"For one hundred and twenty years…"
Elder Lao's voice was barely above a whisper, like a ghost reciting scripture from a crumbling scroll.
"Our tradition… ended like this."
His tone carried no power. No fire.
Only loss.
Only regret.
Only the slow, cold realization that everything they had built—rituals, oaths, generations of purpose had crumbled into ash.
Elder Mia stood beside him, her head bowed. Her eyes shimmered with unspoken sorrow, a single tear tracing the edge of her cheek.
Ko stood paralyzed, fists clenched so tightly his knuckles whitened, as if gripping onto something that had already slipped through his fingers.
Li turned his face upward toward the chaotic, cracked sky searching for a sign. A symbol. Anything. But the heavens offered only silence.
Juno took a slow step back. The wind tore at her hair as her gaze drifted—not toward the elders, nor the void but toward Lin.
And Khael.
