The church bells tolled softly against the gray sky, their echoes drifting across the quiet cemetery where mourners gathered in clusters beneath black umbrellas. Rain had threatened since dawn, and now a mist fell lightly, blurring the edges of the gravestones and settling on faces already streaked with tears.Dylan’s coffin lay at the center, draped in white lilies and evergreen branches. The scent was heavy, cloying, mixing with damp earth as pallbearers lowered it slowly into the ground.Jackson stood motionless at the front, his shoulders squared but his face carved with grief he could no longer hide. His hands clenched and unclenched at his sides, as though the only thing keeping him upright was the discipline drilled into him since childhood. Inside, however, the weight was unbearable.He had promised himself Dylan would live. He had promised that all the sacrifices, would mean something. And yet, here they stood—burying another friend, another brother.Bella slipped quietly to

The air shimmered between them like a heatwave, the unnatural hum of Tyler’s corrupted energy pressing on their lungs, bending the light, warping the space itself. Jackson could feel it crawling against his skin as though it was a distorted reflection of the person he once used to be.Tyler’s smile widened, his voice unsteady yet sharp. “The Flameborn Compass, Jackson. Hand it over, or…” His gaze slid to Bella, predatory. “…she burns.”Bella’s breath hitched, but she didn’t back away. She stood tall behind Jackson, though her fingers gripped the edge of the car door so tightly her knuckles whitened.“You won’t touch her,” Jackson said, voice low, steady, and deadly serious. Tyler laughed, the sound fractured like glass cracking. “Always the protector. Always playing the hero. But you don't have that ability anymore Jackson."The distortion in the air thickened, swirling into jagged arcs of light, splitting cracks in the ground. Bella stumbled back, shielding her face from the stingi