The hall emptied slowly.
Gods drifted toward the exits in small, suspicious clusters. Ares left first, his boots cracking against the stone, his hand still resting on his sword hilt. Odin followed, Gungnir tapping a rhythm that echoed too long in the broken space. The Egyptian priestess disappeared into shadow without a word. The Old Man from Japan walked bent and slow, his sandals scraping against the cracked floor.
Athena stayed.
Hermes stayed.
Zeus stayed.
And Hera—Hera remained near the pillar where she had stood through the entire argument, arms crossed, face carved from stone.
The map table still glowed with silver lines. The fractures had shifted again. A new crack had opened near the eastern sector, thin as a thread but growing. Athena stared at it. She didn't need to trace it. She knew every line, every stress point, every place where reality was already tearing.
"We need a structure," she said.
No one answered.
