"Khael!" Ceyla's shout was immediate, fierce. She pushed forward, storm and lightning coiling to yank him free.
"Hold him! Don't let it draw him!" Lira's voice trembled but was iron. Her glow intensified, pouring threads of Bloom into his chest. "If it drains him now, we lose more than a plan—we lose a heart."
But the shard had teeth: the more the team tried to wrench it apart, the more it siphoned at the dragon core inside Khael. Images flashed ghostly memories, a chorus of lost voices, a promise of power in exchange for a silence that smelled like oceans swallowed whole.
Juno's jaw clenched. "Taishin Gate, Vein Sense!" He forced the Gate open despite the scream of his bones. Every echo of the shard's pull became visible to him: currents inside the stone, little veins of corrupt Shinrei. He directed his body as if he were a surgeon, every muscle a suture. "Aim for the seams, don't match its pull!"
