The throne was gone. Shattered into dust and memory. But the weight of its presence remained.
Saylor stood where it had been, his boots balanced on the jagged outline of what used to be a seat of power. There was no elevation now, no command, no voice of the system to confirm or deny his status. Just silence—and the crackling aftershock of something ancient crawling beneath the Field.
Lucia stayed back. Her chain was looped and still. Brant sat half-conscious, the left side of his face marked by static burns from shielding Saylor during the throne collapse.
> [SYSTEM STATUS: ROOT THREADS UNLOCKED] [USER: COGNI, S. — ACCESS GRANTED VIA FRAGMENT TRACE]
The system didn't ask permission anymore. It reacted.
---
Beneath Saylor, a threadline appeared—thin and glowing, red like spilled godblood.
He crouched. Touched it.
Instantly, the Field shifted.
The air thinned. The sky flickered. And hundreds of threadlines bloomed around him, some horizontal, some vertical, some looping through space like serpents.
He saw names attached to them—Rhestil, Solven, Kharn, Uryx—the gods he'd fought or heard whispered through the mouths of Remnants.
And one—burned black and unmarked.
The thread quivered.
> "You cast your vote. Now face what it made."
A voice. Not god. Not Remnant. Not system.
Something else.
---
From the thread came a shape.
Not born.
Stitched.
A humanoid form stepped into view, emerging from the thread like light being pulled into flesh. It wore pieces of multiple gods—Rhestil's burned shoulders, Kharn's glitched crown, the voice of a player Saylor didn't recognize.
Brant stirred.
"That voice... I heard it... on my first spin."
Lucia's grip on her chain tightened. The being turned to face her.
> [PHANTOM GOD-FRAGMENT DETECTED] [THREADWALKER INITIATED]
> "Name me," it said. "Or fight me."
---
Saylor felt his Unholy Devotion activate on its own.
The Remnants inside him screamed and shifted, one attempting to detach itself and flee through the system.
He gasped.
Lucia stepped forward and launched Chain Echo. The chain struck the entity's shoulder—then bounced off, rewound, and snapped back to her.
> "You can't bind what isn't named," the entity whispered.
> "You can't kill what was never born."
Brant tried to stand. Blood leaked from his left eye.
> "That thing... it's made from memory. The system's guilt."
> "It's a god that wasn't allowed to die."
---
Saylor's body moved before his mind did.
He activated Devotion, reached out, and touched the entity—not with a command, but with recognition.
He did not name it.
He did not resist it.
He bound it.
> [UNHOLY DEVOTION: NON-TITLED GOD FRAGMENT BOUND] [COST: MEMORY INTEGRITY -11%]
The entity flickered.
Then stilled.
Lucia ran to Saylor, steadying him.
> "You bound a god that doesn't know what it is. That makes you... what?"
> "Someone the system won't define," he said. "Let's keep it that way."
> [UNNAMED GOD CLASS: THREADWALKER] [FIELD TENSION INCREASING]
---
They turned as the sky cracked again.
Not from above.
From under the Field.
Something was pulling the god threads upward—and the Field no longer knew which version of reality it was rendering.
> [THREAD CORRUPTION DETECTED] [INITIATING AUTO-CLEANSE: TARGET UNKNOWN]
Saylor looked at Lucia.
Brant stood behind them, barely able to keep his footing.
The next god wasn't coming.
It was remembering itself.