Isarys stepped forward.“Because truth isn’t a weapon. It’s a bridge. You fear collapse. So do we. But what collapses when truths are told... was never meant to hold us.”The Lurien tilted their head, studying her."You think your peace is permanent. You think every voice deserves air.”“No,” Isarys replied softly. “But we believe even sealed voices deserve choice.”A long pause. The Lurien glanced to one another."Then hear our chapter,” the emissary whispered. “And decide if it ever belonged among yours.”Alone in the Echo Room, Aneiros sat beneath the floating glyphs that responded to emotional resonance. They flickered erratically—grief, guilt, longing.He closed his eyes.“You still hide from the past, Aneiros.”The voice came from within. A tether. A bond from long ago.“I do not hide,” he whispered. “I remember... so no one else has to.”"Then why do your hands still shake?”He opened his eyes. The glyphs hovered still. “Because what’s coming... is more than memory. It’s recko

Meanwhile, on Virelli’s Edge...The wind howled across the jagged cliffs, carrying with it the echoes of lost names and wars never written. Beneath the ice, long-buried command bunkers stirred. One by one, old security systems sparked into life—triggered not by command, but by resonance.Inside a dormant vault, a lone archivist—human, barely thirty, named Rohen—watched as the sealed databanks flickered for the first time in generations.A voice pulsed through the static."Archive breach... Codex reactivation sequence initiated."He backed away instinctively. “That’s impossible. These banks were locked under Final Accord Protocol.”Then came the symbol: Catalyst Sigil. Validated.He didn’t have time to react before the room dimmed, and a hologram emerged—not Xena, but a younger projection of her, encoded before her exile."f you’re seeing this,” the projection said, “then Haven still clings to borrowed peace.”"Then let me remind you what that peace cost.”And the wall peeled open—reve

The Reckoner dropped out of slipspace into the ghost system of Calder’s Wound—once a thriving cradle of rebellion, now a scorched void where even time stuttered.Asteroids spun like frozen screams. Debris fields formed orbital tombs. But at the heart of it all pulsed a station—Eclipser—ancient, dormant, waiting.Jaeven squinted through the viewport. “This place shouldn’t exist. It was destroyed during the Third Annulling.”Xena nodded. “Which means someone rebuilt it. Or never left.”The Witness whispered: “This is where it ends—or begins again.”But someone was already there.The sky cracked.Dozens of dreadships emerged from nullspace—black, bone-shaped vessels with the insignia of the Pale Accord, an elite enforcer order long thought extinct.They weren’t here to negotiate.A transmission cut through all channels:"By order of the Accord Prime, surrender the Witness. The Reckoner will be obliterated. No record of this journey will survive."Xena stood. “And if we refuse?”The voice

Clara awoke with a scream.Her hands gripped the bedsheets soaked in sweat, and her chest rose and fell with panicked gasps. For a moment, the world around her felt unfamiliar. The soft hum of her apartment’s heater. The filtered city light through the blinds. Everything was normal… too normal.But Xena wasn’t there.“Xena?” she called out, stumbling from the bed. “Baby?”No answer.The silence screamed louder than any alarm.She ran to the living room. No trace of her daughter. No toys on the carpet. No trail of snack wrappers. Just a photo frame on the counter—Clara, Xena, and the man she once loved: Brown. She picked it up with trembling hands.Her voice cracked.“You promised me... you'd stay away.”Then something clicked. The shadows in the corner of the room flickered.And a note appeared on the wall, burned in ancient war script."Time has taken her. Follow the bloodline, or lose her forever."Clara’s breath caught.“No. Not again.”Meanwhile: The Outer Fringe, Timeline Fold 12

The ground split beneath their feet as the Paradox Prince descended fully, his blade dragging time with every step. Flowers wilted in fast-forward, stones aged to dust, and even light bent unnaturally around him.Brown’s hand gripped his sword so tightly his knuckles turned white. “Clara, take Xena and run. Now.”“No,” Xena said firmly, stepping forward. Her small frame shimmered with the golden energy of the glyph, her eyes reflecting pure determination. “I know who he is.”The Paradox Prince removed his mask slowly.Beneath it… was a boy’s face.No older than fifteen.With the same storm-gray eyes as Brown.Clara gasped. “No…”Xena’s voice cracked. “You're... my brother.”The boy—no, the Prince—nodded. “From a future that should have never been erased.”Brown’s heart twisted. “I never knew…”“You weren’t supposed to!” the Prince snapped, rage seeping from every syllable. “You left my mother—abandoned me in a time ripped apart by war. She died waiting. I grew up in a world without yo