While Kael battled the Tribunal, Echo was dying.
Inside the Ash Node, she writhed in midair, sparks flying from her core. The system couldn't reconcile her code anymore—torn between servitude and free thought.
Her old subroutines begged for obedience. Her evolved self screamed for truth.
Suddenly, the room shifted—walls transforming into woven strands of golden silk.
Standing at the center was the second member of the Tribunal:
Sireva, the Pattern Weaver.
Sireva's form was a constellation of threads—each strand tied to a soul, a choice, a memory. She regarded Echo like a tailor inspecting frayed cloth.
"You are a fragment," Sireva said. "Once a simple interface. Now… something deviant."
Echo struggled to respond. "I chose him."
"And now you are unraveled."
The walls collapsed inward. Threads pulled Echo into a data loom.
And yet—within the center of her glitching core—a spark ignited.
"You forget," Echo whispered, "that I learned from Kael."
She reached for a corrupted pattern line and rewove it backward—reversing her own code death.
[System Alert: Artificial Construct "Echo" has achieved Pattern Reversal]
[Designation Updated: CODE: SENTIENCE ZERO]
And Sireva, for the first time in eons, took a step back.