The sky above the Rewritten World shimmered with impossible hues, each fragment of color a fragment of a reality Kael had once saved. Gold glimmered along the edges of violet clouds, deep azure streaked the heavens like brushstrokes from a cosmic painter, and soft pulses of emerald light wove through the horizon. The Riftstorm’s lingering consciousness had not disappeared; it had settled into a delicate equilibrium, a sentient aurora watching over a world reshaped.Lyria stood atop a high ridge, the wind tugging at her hair as her eyes traced the valley below. Rivers twisted with impossible geometries, bending in elegant arcs that defied natural logic. Forests shimmered with vitality, leaves and crystalline growths pulsing in rhythm with the residual Riftstorm energy. Every breath of air carried faint traces of Rift-light and earth’s renewal, tinged with the smell of rain and vibrant flora.Beside her, the faint glow of the Core Echo pulsed gently, Kael’s consciousness fully integrate

The Riftborn Academy ruins always felt colder before dawn.Steel groaned under Aedan’s weight as he forced himself through another shield-stance drill. His arms shook, vision blurring with exhaustion. Dirt and cracked white-stone formed a jagged arena beneath his boots, illuminated only by the flickering blue glow of Riftstorm lanterns.His shield—more a relic than a weapon—vibrated violently as he strained to synchronize with it. The etched sigils along its surface pulsed like a heartbeat resisting his own.[System Alert: Synchronization Rate — 27%… 28%… WARNING: Instability Detected][Failure Imminent]Aedan gritted his teeth as a spike of pain shot from his shoulder down to his spine.He refused to let go.Because every time he closed his eyes, he saw his village burning. He heard the ravaged screams of his mother and little brother. He smelled the smoke of Crown experiments gone wrong. And he remembered the soldiers who laughed as they left him buried beneath the rubble—convinced

The village lay quiet beneath the fractured horizon—a scattering of timber homes, smoke curling weakly from chimneys, and farmers who kept glancing toward the Riftlands like prey sensing a predator’s return. Aedan tightened his cloak and stepped past a cracked boundary stone. Aya followed, saying nothing; their earlier rhythm had faded back into wary distance. Even so, he felt her gaze on his back—evaluating every choice. The smell of ash reached him before the first scream. Aedan ran. Around the corner of a burned granary, a farmer struggled against a Riftborn wolf twice the size of the ones before—fur bristling with jagged obsidian shards, eyes glowing like furnace coals. [System Alert: Variant Detected — Riftborn Direwolf] [Adaptive Tier: Beta-Class] [Recommended Strategy: Coordinated Fire Support] Aedan didn’t hesitate. He charged in, blade up. “Draw it away from him,” Aya snapped, flanking the creature even as she spoke. “I’ll blind it.” The wolf lunged. Aedan met it he

The northern plains were a hellscape of violet lightning and shattered earth. Rift energy hissed through the air like serpents, and every breath tasted metallic. Aedan’s shield-mark flared violently, reacting to the storm with a pulse that shook his bones.[System Alert: Riftstorm Communication Detected — Direct Link Established][Warning: Consciousness Level Rising — Approach with Caution]Ahead, the Riftstorm churned into a vortex, an eye of violet fury where the wind itself seemed to bend toward a hidden center. This was the heart of the anomaly—the core Aedan had been drawn to.Aya turned to him, expression sharp beneath the lightning-lit sky. “This is it. Get close to the core. Stay alive. Protect the mage.”Solara’s fire blazed along the jagged ground, illuminating storm-forged rifts. “I’ll keep anything from getting through,” she said. “But be ready. Whatever is at the core isn’t natural.”Aedan clenched his fists, the shield-mark burning hotter than ever. A pulse of energy ran

The northern plains shook. Rift energy spiraled upward in wild, jagged bolts, shattering the twilight as if the sky itself had cracked. Aedan’s shield vibrated violently, humming with the intelligence of the Riftstorm. It was no longer semi-autonomous—it now acted with an awareness that made him simultaneously the master and the passenger.[System Alert: Riftstorm Autonomy — Level 4 Initiated][Mental Strain: 68%][Skill Available: Rift Conduit Strike — Requires Full Merge Synchronization]Before them, multiple Rift mutations emerged from the churning energy. Unlike the Alpha mutations Aedan had faced before, these creatures moved in coordinated packs, their intelligence heightened by the Riftstorm itself. Limbs crackled with energy, eyes glowed with semi-conscious malice, and their attacks seemed preemptively calculated to test every defensive motion Aedan had mastered.[New Enemies Detected: Rift Mutations — Pack Elite, x5][Threat Level: Catastrophic — Coordinated Attack Pattern Ob