The first salvo wasn't subtle.
Before dawn, the horizon lit up in white fire as the Conclave's Spirefire cannons ignited. Columns of blinding energy lanced across Starlight City, not at Arielle, not at the tether, but at everything—streets, buildings, entire blocks reduced to shimmering ash.
The hum in Arielle's chest spiked so violently it nearly threw her to her knees. Every impact tore through her bones like a scream, the city itself recoiling from the Conclave's assault.
Selene gritted their teeth beside her, silver stitches blazing as they tried to patch ruptured veins of the tether. "They're not even aiming at you. They're burning the city itself so it can't hold you. If they collapse enough districts, the tether will splinter, and you'll… unravel with it."
Draven's constructs swirled violently, absorbing stray shockwaves as he scanned the burning skyline. "Spirefire was designed to incinerate rogue lattices. The Conclave doesn't care if Starlight City survives. As long as you're cut loose, the ashes don't matter."
Arielle pressed her palm to the nearest wall, forcing herself to focus through the agony coursing up her arm. The city's hum wasn't just pain — it was anger. The streets quivered, the lights in shattered windows flared, and beneath her fingers, the wall itself rippled like a living muscle, responding to her steadiness.
She drew a long, deliberate breath, syncing her heartbeat to the city's shuddering pulse.
Hold. Don't break.
The hum steadied — not calm, not quiet, but focused. The ground beneath their feet flexed, redirecting collapsing streets to swallow the Spirefire shockwaves, dispersing their impact through empty alleys and canals. Whole blocks shivered but stayed standing.
The Conclave noticed. Their cannons adjusted, focusing now on Arielle's pulse itself, triangulating her position with bursts of white-thread resonance that made her vision blur and her chest burn.
Draven caught her arm before she stumbled. "They've found you. You either move deeper into the city, or you become the city entirely. There's no middle ground now."
Arielle's jaw tightened. "If I merge with it, I'm gone."
Selene met her gaze, their stitches trembling as they fought to mend another ruptured vein. "If you don't… so is the city. And so are you."
The hum inside her surged, louder than it had ever been, almost demanding. It wasn't words — it was a plea.
Choose.
The Conclave's second wave came faster: phalanxes of Wardens escorted by aerial constructs, each one tethered to mobile Spirefire generators that pulsed white energy into the streets like heart-stopping beats. Wherever they stepped, the hum in Arielle's chest fractured.
She stumbled, clutching the wall as cracks spread up the pavement like spiderwebs. The city's pulse faltered, dangerously close to snapping in half.
Selene shouted something — she couldn't hear what. Draven pulled her upright, his constructs exploding outward to hold off the Wardens for seconds, maybe less.
Her vision swam with violet light, the tether's threads clawing at her ribs, begging for a decision. She could hold it together if she let go of herself — stopped being Arielle and became the nexus fully. The hum wouldn't stutter. The streets wouldn't break. But her voice, her thoughts, her self would vanish into the pulse.
She closed her eyes. The city's pulse and her own synced for a single, steady beat.
And then she exhaled. "Not yet. I'm not done being me."
The streets obeyed. Entire districts flexed like living limbs, swallowing Spirefire constructs and collapsing on Warden squads before they could advance. The city fought not as a core, but as something new — something alive.
The Conclave pulled back, their cannons dimming, their formations retreating into the haze. But Arielle felt it even before the last Warden vanished into the smoke: this was only the opening act.
The next wave wouldn't just burn the city.It would come for her.