The city was in chaos when we returned to the top. Guards swarmed after people, knocking them down and harming them. Magi-knights and mages trapped people as they cried for their lives. Flickers of shadows appeared all around. The injustice that was apparent, froze me in my spot.
"Leave them be… It's not like you can do anything to save them." The shadow man spoke. "You did kill everyone you loved after all."
My breath hitched in my throat as the chaos snapped me out of it.
"Horus!" Lian shouted as a fireball was lobbed straight for him.
I lifted my hand, trying to summon my staff but only getting a response in strange purple lines coursing down my fingertips and arms.
"Barrier!" Horus shouted, manifesting a blue barrier in the nick of time as the fireball slammed into it, eating the spell up. "Why are they attacking everyone? Do they not know who they protect?"
"Horus, we have to go!" Lian shouted.
"Go where?" Horus responded, pulling me forward as he followed Lian and Alice.
"Stop right there!" A guard shouted, blocking our way. Two more guards flanked Horus and I.
I pulled my hand off Horus' hand and glanced at all of the guards around us.
"What's happening?" Alice asked the guard.
"Two individuals spotted with the targets." The guard spoke as he touched a rune on his neck.
A communication sigil. I recognized the crude sigil. It was one of the first things I fixed when I came into this world. The guards eyes looked past Lian and Alice onto Horus and I in particular.
"They go too!" The guard shouted the order.
"W-what? We didn't do anything!" Alice shouted as chaos erupted.
Horus swore under his breath as he summoned his staff. It was an dark oak staff that had a green gem on top of it with vines crawling up it. He slammed his staff onto the ground, beginning to chant something as the guards behind us, rushed for him.
I turned, trying to summon my staff, again, only to be answered by the purple lines on my arms. I swung a fist at the first guard, taking him by surprise as a red sigil bloomed to life. My fist went straight through his armor, creating a large hole and cracking his ribs as he flew backwards.
The second guard jumped on Horus, grabbing him and stopping his concentration.
Horus grunted, throwing his elbow into the man's helmet as hard as he can, before failing to shake him off.
"Horus!" I shouted.
The guard's gauntlet tightened around his throat, cutting off the last syllable of the spell he was chanting. The vines on his staff withered mid-growth, green light flickering as his magic collapsed in on itself.
I didn't even think. I moved and before I knew it, the purple lines surged from my wrist to my shoulder, burning cold instead of hot. I reached out, not with a spell, not with a chant, but with intent.
The air folded. The guard holding Horus slammed sideways as if struck by an invisible wall, crashing into a stone pillar hard enough to crater it. He slid down, unmoving.
I stared at my hand. What just… happened?
"What—" Alice gasped.
"There's no time!" Lian shouted. "More are coming! Ready yourselves!"
I turned, noticing Lian and Alice summoning their staves: one made of burnt wood and a red gem for Lian and a blue staff with a blue gem for Alice.
Shadows poured in as more guards appeared. Mage sigils flared. Steel rang. Someone screamed.
"Horus, can you move?" I asked.
He coughed, dragging in a breath. "Y-yeah. You just… what did you do?"
"I don't know," I answered honestly.
Another fireball streaked to us. I lifted my hand. No words, no staff to focus my intention. The mana answered anyways, dispersing the fire midair, unraveling it into harmless sparks like a spell that had forgotten its purpose.
The guards hesitated.
It was all Lian needed to finish her chant, creating two fire walls.
"This way!" Lian shouted, grabbing Alice and sprinting down the fire lane.
"Horus!" I barked.
He didn't argue this time. He grabbed my arm and ran.
We burst into the slums proper, the narrow streets working in our favor as Lian and Alice watched for any guards. The blend of the slums worked in our favor, covering us. Shanty roofs blurred overhead as people scattered, doors slamming, shutters falling. Somewhere behind us, a horn sounded, sharp, urgent.
"They're herding districts," Horus said between breaths. "This is coordinated."
"For what?" Alice demanded, nearly tripping.
"I don't know," he said grimly. "But its not a riot."
A figure stepped into the street ahead of us. Steel armor. White cloak. No helmet. He raised a hand.
"Stop."
His voice cut through the chaos like a blade through cloth. The guards behind us skittered to a halt. Even the mages hesitated.
Lian and Alice pointed their staves at the man.
I recognized that stance.
A knight's stance. Clean. Controlled.
"Captain?" One of the guards muttered.
The man's blue eyes flicked to us—then lingered on me.
"…You," he said quietly.
Something twisted inside my chest.
Horus stepped forward despite my grip. "Ardyn. Stand down. This is madness."
Ardyn's jaw tightened. "You're under arrest. Horus Typoxy. By order of the Mayor."
"For what?" Horus demanded.
Ardyn didn't answer immediately. Instead, he looked at the slums around us. At the civilians being dragged from homes. At the fear.
"…Marigold's been enacted." He said at last.
The words rippled through the nearby guards. They paled at the word. Others straightened, like soldiers bracing for something they didn't want to name.
Alice lowered her staff. "That's… that's an evacuation protocol."
"No," Horus shook his head. "That's a purge protocol."
Ardyn's hand tightened on his sword hilt. "You are to be brought in," he said, voice strained. "Both of you."
"And them?" Lian snapped. "What about the people you're hurting?"
Silence.
I felt it then. A pressure underneath my skin.
Not Rewrite.
No Runtime.
Something aligning.
Ardyn's eyes flicked bac kto me as the purple lines crept higher up on my forearms, faint but unmistakable.
"…You're the mage from the West," he said.
I met his gaze. "I didn't come here to fight you," I said. "But I won't let whatever you're planning to happen."
A mage behind Ardyn raised their staff.
I moved first. No spell spoken. No gesture made.
The street buckled. Stone rippled outward in a controlled wave, throwing guards off their feet without breaking bone. Magic bled out of active sigils, unraveling like threads cut from a loom.
Everyone froze, including me.
Adryn stared at the warped street, then back at my hands.
"…That's not the magic I know," he said.
"No." I replied. "It wasn't."
For a long moment, choas seemed to hold its breath. Then Ardyn slowly raised his swords, not at us, but sideways, blocking the alley.
"You have one chance," he said quietly. "Get them out of my district."
Horus looked at me. "Ardyn—"
"I will deal with the order," Ardyn cut in. "But if you stay, I won't be able to."
Our eyes met. This was his line. This was the familiar feeling I felt at the pier.
"A person's Creed shapes who they are." Lady Tyresa's vocie appeared in a unsurfaced memory. "What they fight for, what drives them, what lines are to be and not to be crossed. When you bound yourself to a Creed, you explore it and understand what it is."
I almost snorted, drawing strange looks at me.
"Thank you," I said as I grabbed Horus' hand and moved forward. "Miss Lian, Miss Alice, let's go."
We ran.
Behind us, the horn sounded again, much closer this time. And deep behind my skin, something settled. Runtime didn't return. It didn't need to anymore.
We didn't stop running until the screams dulled into distance and the streets narrowed into twisting alleys choked with refuse and damp stone. When we finally slowed, it was beneath a collapsed awning, the four of us pressed into shadow as boots thundered past the main road.
My chest burned. Not from exertion—but from inside. I flexed my fingers. The purple lines hadn't faded. They pulsed, slow and steady, like veins that had learned a new rhythm. When I focused, I didn't feel a staff-shaped absence anymore. No hollow reaching outward.
Instead—Presence.
Not a voice. Not a thought that wasn't mine.
Alignment.
Runtime had always been external. A tool. A structure. A correction engine shaped like a staff because I needed something to hold, something to believe magic required.
Now there was nothing to hold. Because there was nothing missing.
Horus watched my hand carefully. "…It's inside you, isn't it?"
I nodded once. "Not inside like possession. More like… it realized the shape was unnecessary."
Alice swallowed. "That's terrifying."
Lian let out a shaky laugh. "That's genius."
Somewhere far behind us, another horn sounded—different this time. Lower. Heavier. Marigold wasn't finished. And neither was magic. I clenched my fist, not to cast, but to decide. The lines brightened.
Runtime didn't answer.
It acted.