Location: Surface Ruins – Outer Crater Rim
The wind had gone still.
Kael didn't like it.
He paused mid-scan, hand resting near the hilt of his phase blade. Yanis walked ahead, arms crossed, still frustrated from their earlier argument.
She had demanded answers about the "Echo Twin" designation.
Kael hadn't given them.
> "I don't need to be protected," she said. "Not from them. And especially not from you."
> "You think I'm hiding the truth?"
> "I know you are."
The moment hung.
Then Kael blinked — and the world twisted.
Sound vanished. Color bled. Yanis froze in mid-step.
---
Behind Kael: A whisper
> "She bleeds the wrong kind of light."
Kael spun, blade out—too late.
A thin line of silver sliced across his shoulder. Blood hit the air in reverse.
There stood The Pale Knife.
A figure in robes of white static, wrapped in silence. Face hidden by a mask made of harvested Reclaimer bone. Blade gleaming with quantum glyphs.
> "One cut," it whispered. "That is all it takes."
Kael lunged.
The Knife moved before motion even began.
They clashed — once — and Kael was bleeding from five places.
> [Alert: Neural Path Prediction – Enemy Operating 3.4 Seconds Ahead]
> [Combat Rating: UNFAVORABLE]
---
Yanis unfroze
She turned — just in time to see Kael crash into the dirt, coughing blood.
The Pale Knife tilted its head.
> "She is already seeded. Remove her, and the line ends."
Yanis pulled her blade.
> "Try me."
---
The Fight
Yanis charged. The Knife shifted between milliseconds, stabbing through possibilities. Cuts landed—small, precise, deadly.
She fell to one knee—then screamed as red light burst from her hands.
The Knife flinched.
Not from pain.
From confusion.
Yanis wasn't moving anymore.
She was floating.
And her voice had changed.
> "You come to cut the Echo."
> "You come too late."
Her eyes went pure crimson.
The girl in red spoke through her.
> "I remember you, Pale Knife."
> "I killed you once before."
A shockwave knocked the assassin back, shattering the ground.
The Knife landed, coughing, blade arm fractured.
> "Not... possible…"
Kael stood, staring.
> "That wasn't you," he said to Yanis.
She blinked.
> "I don't know what just happened."
> "You didn't stop the Knife," Kael said. "She did."
> "The Echo... just fought back."
---
Elsewhere – Choir Citadel
The Choir stirred.
> "The Pale Knife failed."
> "The Echo is real."
> "Then it is time."
> "Summon Aeyra Vael."
> "Let the Exiled Queen finish what the King began."