Home / Fantasy / THE SHATTERED SIGIL: CHRONICLES OF THE LAST DAWN / Chapter 53:What Remains When The Light Is Gone
Chapter 53:What Remains When The Light Is Gone
last update2025-12-13 20:21:30

CHAPTER 53 — What Remains When the Light Is Gone

The bond went silent.

Not gradually.

Not gently.

One moment, Auren was everywhere—threaded through Lyra’s breath, Eira’s heartbeat, Corren’s pulse of panic, Silas’s sharp calculations—

—and the next, there was nothing.

No shared thoughts.

No echo of emotion.

No warmth.

Just cold.

Auren collapsed.

The world hit him like a physical blow, sound returning all at once in a violent rush—shattering stone, roaring void-winds, the distant thunder of collapsing reality. He gasped, lungs burning, vision swimming as if he’d surfaced too fast from deep water.

The sigil on his palm was gone.

Not broken.

Gone.

In its place remained a faint scar, pale and lifeless, like a brand long healed but never forgotten.

He tried to stand.

His legs failed.

Somewhere nearby, someone screamed his name.

“AUREN!”

Eira.

Her voice tore through the battlefield with raw terror. She sprinted toward him, flames trailing behind her uncontrolled, wild. She dropped to her kne
Continue to read this book for free
Scan the code to download the app

Latest Chapter

  • Chapter 80: Weight Without Shape

    CHAPTER 80 — Weight Without ShapeMorning came reluctantly.The sun rose, but it did so as if the sky had to be persuaded. Light filtered through thin, uneven bands of cloud, leaving shadows where there should have been warmth. Even the birds hesitated before singing, their calls scattered and uncertain.Auren woke already tired.Not physically — though his muscles ached — but deeper than that. As if the act of being awake required more effort than it used to.He sat up slowly, hands resting on his knees, and waited for the Shared Sigil to settle.It didn’t.It pulsed irregularly, like a heartbeat searching for a rhythm.Eira noticed immediately.“You’re not okay,” she said, kneeling beside him.“I will be,” Auren replied automatically — then stopped himself. He exhaled. “No. That’s not true. I don’t know.”She accepted that without flinching.Around them, the camp was quieter than usual. Lyra sat apart, sketching complex diagrams in the dirt, lines intersecting and erasing each other

  • Chapter 79: The Shape Of Refusal

    CHAPTER 79 — The Shape of RefusalThe world stopped pretending.There was no warning.No tremor.No omen carved into the sky.One moment, the Plains of Iserel lay calm beneath the late sun — tall grass whispering, wind moving in familiar patterns. The next, reality tightened, like a muscle remembering how to clench.Auren felt it before anyone spoke.Not pain. Not danger.Constraint.He staggered, catching himself on the edge of the stone outcrop overlooking the valley. The Shared Sigil flared — not brighter, but denser, its layers folding inward as if bracing.Eira was at his side instantly. “What just happened?”Silas didn’t answer. He was staring at the horizon, face gone pale. “They’ve drawn a line.”Lyra closed her eyes, listening not to sound but to structure. “No. They’ve drawn many.”Corren swore softly. “Of course they did.”The sky hadn’t changed color. The air hadn’t thickened. But movement felt… guided. Wind bent in cleaner arcs. Shadows aligned more neatly than they shoul

  • Chapter 78: Friction At The Edges

    CHAPTER 78 — Friction at the EdgesThe world did not interrupt them.It adjusted around them.Auren noticed it at dawn, standing alone near the gate while the valley slept. The stars above were fractionally misaligned — not wrong, just… optimized. As if the sky had re-run its calculations overnight and nudged itself into a configuration that reduced uncertainty.He didn’t like that.The Shared Sigil hummed low in his chest, not warning, not urging.Observing.Footsteps approached — careful, measured.Lyra joined him, wrapping her cloak tighter against the morning chill. “They’ve begun stabilizing regions near us.”Auren exhaled. “So we don’t destabilize them.”“Or so we don’t have excuses,” Lyra replied.Below them, Maelis slept curled near the dying embers, breathing evenly. The lattice around her remained loose, adaptive — no signs of stress.Yet.Silas emerged next, rubbing his eyes. “We’ve got traffic.”Auren turned. “How much?”“Three clusters,” Silas said. “Not anomalies. Author

  • Chapter 77: Learning To Hold

    CHAPTER 77 — Learning to HoldMorning arrived cautiously.Light filtered into the valley as if unsure it was welcome, touching the grass in pale increments rather than flooding it. The gate remained unchanged — steady, luminous, indifferent to time — but something around it had softened. The air no longer felt like a boundary. It felt like a threshold.Maelis woke before anyone else.Auren sensed it through the Shared Sigil — not as an alarm, but as a subtle displacement, like a weight shifting on a balanced scale. He opened his eyes to see her sitting upright near the remnants of Eira’s fire, knees drawn to her chest, staring at her hands.She looked terrified.“Hey,” Auren said gently, sitting up. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”Maelis flinched anyway. “I felt it.”“Felt what?” Silas asked, groggy.Maelis hesitated. “Something… waiting. Not like a voice. More like… pressure behind my thoughts.”Lyra stirred, instantly alert. “The lattice noticed you noticing it.”Maelis swallowed ha

  • Chapter 76: The Weight Of An Open Door

    CHAPTER 76 — The Weight of an Open DoorThe valley did not return to normal.It remembered.Where the Successor Frame had stood, the air felt thicker, not with pressure, but with possibility. The gate remained — steady, luminous, unmistakably finished — yet no longer demanded attention. It simply existed, like a bridge that trusted someone would eventually cross it.Auren stood before it long after the others had sat down or leaned against stone markers, exhaustion finally catching up with them.Permanent.The word echoed again, heavier now that it had survived scrutiny.Silas broke the silence first, lying flat on his back and staring at the sky. “So. We’re not being replaced. That’s good.”Eira snorted weakly. “We’re just being multiplied.”Corren lowered himself onto a rock, elbows on knees. “Which is worse.”Lyra hadn’t spoken at all. She stood at the edge of the valley, gaze distant, fingers brushing invisible paths.Auren felt it — the subtle outward pull of the Shared Sigil, no

  • Chapter 75: The Shape That Arrives

    CHAPTER 75 — The Shape That ArrivesThe pressure did not rush in.It assembled.Auren felt it like weight being carefully stacked, layer upon layer, each one measured, deliberate. This was not an attack. It was not even hostility.It was arrival.The valley dimmed, colors draining into muted tones as if reality were lowering its voice out of respect. Wind ceased entirely. The gate’s glow steadied into a firm, unwavering line of light.Something descended — not from the sky, not from any direction that could be named.It emerged from alignment.Space folded inward upon a single point, not tearing, not breaking, simply agreeing to host what came next.Eira’s flame tightened into a razor-thin outline around her fists. “That’s not an entity.”Silas swallowed. “It’s a mandate.”The shape resolved slowly.Humanoid only in the loosest sense, it stood taller than any of them, formed of overlapping planes of translucent structure — crystal, script, probability curves intersecting at impossible

More Chapter
Explore and read good novels for free
Free access to a vast number of good novels on MegaNovel app. Download the books you like and read anywhere & anytime.
Read books for free on the app
Scan code to read on App