**January 15, 2024 – 03:42 a.m.**
Michael woke gasping, aura flaring crimson so violently the wards in his dorm wall sparked. The dream had been vivid: the void-being again, but this time it wore his own face.
**"You're late,"** it hissed. **"The seed cracks. Feed it."**
He stumbled to the bathroom, splashed icy water on his face. In the mirror, his scar pulsed like a heartbeat. The aura had evolved overnight: new patterns, fractal veins of gold threading the red. He flexed; the air around his hand warped, a miniature gravity well.
Emily's telepathic touch brushed his mind from the next room: *Nightmare?*
*Memory,* he sent back. *And a warning.*
**House 1A Common Room – Dawn**
The group gathered over breakfast: synth-protein pancakes, rift-fruit smoothies. Isaac, the new kid, copied Vera's ice to chill his drink, grinning. Logan zipped in and out, leaving after-images of electricity. Sierra healed a paper cut on Kate's finger with a soft green glow.
Michael laid it out: "The entity that revived me—it's back. Says I'm not growing fast enough."
Alvin's flames dimmed. "You died because of me. If it wants blood—"
"No." Michael's voice cut like steel. "It wants *conflict*. Battle. Evolution."
Emily projected a psychic map: rift activity spiking globally, patterns forming a spiral centred on Valkyrie. "Someone's orchestrating breaches. Not random."
**Flashback – Lagos, 2019**
Michael's mind reeled. The being's voice triggered memories he'd buried.
He was eleven, hiding in a drainage pipe during the Lagos Incursion. Beasts had torn through his neighborhood. His parents—ordinary humans—died shielding him from a shadow-wolf's claws. Blood on the concrete. Screams. Then a man in a golden cape descended: **Homelander**.
He'd saved Michael, but not out of kindness. "Weak stock," Homelander had sneered to his team. "No powers. Useless." He'd left Michael with Aunt Uche and never looked back.
The memory ended with Michael's fists clenched, aura cracking the table.
**Valkyrie Archives – Restricted Section**
That afternoon, Emily hacked the wards (telekinesis on a molecular level). The archives were a cavern of crystal data-spheres. Michael touched one labelled **"Amadike Incident – 2023"**.
Holograms bloomed: camp footage. The heist. His death. The entity's hand on his heart. But new data: the being's energy signature matched a **pre-rift anomaly** recorded in 2018—same fractal pattern now in Michael's aura.
Isaac copied the sphere's interface, downloading to his neural implant. "This thing's older than the rifts. It *chose* you."
**Training Grounds – Night**
Homelander cornered Michael during solo drills. Jason watched from the shadows, smirking.
"You're a mistake," Homelander said, voice low. "My brother's bastard kid, powerless. Whatever gave you that aura—it'll burn you out."
Michael's aura flared, gold veins igniting. "You abandoned me. Don't pretend concern."
Homelander's heat vision charged. Michael phased— aura bending light, stepping *through* the beam. He reappeared behind Homelander, palm on his uncle's back. A pulse of aura disrupted flight stability; Homelander crashed into the dirt.
Jason lunged, but Alvin's blue flames formed a wall. "Touch him, and I roast you both."
**Nigeria – Virtual Reunion**
Assurance opened a portal window to Lagos. Ekene, Uche, Faith, Favour, and the old crew appeared in hologram.
Favour's eyes widened at Michael's new aura. "You're… glowing."
A rift cracked open behind them—real, not simulated. Shadow-wolves poured through. Faith healed a civilian mid-bite. Sonia shifted to were-cheetah, tearing throats. Success levitated cars as barriers.
Michael's aura reached through the portal, a crimson thread. He *felt* the beasts, crushed one's heart from 10,000 km away. The thread snapped back, leaving him drained but exhilarated.
Favour whispered, "Come home soon." Her kiss through the portal was ghost-soft on his cheek.
**The Bullies' Trap**
January 25. Billy, Rick, Gerald, and Jason lured House 1A to the abandoned sub-levels—old rift testing chambers.
They sprang the trap: a captured Class-2 wyrm, collared with rift-tech. It broke free, crystalline tail whipping.
Michael's aura evolved mid-fight: gold fractals formed a **domain**—a 50-metre sphere where gravity bent to his will. The wyrm floated, helpless. He crushed it into a diamond of compressed bone and crystal.
Billy's muscle fibers strained against the domain. Rick's iron skin cracked. Gerald's minotaur form shrank, crushed by pressure. Jason tried flight— aura tendrils yanked him down.
Michael stood at the centre, eyes pure gold. "Touch my family again, and I erase you."
**The Entity's Offer**
That night, the void-being returned—not in dream, but physically. It stepped from a rift in Michael's room, cloaked in starlight.
**"You've fed the seed. Now choose: remain a weapon, or become a god."**
It offered a **core**—a fist-sized orb of compressed aura, pulsing with universes. "Absorb it. Break your limits. But the cost: every life you take feeds me."
Michael hesitated. Emily's voice in his mind: *You're not a killer.*
He crushed the core in his fist. Aura exploded outward, gold and crimson fusing into **sovereign white**. The entity smiled—approval, not anger.
**"Good. Earn it yourself."** It vanished.
**Family Secrets**
Aunt Uche arrived via portal, summoned by Assurance. She revealed the truth: Michael's mother was Homelander's sister, disowned for marrying a human. The entity had watched the bloodline for generations, waiting for a vessel.
"You were never powerless," Uche said. "Just dormant."
**The Spiral Accelerates**
February 1. Global news: rifts forming a perfect spiral, Valkyrie at the centre. Alien signatures detected—scouts, not beasts.
Michael stood on the cliff, sovereign aura cloaking the academy. Emily beside him, hand in his.
"The past is fuel," he said. "The future's war."
Behind them, House 1A trained. Ahead, the spiral tightened.
The entity's voice echoed in his bones:
**"Grow, Sovereign. The gods are watching."**