The wind shifted around The White Valley that was normally silent and sacred but now pulsed with a heartbeat that didn’t belong to the land, to the hunters,or even to Tom.Snowly crouched low, his glowing fur dimming under the suffocating pressure. “This presence is ancient and much Older than the Spirit Domain itself.”Gabby pressed his back to the frozen cliff wall. You really mean“ Much Older than the, Snowly, what does that even mean? Who the hell is calling Tom!?”Snowly didn’t answer. Because he couldn’t.He was busy shaking.The reflection of Tom's awakened double was on one knee,clutching his head as silver static cracked violently along his arms.“Pull it together!”he snarled at himself. “I’m in control here, I’m the dominant consciousness, I don’t lose to anyone!”But his voice trembled.His eyes flickered.His aura stuttered like a dying flame.Snowly stepped toward him. “Reflection please tell me exactly what is pulling Tom!”The boy looked up.For the first time, he didn’t s

The darkness that swallowed Tom’s apartment wasn’t natural.It didn’t behave like shadows or the simple absence of light. It pressed a velvet black weight sinking into the room, stirring the air like something alive.Snowly’s hackles rose. “Tom, stay close.”Tom’s silver-lit eye was the only clear thing in the room. His breath fogged faintly, as if the temperature had dropped by fifteen degrees in seconds.“What is this?” Tom whispered.Snowly’s tail stiffened. “A tracking shroud. The Pale Order sent it to trace awakened Spirit energy.”Tom exhaled slowly. “It’s searching for me.”“And for Gabby,”Snowly added quietly.The reminder stabbed Tom’s chest like a blade. “Where do we start?”Snowly didn’t answer. Instead, he sniffed the air in a quick, sharp motion and suddenly jerked his head toward the far wall.“There,” Snowly said. “A thread.”Tom blinked. “A what?”“A spirit trace Gabby left behind,” Snowly explained. “You can only see it if”Tom’s eye flared instinctively, revealing a f

Night settled over the Ridge with an unease that felt almost alive.The wind stirred the dust in slow spirals, as though the air itself was bracing for something that had long been delayed. Tom stood on the balcony of the inn, arms folded, staring towardthe distant lights of the city. Snowly lay at his feet, white fur shimmering faintly under the moonlight though tonight, even Snowly seemed restless.Tom’s mind was a storm.Aelor’s warning.Gabby’s growing influence.The Hunters’ reappearance.And the revelation that his mother’s legacywasn’t just a system, it was a weapon.He exhaled slowly. “Everything is changing too quickly.”Snowly lifted his head, eyes glowing an icy blue. “Change was always the path, Tom. What matters is whether you walk it or run from it.”“And what if I don’t know which is which?” Tom asked.Snowly rose and nudged his arm. “Then it means you’re still choosing. Confusion is not failure.”Tom chuckled weakly. “You sound like Aelor.”“Aelor sounds like me.”Tom smi

There was no sound,no breath. No world,Only white asTom floated in it, weightless and suspended as though the universe had been erased and replaced with pure blankness.His body wasn’t here. His voice wasn’t here.But the burning in his Spirit Eye survived and so he asked “Where am I?”The question didn’t echo. It simply existed. And because nothing else did, the question became the entire space around him.Then suddenly crack,A thin fissure of black split across the white expanse like glass fracturing.Tom’s breathing returned in a violent rush as gravity slammed him downward onto a floor that didn’t exist moments ago.He staggered upright, blinking hard.He stood in a vast,endless cathedral of white mist and glowing symbols.Silver threads hung suspended in the air like constellations frozen mid pattern.Tom gasped. “The Spirit Core Realm?”A voice drifted behind him, calm and cold.“Not the Core,The Chamber of Origin.”Tom whirled around and nearly fell.The White Shadow stood at the fa

The night wind lashed the glass towers of Silverlight Heights, carrying with it a low, humming tremor one Tom felt vibrating beneath his ribs the moment he and Snowly emerged from the stairwell roof.The city was wrong tonight. Too still. Too watchful.Snowly’s fur stood like needles. “Tom, do you hear that?”Tom did. Not with his ears.With his bad eye.A single tone, faint like a string plucked in the dark. And the moment he recognized it, a pulse of pain shot through his scarred socket.He stumbled forward, gripping the ledge. “The Thread it’s being pulled.”Snowly growled. “By who?”He didn’t get to answer.A silver disc split the sky like a blade WHIP cutting a perfect ripple across the clouds.Tom froze. “Oh no that’s not possible.”Snowly’s tail lowered. “Someone opened a Spirit Gate.”And not a small one.This was wide enough to swallow a stadium.The shimmering oval flickered between the skyscrapers, dripping sparks that sizzled into the air and cracked the surrounding windows.From