The silence after Cipher's warning wrapped around Kael like a heavy blanket.
> "You're waking up things that were meant to stay buried."
That one sentence kept repeating inside his head. It was louder than any explosion they had survived, and much harder to forget. Even after they left the old Dominion vault and stepped into the cool night air, Kael could still feel the weight of those words pressing on his chest. It wasn't just a warning. It felt like something deeper—like Cipher knew something important, something dangerous, and now Kael had stirred it awake.
The three of them—Kael, Iria, and Rai—stood on a rocky ridge, looking out at what remained of the Dominion stronghold. What had once been a massive base full of power and pride was now just a dead landscape of ruins. Craters marked the ground like old wounds. Towers had been blown apart, leaving behind twisted steel and shattered walls. The broken pieces stretched across the land, glowing faintly under the light of the fractured moons above.
Kael stared into the distance, quiet and thoughtful.
Iria stepped closer to him, her voice calm but curious. "That guy… Cipher. He knew something about you. About your Void Nexus. He wasn't surprised to see it."
"He knew too much," Rai added, frowning. "And the way he vanished? That wasn't normal Aether-tech. That was something way older. Old World level. That's the kind of phasing tech the Dominion could barely copy, even with all their resources."
Kael nodded slowly, not really reacting to their words. His thoughts were elsewhere—back in the vault, where he had read something that shook him deeply. The logs, the old files, had mentioned something called the Null Catalyst. And one line wouldn't stop repeating in his mind:
Subject Zero: The Voidborne Prototype. Designation—Kael Veyrn.
He clenched his jaw.
"I wasn't born," he finally said, voice low. "I was made."
Rai's head snapped toward him, surprised by the confession. But he stayed quiet, waiting for Kael to explain.
Kael's hands curled into fists. "The Dominion wanted to build a perfect conduit. Someone who could use pure Aetherium without being destroyed by it. They wanted control over the most powerful force in the world. That's what the Null Catalyst was meant to be."
He looked down, his eyes distant.
"But it didn't work. The power was too much. The experiment was unstable. Dangerous. They shut it down and buried everything—including the first version of me."
Iria looked at him carefully. "You believe you're that prototype?"
Kael gave a slow nod. "I don't just believe it. I know it."
For a few seconds, none of them said anything. The only sound was the soft wind brushing against the ruins, carrying with it the smell of burned stone and rusted metal.
Then Rai's comms crystal buzzed. A familiar voice came through—Tessa's, clear but tense.
"You guys alive?"
Rai tapped the control. "Barely. Thanks to ancient murder machines and creepy shadow-walking weirdos."
"Good. Because something's come up. You need to get back. Fast."
Kael's eyes narrowed. "What happened?"
"I'm not explaining it over comms. Just get moving."
They didn't waste a second. The trip back to Tessa's hideout—a secret tech lab hidden under the remains of an old transport hub—was quiet and fast. The air felt strange on the ride back. Not just colder, but heavier. It was like the world itself knew something had changed.
Tessa was waiting for them when they arrived. She usually had a smart remark or a half-smile, but this time her face was serious. Her pink hair was pulled back tightly, and her mechanical gauntlet was humming with a low, steady whirr.
"There's been a situation," she said, getting straight to the point. "At the Aetherfront."
Kael's body tensed. "The border zone?"
Tessa gave a small nod. "Yeah. One of our forward outposts—completely wiped out. Not destroyed. Just… gone. No signs of a fight. No bodies. No damage. Just silence."
"Void corruption?" Iria guessed, eyes sharp.
Tessa looked uneasy. "We thought so. But it's worse. I broke into some old Dominion satellite data. They were tracking leftover Aether trails—residual energy signatures. And there's a movement pattern."
She pointed to a flickering display. "Something is moving underground. Not teleporting. Not flying. It's tunneling. Like it's swimming through Aetherium itself."
Rai raised an eyebrow. "That's not possible."
"I know," Tessa said. "But it's doing it anyway. And the path it's taking? It's going right back to the ruins you just came from."
Kael's stomach sank. "It's following me."
The whole room went quiet.
Iria didn't back down. She stepped forward, voice firm. "Then we face it. We don't hide."
Kael shook his head. "No. Not yet. We don't even know what it is. The Sentinel in the ruins recognized me. It responded to me. And now this thing is coming… probably because of me. We need more answers."
Tessa turned toward one of her consoles and pulled up a glowing map—an old star chart from the Dominion era, full of faded markers and red zones. One dot blinked softly in the corner of the screen.
"There's one more place where the Voidborne Protocol was mentioned. It's called Echelon 9. An off-grid research sector. Dominion red zone. Totally sealed for decades."
Kael stared at the blinking light.
"Then we go there," he said without hesitation.
Rai groaned, already knowing it was coming. "Of course we do."
Everyone started preparing for the next trip, checking weapons, charging gear, and loading supplies. As they worked, Kael wandered to the back of the room. His eyes landed on an old mirror stuck into the wall—probably a leftover from before the fall of the Dominion. The glass was cracked and dusty, but Kael could still see himself.
His silver eyes flickered, shifting like static on a broken screen.
Suddenly, he heard a whisper. No one else seemed to notice it. It didn't come from a speaker or the comms—it came from the shadows, from the Void itself.
> "You are not just the beginning… You are the convergence."
Kael didn't turn away. He didn't blink.
He whispered back, "Then I'll find out what that means."
The shadows pulsed gently behind him, moving like waves across the floor. Silent. Watching. Waiting.
Something ancient was rising. And Kael was right in the center of it.