At first, it was just a sound.
A tiny crack, like dry wood snapping in the distance.
Then came the smell.
Earth.
Blood.
Something old… and wet.
The candles in the cemetery went out one by one.
Not from the wind.
From something heavier.
Something that breathed beneath the soil.
The gravedigger stopped walking.
The procession of heads grew quiet.
Even the roots beneath my feet trembled in warning.
I knew it had begun.
The crack was opening.
⸻
It wasn't in a grave.
It wasn't in the caretaker's house.
It wasn't in the chapel.
It was in the center.
Right in the heart of the cemetery.
A fissure no wider than a finger… but deep.
Endlessly deep.
From it came a moan.
Low.
Tense.
Like someone who's been crying underground for centuries and finally found air.
The earth pulsated.
The tombstones wept black tears.
And my obsidian flared red-hot against my chest.
"Don't open it," said a voice behind me.
I turned.
It was the woman in white.
The same one who used to weep beside the child's grave.
But now she wasn't crying.
She was watching.
Guarding.
"That crack is not for the living," she whispered.
"Not even for the dead."
"What's inside?" I asked.
"What he left behind."
"The general?"
She didn't answer.
But I saw it in her eyes.
Fear.
⸻
The ground cracked further.
From the fissure rose a hand.
Small.
Thin.
Childlike.
But not made of flesh.
It was made of stone.
And it moved.
Trembling.
Searching.
The procession of heads backed away.
The gravedigger turned his face to the ground.
I stepped forward.
"Is it one of ours?" I asked.
The woman in white shook her head.
"No.
It's one of his creations."
"Then we should stop it—"
"No."
"You can't stop it now."
"Why not?"
"Because you were the key."
My breath caught.
"You mean I… opened it?"
"You are the crack," she said.
"You were the wound he left behind."
⸻
The sky turned red.
The clouds twisted.
And from the fissure came more hands.
Dozens.
Some still holding rosaries.
Others with fingernails torn from clawing at stone.
They didn't scream.
They didn't beg.
They just climbed.
The woman in white stepped in front of me.
"You must decide."
"Decide what?"
"Whether to become what he made you…
or what you were born to be."
"And if I choose neither?"
"Then they will decide for you."
She vanished.
And I was alone again.
Facing the crack.
Facing myself.
⸻
Now I see it clearly.
The crack is not in the ground.
It's in me.
In my memory.
In my rage.
In my silence.
And every time I speak,
every time I fight,
every time I remember—
—the crack opens a little more.
And something comes out.
Something I don't fully understand.
Something older than the general.
Older than me.
Older than the cemetery.
But I'm not afraid anymore.
Because whatever I become…
…it will be mine.