The dead did not rest beneath the Celestial Dominion Academy.
They whispered.
Aren heard them now, even through the protective glyphs carved into the Ashwake's sanctuary walls. Every night, their voices scratched at his dreams—Eriar, Lira, and others he hadn't yet buried. Names without faces. Faces without peace.
They weren't accusing.
They were warning.
"You're changing," Kaelith said one morning as she watched him train. "Not just in power."
Aren said nothing.
The parasite had spread to his spine now—visible only when shirtless, a branching series of crimson-black ridges laced with constellation fractures, like someone had tried to tattoo a living void into his bones.
"I dreamed I was a god last night," he said softly. "And when I woke up… I missed it."
Kaelith approached slowly. "Do you remember who you were before the parasite?"
He thought for a moment.
Then shook his head. "Not clearly. Just the pain. The crawling. The way I had to pretend not to hear the stars laughing."
She frowned. "They laugh?"
"Only at the weak."
His next strike shattered a reinforced training dummy into dust.
Aren no longer participated in all meetings.
The Ashwake had grown.
Nearly ninety-two members now, including small cells operating out of the Cradle District, beneath the Hall of Reverence, and deep in the catacombs of the Old Academy Ruins. Recruits from other academies—exiled summoners, disgraced mages, hollowed priestesses—had begun arriving after hearing rumors of the parasite-bearer who had shattered a divine champion.
But not all came with loyalty.
The traitor was discovered during a routine supply run—Yren, a third-year enchanter once thought harmless. Kaelith found him passing celestial coordinates to a noble runner through blood-linked ink.
Aren didn't wait for a trial.
He burned the coordinates from Yren's tongue with a fragment of his parasite and exiled him from the tower in full view of the Ashwake.
He did not speak.
He did not blink.
Yren's screams echoed for hours.
Kaelith didn't protest. Not openly.
But that night, Aren found her sitting at the altar of the unnamed star—Lira's old station. Her blade rested beside her like an old truth, and her eyes were hollow.
"He was just afraid," she said.
Aren looked away. "Fear doesn't buy back the dead."
"No," she whispered. "But it buys back who we used to be."
The day the Wounded Star descended, the skies refused to move.
No sunrise. No starlight. Just a pale bruise stretched across the heavens, dim and bleeding at the edges. It wasn't an eclipse. It was an intrusion.
**System Alert:**
Astral Disturbance Detected
Source: Uncatalogued Celestial Entity
Designation: [UNKNOWN GODFORM]
Alias: Wounded Star
Threat Level: ANNIHILATION
Aren stood at the parapet of the Ashwake stronghold, gazing up at the distortion bleeding across the sky. The air tasted like grief. Magic refused to form proper patterns. Even the parasite in his chest writhed.
"Is that… it?" Kaelith asked, appearing beside him.
He didn't answer. He couldn't.
Because something inside him was being unraveled.
The parasite wasn't resisting.
It was kneeling.
And that terrified him more than anything.
That same night, Lyon Dareth was dragged from his recovery ward beneath House Dareth's private sanctum—his body broken, pulse weak, barely clinging to life after Aren had shattered his ribs during the confrontation at the Vigil Ascendant.
His father, Lord Kareth Dareth, had waited long enough.
The ritual began beneath the sunken altar of Kalas'Thir—the Radiant Ascender, patron of conquest and rebirth. The chamber was lit with sacrificial flame, and in its center stood the conduit: Lyon's dying body, surrounded by priests weaving spells of resurrection, not from the roots of life, but from celestial reclamation.
Forbidden. Unstable. Desperate.
They fed him godblood drawn from imprisoned stars.
And for a moment, the chamber went silent.
Then Lyon screamed.
His body seized. Eyes burned white. His back arched as divine fire exploded from his mouth and spine. Light swallowed the altar.
When it cleared…
Lyon was standing.
Alive.
Transfigured.
A new constellation burned behind him—foreign, sharp, and unnatural.
But his voice was not his own.
"The Hollowing begins," Lyon said, and smiled with a mouth not built for joy.
Hours earlier, deep within the Ashwake archives…
Kaelith ran her fingers along the spine of a book that shouldn't exist.
It was hidden behind a false wall inside the forbidden wing. It bore no title—only a symbol burned into old leather: a broken star dripping blood.
The parasite in Aren reacted when she touched it.
She brought it to him without a word.
He placed his hand over the cover—and memories that weren't his slammed into him like a tidal wave.
He saw a mountain carved from the skeleton of a god.
He saw constellations screaming as they were devoured by a shadow they had tried to name.
He saw a throne of ruin. And on it… himself.
But not himself.
Older. Barefoot. Eyes like burnt galaxies. A voice that shattered names.
He turned to face Aren.
And spoke one word:
"Remember."
He collapsed, convulsing.
Kaelith caught him, barely.
When his eyes opened again, something was different.
Not just the parasite.
Him.