Blackreach wasn’t built to feel earthquakes.But it did.A second tremor hit the city—deep, low, and rolling like the growl of something waking thousands of meters below. Lights flickered in every district. Warning sirens howled as civilians spilled onto the streets.In the North Quadrant, the glass ribs of the Sovereign Citadel shuddered.In the West Slums, water tanks burst and rolled into alleys.Above the city, old suspension bridges oscillated like taut strings.And in the sky, visible only to those sensitive enough to feel it, a web of blue fracture-lines rippled through the clouds… spreading… widening…The shockwave Kai released wasn’t done.It was only beginning.(In Blackreach) “We have a bigger problem.”Commander Hux swore under his breath as another tremor rattled the holo-table.“Status?” he barked.A dozen officers scrambled around the room.“Seismic index rising—source still unknown!”“No enemy movement detected!”“Convergence spikes are at catastrophic instability!”“

The world around Kai flickered like a dying interface—light trembling at the edges, colors bending wrong. Veil held his face between her hands, her voice shaking even though she tried to hide it.“Kai… stay with me—look at me.”His vision glitched.Her face split into three copies, then remerged. The shard inside him thrashed violently as if trying to escape his body.WARNING.ASCENSION PATH: CORRUPTED.TEMPORAL THREAD: DISPLACED.Kai clenched his teeth as another pulse tore through him. “I—I can’t… stabilize…”Veil pressed her forehead to his.“Then I’ll stabilize you.”She pushed her energy into him without hesitation.The effect was immediate violent, unpredictable and wrong.The ground beneath them cracked open with a low, grinding groan. Shapes rose beneath the floor, like shadows trying to form bodies.Kai’s eyes widened.“That’s not me—”Veil stepped in front of him, blades flashing into existence.“I know. Something else is here.”A ripple cut the air open like a tear in fabri

The station floor split open.The shockwave blasted outward like a living thing, ripping rails out of the concrete and hurling debris through the air. Veil twisted mid-flight, planting her feet against a pillar and absorbing the impact with a grunt.Kai wasn’t so lucky.The tremor hit him like a hammer. His unstable body flickered in and out of alignment, his left side dissolving into static before snapping back into shape.“Kai—MOVE!” Veil’s voice cut through the chaotic echo of shifting metal.He tried.He really did.But the moment he pushed off the ground, his legs buckled as a surge of paradox energy tore through his nerves.The Primordial Ascendant descended the stairs slowly, each step bending the space beneath his feet as though the world were lowering itself for him.“You cannot flee,” he said calmly. “You cannot fight. You cannot bargain. You are incomplete.”Kai grit his teeth.“Then come finish me.”The Primordial Ascendant smiled faintly.“Gladly.”He raised a hand.Reali

The sky over Blackreach bent into impossible angles. Buildings fractured into slivers of light and shadow. Cars, streetlamps, even the air itself pulsed as if reality were a drum being struck by Kai’s awakening energy.Veil’s cloak whipped violently as she sprinted toward him, blades igniting with blue energy that crackled against the warped gravity. She could barely stand—every step felt like wading through molten glass but she had no choice. Kai was spiraling beyond comprehension.“Kai!” she shouted, though her voice barely carried over the static roar of his core.He didn’t answer. Not with words. Not with recognition. His form flickered—humanoid one moment, fractal constructs the next, a void of shifting geometry the next. Multiple versions of him spoke at once, overlapping voices in her mind.“Veil… I… cannot… anchor… myself…”She ducked under a descending shard of warped concrete and rolled forward. Reaching him wasn’t enough, she needed to reach him in mind and soul, to pull hi

The first rays of fractured sunlight cut through Blackreach’s smoke-filled sky, glinting off twisted metal and shattered glass. The city was alive in a new way, vibrating, raw, unstable but still standing. For now.Kai stood at the center of the North Quadrant, the Paradox Core inside him still humming, pulsing with a soft blue glow. Every step he took left faint cracks in the pavement—proof that his body was no longer entirely aligned with the rules of reality.Veil followed closely, scanning the skyline. “Damage report?” she asked.Kai shook his head, voice rasping. “Too early. The city… it’s… changed. Not just broken. Something else. Something… alive.”From the West Slums, smoke plumes twisted skyward like spirals. Street signs were bent impossibly, hovering in midair as if some invisible hand had lifted them. People stumbled into the streets, faces pale, eyes wide, some terrified, some in awe of the phenomena.Commander Hux’s voice crackled over the comms. “All units, stabilize ci