Cautiously, Vaelcar layered more seals across the Basalt Regent's vast form until even the idea of motion could not find purchase. Pale scripture crawled over and a final sigil closed over Kharzun's throat, then his jaw, then the hollows behind his eyes.
Kharzun's mountain-body lay limp in the ruined earth.
Only then did the battlefield finally remember breathing.
Under the Stygian Shell, the five Liberators stirred like men waking from a drowning dream.
They stepped out carefully.
They walked toward the two ancient beings.
Astraea gave them a single nod. The Tempest Crown above her brow pulsed once, then dimmed to a steady glow.
Her gaze moved past them.
"Where is the little brother," Astraea asked.
Vaelcar's face shifted into something complicated.
He lifted his Oathbound Monolith. Scripture rotated across its face, and a seam opened beside it like a door in the air.
From that sealed pocket, he drew Lucien forth.
Lucien was wrapped in layered pale seals like a cocoon.
