The silence after the Warden's fall was not peace it was the kind that came before a storm.
Kael stood at the center of the scorched chamber, his chest still heaving, body steaming with raw heat. Lira watched him like one might watch a god being born—terrified, reverent, unsure.
But inside him, the third seal pulsed… and so did something else.
Aria.
He could feel her again, faint, but clearer now, like a breath of frost in his lungs. Her heartbeat was wrong. Uneven. Weak. Every part of him screamed to run to her. But there was no straight path. Not through the Labyrinth. Not through the Crown's hold.
"She's dying," Kael said under his breath.
Lira froze. "Aria?"
Kael turned toward her, jaw tight. "They're killing her slowly. They're feeding off her essence using the bond to keep her alive just long enough to draw me in."
Lira's eyes widened. "A trap."
"I know," he growled. "But I'm still walking in."
Before Lira could reply, a cold gust swept through the charred hall. Ice began to form along the scorched walls. The flames that had danced moments before snuffed out, as if fearing the presence now entering.
Kael spun, magic surging to his fingertips.
A figure stepped from the shadows of the corridor. Draped in frost-blue robes, silver eyes glowing beneath a cowl-Erias, the Frozen Shade. One of the last Sealed Watchers… and a ghost from Kael's cursed past.
Kael's hands clenched. "I should've known they'd send you."
Erias smirked. "You've broken three seals. Impressive. But if you cross the fourth, Kael… you'll never come back. You'll lose whatever soul is still clinging to your spine."
Kael stared him down. "Is that a warning, or a threat?"
"Both."
Lira stepped between them, uncertain. "What does he mean?"
Erias' voice dropped. "The Fourth Seal is not a place. It's a person."
Kael froze.
Erias nodded slowly. "Aria is the fourth seal."
The world stopped spinning.
"No," Kael whispered.
"Yes," Erias said. "They tied her soul to the Flame Crown. If you awaken it… you'll destroy what's left of her. The bond is fused. Her life is the final key."
Kael's knees nearly buckled. Everything he'd fought for. Every flame he had bled to control. Every whisper of Aria's name. All of it… would lead to killing her?
"Unless," Erias continued, "you walk away."
Kael didn't respond.
He couldn't.
Because he knew.
He wouldn't walk away.
Not from Aria.
Not from this.