Rain fell over Velkaris Prime.
For once, the rain arrived after the clouds.
Many citizens considered this encouraging.
Inside the Scholar Tower, nobody shared that optimism.
A dozen projection arrays illuminated the central observation chamber.
Maps.
Records.
Temporal traces.
Containment reports.
Witness statements.
And in the center of them all—
one name appeared repeatedly.
ERYNDOR
Lysandor Vehl stared at the projections silently.
A younger analyst shifted uncomfortably.
"...there has to be another explanation."
Nobody answered.
Because they had already spent three days searching for one.
One projection displayed the clock tower anomaly.
Another showed the underground city.
Another tracked the regressor confrontation.
Another displayed recent instability events throughout Velkaris Prime.
The connections formed an increasingly unpleasant pattern.
Selyra Vonn examined the data.
Long silver-black hair partially obscured unreadable eyes.
Finally:
"The correlations are genuine."
The room grew colder.
A scholar immediately objected.
"Correlation is not causation."
"Correct."
The room relaxed slightly.
Then Selyra continued.
"Unfortunately, we are no longer observing normal causality."
The room became uncomfortable again.
Far away—
Kael Virex was having a worse morning.
The report landed on his desk.
He read it.
Read it again.
Then considered setting it on fire.
"Tell me this is a joke."
The containment officer shook his head.
"The analysts are serious."
Kael leaned back.
"...Frey."
The officer nodded.
"That's approximately what everyone said."
The report was simple.
Terrifyingly simple.
Every major anomaly of the last few weeks connected to one individual.
Not perfectly.
Not conclusively.
But enough.
Enough for people to start asking dangerous questions.
Meanwhile—
Eryndor walked through the lower district.
Unaware.
Or mostly unaware.
The city felt different today.
People looked at him slightly longer.
Conversations stopped when he passed.
Nothing obvious.
Nothing direct.
But something had changed.
The feeling reminded him of standing outside a room where everyone had been discussing him moments earlier.
Across the street, Nysera Vale walked beside him.
At least this time she had warned him before appearing.
Which Eryndor considered progress.
"People are watching."
"I noticed."
"No."
Nysera's expression remained calm.
"They are investigating."
That got his attention.
Eryndor looked toward her.
The shadows around her feet moved softly across the pavement.
"What did they find?"
Nysera was silent for several moments.
Then:
"A pattern."
He immediately disliked that answer.
"What kind of pattern?"
"The kind that makes intelligent people afraid."
That was somehow worse.
They continued walking.
Rain tapped softly against rooftops.
Finally Nysera spoke again.
"If someone mapped every major anomaly from the past few weeks..."
A pause.
"...they would eventually find you."
Eryndor stopped.
The crowd flowed around them.
Unaware.
"...I didn't cause the tower."
"No."
"I didn't create the underground city."
"No."
"I don't even know what Origin is."
"No."
Silence.
Then Eryndor frowned.
"You're agreeing very quickly."
For the first time—
Nysera looked uncertain.
A tiny hesitation.
Brief.
Almost invisible.
Yet Eryndor noticed it immediately.
And suddenly—
for the first time since meeting her—
he felt something unexpected.
Suspicion.
Not fear.
Not distrust.
Suspicion.
Because she knew more than she was saying.
Much more.
And she was deliberately choosing what information to reveal.
Far away—
inside an abandoned structure overlooking the city—
the veteran regressor sat alone.
Watching.
Waiting.
Remembering.
His expression remained troubled.
In one timeline—
Eryndor had died inside the tower.
In another—
the tower never existed.
In another—
the underground city awakened decades later.
In another—
millions died.
His hands tightened.
The memories contradicted each other.
That should not have been possible.
Yet they remained.
Every sequence pointed toward the same impossible conclusion.
Something was changing.
Not the future.
The past.
And that terrified him more than any apocalypse.
Back inside the Scholar Tower—
a final report arrived.
One prepared using records recovered from sealed archives.
Records older than the Imperium.
Lysandor opened it carefully.
The room fell silent.
Ancient text appeared across the projection.
Damaged.
Incomplete.
Barely preserved.
Yet one line remained readable.
"When the First Thread awakens, reality will seek a culprit."
Silence.
Nobody spoke.
Because the sentence felt wrong.
Not factually.
Interpretively.
As though the document had not predicted events.
As though it remembered them.
And somewhere beneath Velkaris Prime—
the fractured clock moved again.
One hand shifted toward a moment that had not occurred yet.
And another moved toward one that perhaps never would.