"And when weak men," Lilith said softly, her voice like the edge of a blade wrapped in velvet, "are given purpose by monsters…"
Her gaze shifted slowly toward the doorway. She didn't expect anyone to speak. She wasn't waiting for agreement. The words were already complete.
"…they always become monsters themselves."
No one replied.
There was nothing left to add. The truth had landed too fully, filled the space between them like quiet smoke, curling into every corner of the room.
To speak now would only make it smaller. And no one wanted that.
The silence didn't push down. It didn't threaten to explode. It just… stayed. Still. Balanced on the edge of something unseen.
Like the breath before a scream. Or the calm before a sky falls open.
But far beyond that quiet room, past the polished floors of Astralis, beyond the fortified outer rings of the last surviving cities of man, and even past the charts of star-faring ships or dream-seekers, there was no such stillness.
