s eyes blazed.

"Yes — but if we do this wrong, we could set it loose. All of it. Not just the Hollow. Everything the Old Masters ever locked away."

A decision.
And no more time.

The Root surged toward Calen, sensing the threat.

Elian leapt, striking it full across the chest — the Memory Blade biting deep, severing an entire arm of thought and shadow.

The Root screamed — a noise like metal twisting under centuries of pressure.

Elian landed hard, the blow rattling his bones.

"NOW, CALEN!"

Calen slammed the crystal into the Core.

Light exploded.

The Fracture reacted violently — the prison’s walls collapsing inward even as the Core tried to split open.

Screams filled the void — not from their enemies, but from within the fracture itself.

Something thrashed inside it.
Something bound.

Elian dropped to one knee, shielding his eyes.
"Calen—!"

"Almost—there!"

The crystal cracked — shards of memory scattering outward like shattered mirrors.

Then—

Silence.

The Root entity staggered.

The Core began to pull itself inward — the cracks stitching, the light sealing.

Whatever was trapped inside…
was staying inside.

For now.

The Root let out a final, hollow shriek — a sound of thwarted destiny.

"You have delayed oblivion," it rasped.

Elian raised the blade, breathing hard.
"Then we’ll delay it again. And again. However many times it takes."

The Root faded, dissipating into mist — not killed, but wounded. Banished.

For now.

The Core sealed.

The First Fracture closed.

And for the first time in countless ages…
the Underfold fell still.

They collapsed together on the stone, exhausted, wounded, alive.

Elian looked around at the team. Cray sat cross-legged, grinning through the blood on his lips. Lysara knelt beside Calen, who lay gasping but alive.

They’d done it.

Against every law of existence —
They’d done it.

From above, the Cartographer’s voice echoed softly.

"A thread cut. A wound bound. But the loom remains."

Elian raised his eyes.
"Then we’ll tear the whole loom apart next time."