Night had no mercy in the Shuddering District.
Cold winds scraped through broken sheet-metal roofs, carrying the stench of burned resin and the distant echo chants of female patrol squads. Men stayed inside. Doors were barred. Even the rats didn't risk the streets when Echo users marched.
Kaelen walked anyway.
His clothes were threadbare. Boots split at the toes. A scratch on his cheek still bled from earlier punishment for trying to look a patrol woman in the eyes.
Men weren't allowed to look at Echo-bearers.
Men weren't allowed to speak to Echo-bearers.
Men weren't allowed near Echo altars.
And they certainly weren't allowed to touch Echo relics.
Kaelen had learned that last rule very personally.
He shifted the burlap sack slung across his back. Inside it… something pulsed. Weakly. As if annoyed at being moved.
A relic. A forbidden one.
Something he had never been meant to see, much less pick up.
He kept walking until the alley narrowed into a dead end between two leaning brick buildings. Here, moonlight barely reached. Here, the world felt abandoned.
Only then did he pull the sack open.
A faint violet glow spilled out no, not glow… emptiness. A circular gauntlet of interlocking rings floated above his palm, spinning slowly like layers of fractured glass. It emitted no light. It consumed it.
A Null Gauntlet.
A relic so dangerous the Echo Mother herself had once tried to erase it from history.
Kaelen didn't know any of that.
He only knew three things:
Touching it hadn't killed him.
It whispered to him the moment his fingers brushed the surface.
That whisper had not been human.
You resonate with nothing… therefore, you may resonate with all.
That had been its first words.
He hadn't slept since.
Kaelen swallowed, heartbeat stuttering. "Why me…?"
Compatibility: 0.04%. Acceptable.
Initiating Integration Sequence.
"No, no, wait!"
A ring of the gauntlet snapped outward like a blade of glass and clamped around his forearm. Not physically it phased through skin, nerves, bone, without tearing.
He gasped.
Cold rushed through him.
Then heat.
Then both collapsed into a single overwhelming sensation...
Information.
Thousands of strands.
Millions of tiny resonances.
Breathing. Footsteps. Heartbeats. Echo signatures.
The world wasn't quiet.
It was vibrating.
Everywhere.
Echoes in every direction unseen to normal men suddenly mapped themselves into geometric patterns behind his eyelids.
For the first time in his life, Kaelen felt everything.
And it terrified him.
The gauntlet pulsed.
Null Integration at 3%. Host consciousness stable.
Kaelen fell to one knee, clutching his arm. "S-stop...stop"
Integration cannot be stopped.
The Mother feared this.
The Mother hunted this.
The Mother failed.
"What do you mean 'Mother'…?"
Before the gauntlet could answer, a sharp metal click echoed from the alley entrance.
Kaelen jerked his head up.
A pair of armored boots stepped into view. Gleaming silver greaves. Soft blue cloak. Intricate Echo circuits etched across her armor like living veins.
A female patrol officer.
An Echo bearer.
The worst possible person to see him like this.
Her eyes narrowed the moment she spotted the faint distortion around his arm. "You. Boy. Stand."
Kaelen froze.
She lifted her hand. Echo light rippled across her palm like living steel. A blade shaped Echo Bladecry manifested in a shimmer of sound.
"Remove whatever you're hiding," she commanded coldly. "Now."
Kaelen swallowed. His mind raced. He'd seen people executed on the spot for less. Men weren't allowed Echo artifacts. Men definitely weren't allowed active relics.
But the Null Gauntlet whispered again:
Reposition left. Threat vector: 41°.
Her Echo vibrates at 112 Hz.
Angle of strike predictable.
Kaelen didn't even have time to react.
His body moved on instinct.
When the woman lunged, he sidestepped barely and her blade tore through the wall behind him.
She blinked.
Then her eyes widened.
"You… dodged? Without an Echo?"
Kaelen didn't know how he had dodged. The gauntlet kept feeding him predictions—subtle shifts in her foot pressure, the resonance of her breathing, the slight distortion of the air before she swung.
He wasn't stronger.
He wasn't faster.
He just… knew.
The woman gritted her teeth. "Relic resonance detected. You're under arrest."
Recommendation: Do not be arrested.
Host execution probability: 98.7%.
Kaelen took a step back. "I don't want trouble"
"You already have it."
She flicked her wrist.
Bladecry split into two vibrating arcs one low, one high the kind designed to kill even fast Echo bearers.
Kaelen should've died.
Step left. Bend. Hold breath.
He obeyed.
The blades whistled past him, missing by a hand's width.
The officer stared at him as though seeing a myth. "A man resonating with movement… Impossible."
Kaelen didn't have time to appreciate the miracle.
Because she lunged again
Faster.
Harder.
Echo-blade singing with lethal intent.
Countermeasure: nullify resonance.
"What...how"
The gauntlet snapped.
A ring spun.
The air around Kaelen dimmed.
The woman's blade hit that air
And died.
Not broke.
Not deflected.
It died.
Its resonance collapsed like sound falling off a cliff.
The blade dissolved into harmless particles.
The patrol officer stumbled backward, shock twisting her features. "Wh-what…? My Echo!"
Kaelen didn't know how he was doing any of it.
The gauntlet whispered like poison in his veins..
Nullification successful.
You are what should not exist.
You are what the Mother feared.
The officer gritted her teeth. "I don't know what you stole, but you're coming with"
She never finished the sentence.
A scream echoed from the street.
"Patrol Officer! Reinforcements coming!"
"Someone said a MALE activated a relic!"
"Kill him before it spreads!"
Kaelen's blood went cold.
More boots.
More Echo-bearers.
At least six.
The officer's expression hardened. "Stay still unless you want to die slowly."
Kaelen's breath caught.
He didn't know what he wanted.
But the gauntlet decided for him.
The rings spun violently.
Null energy bled into the air.
The world around him distorted.
Host directive: survive.
Recommendation: run.
Kaelen's legs moved before he could think.
He sprinted toward the alley wall, boots slamming against brick. His fingers found ledges he couldn't see. His body reacted to vibrations he shouldn't be able to sense.
Echo-bearing officers shouted behind him.
"Stop him!"
"He's resonating!"
"He's a man this is impossible!"
"Kill him before he contaminates the law!"
Kaelen vaulted onto a rooftop. Rolled. Caught his balance.
His lungs burned.
His mind raced.
The gauntlet pulsed again..
Integration at 8%.
Host resonance capability expanding.
The Mother will feel you soon.
Kaelen stopped dead on the rooftop.
"What does that mean?"
The gauntlet answered with chilling finality:
She will come for you.
They all will.
Because you are the only one capable of awakening the power she feared most.
Kaelen's breath froze.
"The… Ultimate Resonance?"
Correct.
"And how do I stop her?"
The gauntlet paused.
Then whispered:
You don't stop her.
You survive her…
until the one who would die for you awakens the resonance she never could.
Kaelen's pulse hammered in his ears..
As six Echo-bearing officers climbed onto the opposing rooftop.
As Echo-lights ignited across the district.
As shouts echoed into the night:
"THERE! THE MALE ANOMALY!"
The gauntlet tightened around his arm.
Host survival probability: 3.1%.
Cliff sequence initiating.
Prepare.
Kaelen turned.
They were already charging.
And the rooftop beneath him began to crack.