The spores pulsed.
Once.
Twice.
Brighter.
And then everything flashed green.
Seul didn't wait to see what came next.
The moment the light flared above them, she pulled.
A silent command to gravity rippled outward from her, folding the space between them in an instant. Joon jerked sideways from where he'd been crouched behind a wrecked sign; Jin, halfway to shifting his stance, was yanked off-balance mid-step. Even Echo, alert and always in motion, was dragged back as if the ground itself tilted inward.
They collided around her in a rough knot of limbs and breath.
Seul raised her hands and pushed outward.
It wasn't like the other times, lifting debris, shifting weight, bending gravity to create motion. This was different. Something inside her snapped into place, a pressure coiling at her core and rushing to her skin like molten iron. It wasn't warmth, exactly, more like density, like a second skin wrapped tight around her body and then swelling outward in a pulse of force.
