The morning was still.
Too still.
Jayden stood at the edge of the southern ridge, where the city spilled like a maze of bones and memories. The wind carried a strange quiet — not peaceful, but tense. The kind of silence that came before a scream.
He could feel it in his blood.
The shift.
The calm before the roar.
> "It's coming," he muttered.
Behind him, Aria stepped up, her boots crunching on gravel.
> "How bad do you think it'll be?"
Jayden's jaw tightened.
> "Bad enough to mark the end."
She didn't ask if he meant the end of them or their enemies. Both were equally likely.
--
Later that day, Jayden walked the halls alone. The laughter of the children had been replaced by quiet preparation — whispered prayers, sharpened blades, final letters being tucked into coats.
Each face he passed carried the weight of tomorrow.
At the edge of the hallway, he stopped before a photo — faded and cracked — of his parents. His mother's warm eyes. His father's guarded strength.
> I'm still your son, he thought. But I'm no longer your boy.
He pressed a hand to the frame, then turned and kept walking.
No more ghosts.
Not today.
Anna had changed.
Not in a loud, dramatic way.
But in small, undeniable pieces.
She stood straighter.
She questioned orders now — not out of defiance, but because she understood what was at stake.
She wasn't afraid to speak.
Or to fight.
Elias gave her a blade that once belonged to one of the Syndicate generals. Polished, curved, cruel.
She twirled it once, then nodded.
> "I'll use it better than he ever did."
Jayden had nothing to add.
She already knew what he was thinking.
---
Dinner was simple — boiled roots, flatbread, bits of salted meat.
No one complained.
Sophie told a story about a cat that used to steal pancakes from her window.
It didn't matter that half the kids had heard it ten times already.
They laughed anyway.
Jayden sat beside Lila, who clutched a blanket and looked up at him every few minutes like she expected the world to collapse again.
When the others weren't looking, she slipped her hand into his.
He didn't let go.
--
Just before midnight, a runner arrived.
Bleeding.
Panting.
Eyes wide with dread.
> "They're coming."
The words chilled every room.
A message burned into the man's arm — the Syndicate's seal, surrounded by a snake devouring its own tail.
Jayden leaned close.
> "How many?"
> "All of them," the man rasped. "They're bringing the red banners. The Crimson Protocol."
Everyone froze.
The Crimson Protocol wasn't war.
It was annihilation.
---
They had one day.
Twenty-four hours.
Every hand went to work.
Barricades were reinforced.
Tunnels were collapsed to prevent flanking.
Traps were laid.
Children and non-combatants were led into the deep cellar below the base — the oldest level, carved when the city was young and full of ambition.
Jayden gave the final speech standing atop the roof under the moonlight.
> "Tomorrow, we end this. Not with fear. Not with rage.
But with fire. With belief. With each other."
No cheering followed.
Only nods.
Eyes burning with purpose.
---
Jayden couldn't sleep.
Neither could Aria.
They stood beside each other on the watchtower, looking down at the sea of darkness just beyond the hills.
Somewhere out there, their enemies were gathering.
Jayden glanced sideways.
> "You ever think about what you'll do after?"
Aria didn't answer for a while.
Then softly:
> "Plant tomatoes."
Jayden blinked.
She smirked.
> "Not everything has to end in fire. I want to feel dirt under my nails. Watch something grow."
Jayden looked away.
> "That sounds... nice."
> "What about you?"
He thought for a long time.
> "Sleep. Then maybe… write about all this."
Aria arched a brow.
> "Write?"
> "Yeah. Not for fame. Just so people remember what it took. So kids like Lila don't forget."
A pause.
Then she offered her hand.
Jayden took it.
They stood like that for a long time, hand in hand, as the stars watched silently from above.
---
Hours before dawn, a shadow appeared at the gates.
Tall. Hooded.
Alone.
Jayden moved first, blade drawn.
But the figure raised empty hands.
Then lowered its hood.
Gasps followed.
It was her.
Nadia.
Once a lieutenant of the Syndicate. Long believed dead. Betrayed by her own blood.
Aria's jaw clenched.
> "Why are you here?"
Nadia's eyes burned.
> "Because even wolves abandon a collapsing den.
They've gone too far. I'll show you where their commander will be. And I'll fight."
Jayden didn't respond right away.
He studied her eyes.
Her scars.
And the trembling in her clenched fists.
> "One lie, and you die," he said.
Nadia nodded once.
> "Then let's make that death count for something."
--
As the sun finally peeked above the horizon, painting the sky in blood and ash, Jayden stared down at the horizon.
A line of red banners rippled in the wind.
The Syndicate was coming.
And they brought everything.
Machines.
Beasts.
Mercenaries.
Even traitors who once wore Jayden's crest.
But they were ready.
No more running.
No more hiding.
Today, they would burn or rise.
And in the flames, the truth of who they were would be revealed.
Jayden stepped into his armor — black with silver trim, gifted by Tielen before her mission in the East.
Straps clicked.
Buckles tightened.
He tied a red ribbon around one wrist.
Sophie's idea.
For luck.
For memory.
For love.
And when he finally stepped into the yard where everyone waited, silence fell.
They all looked to him.
The once-forgotten boy.
The hidden heir of ruin.
The protector of broken dreams.
Jayden nodded.
Once.
And they moved.
Together
Into the storm