The journey to Crossroads took five days of hard travel through increasingly lawless territory. The hills gave way to a vast, wind-scoured plain dotted with skeletal trees and the occasional burnt-out farmstead. This was the true buffer zone, claimed by no sect, ruled by the strong, and avoided by the wise.Crossroads, when they finally saw it, was not a town so much as a sprawling, feverish scab on the landscape. No walls, just a chaotic jumble of tents, ramshackle wooden buildings, and a few more permanent stone structures, all clustering around the intersection of three ancient trade routes that were now paths for smugglers and fugitives. Smoke from countless fires hazed the air, and the din of shouting, bartering, and occasional violence was a constant hum.“Remember,” Alistair said as they approached the outer ring of tents. “We are travelers. Mercenaries looking for work. You are ‘Grey.’ I am ‘Silas.’ We know nothing about sects, anomalies, or void-walkers. We are just anothe

The Sundered Spire rose from the cracked, white expanse of the salt flat like a bone shoved through dead skin. It wasn't a natural formation. It was the ruin of a tower, its upper half sheared off by some ancient cataclysm, leaving a jagged stump of black, glassy stone that shimmered in the relentless sun. The air here was dead still and tasted of alkali and old, baked despair. No birds circled it. Nothing grew for miles.Kieran and Alistair stood at the edge of the flat, squinting at the distant spire."Charming," Alistair muttered, checking the strap on his water skin. "If you wanted to leave a package no one would stumble upon, this would be the place."They crossed the salt pan, their boots crunching loudly in the utter silence. The spire grew larger, more imposing. Up close, they could see it wasn't just glassy rock. Veins of faint, silver light pulsed deep within the black stone, like dying embers in ash. It hummed, a sub-audible vibration that made their teeth ache."The cur

The doorway in the spire didn't lead into a cave or a room. It opened onto a bridge a narrow span of glowing, pearlescent mist suspended over an impossible expanse. Below them, instead of earth or sky, was a slow-swirling nebula of colors that had no name, hues that spoke directly to emotion: the bruised purple of a childhood shame, the aching gold of a first love lost, the cold, sharp silver of a long-held grudge.The Garden was not a place of soil and plants. It was a three-dimensional tapestry of crystallized feelings.Massive, intricate formations some like frozen geysers, others like forests of gemstone trees glowed with internal light. A grove of "Sorrow Spires" wept slow, shimmering tears that evaporated before they hit the ground. A field of "Joy-Blooms" pulsed with a warm, humming light that made Kieran's chest feel tight. The air was thick, not with scent, but with the psychic weight of a trillion bottled moments.It was beautiful. It was horrific. It was the most overwhel

The crack in the stillness shield wasn't a sound. It was a feeling of something vital snapping psychic ice sheet giving way. The world didn't grow louder; it grew emptier, as if the concept of noise itself had been wounded.Alistair was thrown to his knees by the spiritual backlash, his mind reeling from the sudden vacuum of sensation. The Curator shrieked, a sound that tore at the edges of reality, their translucent form fraying like mist in a gale.At the top of the Spire, Kieran's body convulsed. The black fluid congealed void energy mixed with the Spire's memory stone dripped from his nose and the corners of his eyes. The perfect, silent frequency he broadcast stuttered, corrupted by the Ravener's direct assault.In the Garden, the fracture in the shield spread, spiderwebbing outwards. Where the black lines touched, the crystallized emotions didn't shatter. They vanished. A grove of "Innocence Petals" simply ceased to be, replaced by a patch of absolute, sterile grey. The Rave

The stillness that settled over the salt flat wasn't peaceful. It was the exhausted quiet after a screaming match with God. The air felt thin, scoured clean not by wind, but by the passing of energies that had no business touching the mortal world.Alistair dragged himself to the base of the Sundered Spire, his body aching from spiritual whiplash. Above, Kieran was a dark shape against the bruised twilight sky, unmoving. The Curator was gone, dissolved into duty fulfilled.Then came the voice. Not a sound, but the cessation of sound forced into meaning. It vibrated up from the ground, through the Spire, into Alistair's teeth.SILENCE IS A LIE.The words were an assault on the mind, a promise of unraveling. FEELING IS DISORDER. I WILL BRING ORDER. BEGINNING WITH THE FALSE QUIET.The Ravener wasn't speaking to them. It was declaring its intent to the universe. And its first target was the source of the quiet that had dared to cage it: Kieran.The pressure shifted. It moved off the Gard