(Kael moves forward through columns of smoke. The world seems frozen. No more screams, no sirens. Only motionless bodies and the crunch of glass beneath his steps.)

(He covers his face with a scarf hanging from an overturned bicycle. The smell of burning tears at his senses.)

(He stops. Looks at the horizon. The figure of the chosen one keeps walking, calm, as if he weren’t the epicenter of the disaster.)

Kael (thinking):

Is this… what the gods call order?

(His eyes drift to a body petrified against the door of a pharmacy. An old man. Still with his eyes open, but dry. As if his soul had been ripped out.)

Kael (whispering):

— Who are you…?

(The air vibrates faintly. As if something answered. But there are no words. Only a sensation: an invisible weight crushing his chest.)

[Scene II – Effect of the Aura | 8:39 A.M.]

(Kael leans against a wall. His vision blurs. He’s not inside yet… but he’s at the edge. On the periphery of the aura.)

(His body trembles. He hears things. Not with his ears… with his memories.)

> Voice of his mother (distorted):

— Are you running away again?

> Voice of his dead friend:

— You can’t save anyone, Kael. Not even yourself.

(He grabs his head. Tries to reason. He’s not inside. But the aura brushes him. Like a finger on his back before the fall.)

Kael (thinking):

This is not power. This is… judgment. Pure. Raw. Wordless.

(A silhouette approaches. It’s not the stranger who started this. It’s a young man, wearing a janitor’s uniform. He’s in shock, but still conscious.)

Kael:

— Are you okay? Do you feel it too?

Young man:

— No… I didn’t want to remember. I didn’t want to see that again…

(He kneels. Cries. Kael watches him in silence.)

Kael (thinking):

This isn’t an attack. It’s a trial. A mental prison that only opens from the inside.

[Scene III – The Codex and the Decision | 8:47 A.M.]

(The Codex, hidden beneath his jacket, vibrates. Kael pulls it out. The letters burn upon its pages.)

> "Enter the Eye of the Storm. Survive yourself."

(Kael breathes. Trembles. Looks toward the stranger, now standing before a collapsed tower, his arms still open like a cross.)

Kael (softly):

— Survive…? Is that all that’s left…?

(He makes a decision. Slow. Irrevocable.)

Kael (softly):

— Fuck you, damn gods…

(He takes a step. And then another. Until the golden aura swallows him whole.)

(His eyes close.)

Codex Gnosis Dei – Fragment IX

> When the soul crosses the threshold, it faces neither gods nor demons,

but itself.

He who enters the light without knowing himself

shall be flayed by his own shadows.

For the chosen one does not punish with fire,

but with truth.

And there is no hell more pure

than that of a memory that cannot be buried.

Judgment does not come from above,

but from within.