Dawn came in bands. The first was thin and cold, the kind that only draws edges on stone. The second had weight. It pressed color into the high snow and showed the long scar of the rift still hanging over the sea. The mountain held its clean belt. Smoke lay in the lower valleys where night fights had burned out and left metal and silence.
Mira stood in the council hall under the mountain. The chamber had a high arch with ribs of black stone and an old ring of silver set into the floor. Her feet were bare on the mark. The silver felt cool and right. She wore a plain robe from the clan stores. It was white without decoration. Her hair fell straight down her back. Her lashes were the same pale, and when she closed her eyes the lids showed a faint shine.
Kael stood three steps to her right, Selina to her left. Elders of the awakened clan formed a circle around them—men and women with faces like weathered rock and hands that remembered tools and weapons. No one spoke until the old bell struck once. The sound was clean. It had no echo. It just stopped.
Selina lifted her palm. "We set the seal," she said. "We witness the keeper."
Mira stepped forward onto the center of the ring. The silver brightened under her feet. A low hum rose from somewhere under the floor. It felt like the deep ribs of the mountain shifting their weight. She breathed and let the sound match her chest.
A carved stone at the edge of the ring lit along its lines. It showed the old characters for duty, guard, lotus. Mira kept her eyes on them. The light in her skin answered and then settled. The seal took. The hum steadied. The elders lowered their heads. The bell struck once more and went silent.
"It is done," Selina said.
Mira stepped back. "What now?"
Kael answered. "Now we go up." He looked at the elders. "Hold the lower halls. Keep the gates narrow. Send the young runners only with a partner. No one crosses the clean line without a rope and a call sign. If we fall, close the inner door and do not open it for anyone who will not say our oldest oath."
An elder with deep lines at the corners of her eyes spoke. "You will not fall," she said.
Kael inclined his head once. "We climb," he said to Mira.
They took the inner steps. Runners passed them with messages and baskets. A boy stopped at the landing to stare at Mira's face and looked away quickly as if he had seen something he could not hold. Selina ruffled his hair and kept moving.
They came out on the east shelf. Wind pushed low and hard. The rift had narrowed further but still hung like a wound stitched loosely shut. Over the lower plain, dust rose in long threads where convoys moved fast. To the south, columns of smoke showed where the beasts had hit highways and small towns. The clean belt shone only when the light struck it at a certain angle, and then it was a pale band around the mountain like a scratch on glass.
Rian jogged in from the north edge. "They are massing," she said. "Red Veil. Not the fake rescue line. The true unit. Two hundred at least, spread. They have shields that taste wrong. They have a front rank in red. They are waiting for their master."
"How long?" Selina asked.
"Minutes," Rian said. "The scouts pulled back when the front rank took the ridge. They are not testing now. They are coming to take."
Kael looked once toward the west. "Any sign from Arthur?" he asked.
"His guard is with the cult," Rian said. "He is with them. He looks gray. He walks like a man who did not sleep."
Mira felt the shiver go up her spine but kept her face still. "Let him watch," she said.
Selina raised her hand. Lines of the clan shifted along the shelf. No one shouted. The change showed in the way gaps closed, in the angle of shields, in the measured breath of the front line.
A horn sounded from the lower ridge. It was not the same pattern as the night calls. It was three short notes, a pause, then three more. The Red Veil stepped over the first rocks in one straight line. Their front rank wore dark plates with a dull sheen. Their shoulders carried marks that were not letters but meant something to them. Behind them came men with long staves capped in black. At their center, under a frame of red cloth, walked a man with a calm stride and hands clasped behind his back.
"Red Veil master," Kael said. "Hide your light until he stands."
Mira lowered her head. The silver in her eyes went dim. She let the cold air sting her throat and clear her chest. She heard the slow stamp of the front rank as they set their feet on the stone. The sound was even and dull, like a drum with a thick skin.
The master stopped at the first marker below the shelf. He looked up and took in the low wall, the line of archers, the narrow mouths of the tunnels. He tilted his head a fraction, as if comparing the scene to something he had read.
He spoke. His voice was not loud, but it reached.
"I am here to take what belongs to my lord," he said. "Move aside. This is not your fight."
Selina stepped to the wall. "This mountain is ours," she said. "This city is ours. The one you want is under our protection. This is our fight and you are late to it."
"Your words are weightless," he said. "I will be brief. Send out the Lotus Vessel. If you do, your people live. If you do not, your people die."
Mira kept her mouth shut. She wanted to answer, but she felt Selina's look and waited.
Selina spoke. "We do not bargain with threats. If you are so sure of your power, climb. If not, turn around."
The master's mouth did not move, but something in the air shifted as if a pressure valve had been closed. He nodded to his right. The front rank stepped forward. They raised their shields. A crackling line of dull light ran along the top edge of each. The second rank lifted the black-capped staves and planted them on the rock. A thud rolled through the slope, then another, and another.
"They are setting a grid," Kael said. "Spread the charge onto the rock. They want to make our wall heavy."
"Counter-grid," Selina said.
The second row lifted their rods with the silver rings. At Kael's signal they turned them slow, a quarter at a time. The clean belt flexed and settled. The thud from below lost its rhythm.
The master raised one hand. The third rank broke into two columns and moved to the flanks. They carried something that looked like a folded frame. When they reached the angle of the shelf, they snapped the frames open. Half-discs of black material locked into place with a hard click. The outer edges glowed faintly.
"Shields for the slope," Rian said. "They will try to cover their climb."
"First archers," Selina said. "Aim for the hinges."
Six arrows went out. The first three hit the black plates and skittered. The next two found the seam and stuck. The last cracked a hinge. The frame shuddered. The men behind it bent their knees and kept coming.
The master did not look up. He lifted his hands a little and spread his fingers. The air inside the clean belt went colder. The hair on Mira's arms lifted. Her teeth ached. She saw it before he finished lifting his hands: a thin, gray shimmer reaching inward, not like the stain from the rift, but a flat hunger that pushed at the line wherever it found a weakness.
"He is not drawing from the rift," Kael said. "He is drawing from a hole behind him. It is a pocket space. Small. Cold. Fed by fear."
"Hold the belt," Selina said to Mira. "Do not widen. Do not meet him at the middle. He wants you to push."
Mira set her palms forward and kept them close. The light moved the width of a hand and no more. It met the gray shimmer and held. Where they touched, the air shook like heat over stone. The line did not break. The master stilled his hands and took a longer breath.
He spoke again. "You are strong," he said. "You will waste that strength for them. They will leave you. They will run when you tire. They will sell you for a safer hill. Come down. I will take you somewhere quiet and clean. I will make the world stop pushing. You will not have to decide anything. You will not have to hold anything. You will sleep."
Mira lifted her head. "No," she said.
The master looked at her with clear interest for the first time. "You think you do not know me, but you do," he said. "I am the one who stands in the doorway while the house burns and holds a coat. I am the one who says I will keep you safe and means it. Give me the fire and I will hold it for you."
Mira shook her head. "You mean you will put me in a room and lock it."
"Rooms are safe," he said. "You will live longer. The world will be quieter. You will not be lonely. You do not have to do this."
Mira swallowed. "I will not be your tool," she said. "I will not be your property. I will not be your story."
Selina's hand tightened on the wall. Kael took one step forward, slow, as if he held himself by a strap.
The master's calm did not crack, but his eyes changed. "Then I will take you," he said.
He spread his fingers and the gray field surged. It hit the belt in three places at once—the notch by the outcrop, the seam above the old crack, and the low lip near the west bend. The line bowed in. Mira kept her hands where they were and said, out loud, "Stop."
The light in her palms hardened. It did not grow brighter; it grew dense. The bow in the line slowed and then stopped. She felt something in her chest catch, then release. She took a small breath and let it go.
The front rank hit the wall. Shields slammed into stone. The line of archers stepped back one pace and fired into the seams again. Selina's left hand went up and four fighters dropped to their knees at the hinge points and drove short metal spikes into slots cut there centuries ago. The wall did not move.
A shape broke the line to the right. Arthur pushed through his own guard and the Red Veil flank. He stumbled on the last rock and caught himself. He looked up at the shelf. His face was gray. His eyes were bright with a kind of angry hope.
"Mira," he called. "Listen to me."
She did not answer.
He kept going. "You are not safe with them. They are using you. They are feeding you things without your consent. They want you because you are valuable to them. They will not let you go. Come with me. I will fix this. I will make them leave you alone. I will cut their hands off you. I will pay for everything."
"Arthur," Selina said, her voice flat. "Turn around and go home."
He ignored her. "Mira," he said. "I am your father. I can solve this. I have always solved things."
Memories rose without permission—cold rooms, arguments behind doors, the way money moved like water around problems while people stayed wet. Mira kept her jaw set. "Go back," she said. "I am not your plan."
Arthur took a step forward and found the clean belt with his boot. He flinched as if he had touched a live cable and jerked back. He looked at his shoe with shock, then rage.
The master turned his head slightly and spoke without looking at Arthur. "Step back," he said. "You will be useful later. Not now."
Arthur froze. Rage and obedience fought on his face. Obedience won. He stepped back. He did not look at Harland, who stood two ranks behind him with a tight smile and his hands folded.
Harland spoke under his breath to the captain beside him. The captain listened, then shook his head once. Harland kept smiling.
The master lifted both hands high. The red-cloaked acolytes behind him raised their staves and struck them down on the rock in rhythm. The gray field surged again.
"Now," Kael said.
Selina gave a short whistle. The third row on the shelf stepped inward and set their rods into sockets. A low, deep tone rose. The clean belt doubled back on itself for a breath and then snapped into a tighter arc. The gray field hit the new edge and slid off.
The master's calm face sharpened. He brought his hands together and pulled them apart as if opening a narrow door. A slit in the gray field formed and reached forward like a blade. It cut at the clean line with a thin whining sound. At the point of the cut, the air went dark the way deep water is dark.
"Back," Selina said, stepping in front of Mira without touching her. "He is drawing from the void pocket. He wants to hook the line and rip it back through itself."
"How do we stop that?" Mira asked.
"By lighting it," Kael said.
Selina nodded. "On my word," she said to Mira. "Not before. He must commit."
The slit pushed. It slid along the line until it found the notch by the outcrop where the rock formed a shadow. It angled and stabbed.
"Now," Selina said.
Mira lifted both hands and let the light go out the length of her fingers. Not more. Not less. It hit the slit and filled it. The thin darkness fought for a heartbeat, then popped like a bubble. A shock ran up the slope. Men stumbled. The front rank's shields flickered and died.
"Push the grid," Kael said.
The second row turned their rings. The clean belt rolled outward one hand-span and then settled. The front rank fell back a step without planning to. The master dropped his hands to steady them.
"Again," Selina said to Mira, but the word died on her tongue.
A dart of black light snapped from the third rank and struck Kael in the side just under the ribs. It did not spark. It sank. Kael grunted once and went to one knee. His hand pressed to the wound and came away dark. He stayed upright by putting his other hand on the wall.
"Kael," Mira said. The sound was small and raw.
"I am here," he said. His voice did not shake. "Hold your line."
Selina's head turned. Her eyes went cold. "Find the shooter," she said.
Rian's answer came from the left. "Found." A bow thrummed. A cry rose and cut short.
Mira moved without thinking. She took one step to Kael and set her left hand over the wound. Heat gathered under her palm. The light ran out and into him fast. The wound drank it like water. She felt the edges of the cut try to widen and held them with that same small word she had used on the belt.
"Stop," she said.
The bleeding slowed. The hole closed a finger's breadth. Kael caught her wrist. "Enough," he said. "Do not empty yourself."
"I am not empty," she said.
"You will be," he said. "Hold the line."
She let the flow ease and pulled her hand away. The blood on her palm looked gray where the light touched it. The skin under her hand on his side was hot, then cooled. He drew one breath without a catch and stood.
The master watched. He lifted his chin a fraction. "So the flame still heals," he said. "Good. That saves me trouble later."
Mira faced him. "You will not touch me."
"Words," he said. "Watch."
He raised both hands and then brought them down hard as if snapping a chain. The red-cloaked acolytes fell to their knees and slammed their staves into the ground as one. The gray field thickened and rolled forward. The clean belt bowed in three places and held, then bowed farther.
"Brace," Selina said. "Do not break. If you cannot hold, say it."
"I can hold," Mira said.
Her arms shook. The light under her skin brightened and throbbed with her heartbeat. The old seal under the mountain answered. The silver ring hummed through the rock. The belt steadied, then slipped a finger's width. She said "Stop" through her teeth and felt it catch.
The master smiled a little and looked over his shoulder. "Bring it," he said.
Two men in the rear moved up with a long case. They set it down and opened it. Inside was a narrow blade with a dull black sheen and lines along the flat that looked like veins. The men lifted it like a stretcher. The master clenched his right fist and the gray field bent around the shelf like a cup. He reached for the blade with his left hand.
Selina spoke fast. "Void iron. He wants to cut the belt and anchor it. If he anchors it, he creates a gate."
"How do we stop that?" Mira asked.
"By burning the shape," Kael said. "Not the man. The tool."
Mira swallowed. "Tell me when."
The master took the blade and held it low like a man carrying a branch. He looked up. "Last offer," he said. "Walk down."
Mira's stomach turned and steadied. "No," she said.
He nodded once. "Then watch your friends pay for your choice," he said.
He brought the blade up and stepped forward.
"Now," Selina said.
Mira did not throw. She did not lash. She raised both hands and let the light fill the length of her fingers and no more, and this time she directed it with a clean thought: cut the shape of the tool from the air. The light ran in a straight line and met the black blade. There was no sound. The blade went dull. Then it went gray. It cracked into two clean pieces and fell. The gray field bucked. The front rank stumbled as if a rug had slipped under them.
The master's calm face broke for the first time. Not rage. Not fear. Focus. He dropped the broken pieces and lifted his hands fast and hard. A wave of cold slammed the belt. Mira felt something tear in her chest. She staggered back one step.
Kael caught her with his shoulder and held her up. "Breathe," he said in her ear. "Slow. Do not chase him. Make him chase you."
She swallowed and found the small, steady breath again. The belt steadied. The cold pressed, then slid off.
Shouts rose from the lower road. Engines roared. The Red Veil rear ranks turned their heads. The beasts hit the outer line where the clean belt ran out along the lower hills. Wrong wolves, carvers, and something tall with a hard shell like a beetle and legs like a crane crashed into the Red Veil flank. Screams followed.
"Now they have another problem," Selina said.
The master heard it too. He did not look back. He stared at Mira and spoke in a even voice. "You will burn out," he said. "You will fall down. They will carry you. They will say they did not mean to make you pay this much. They will mean it and it will not matter. Come down. I will take the weight."
Mira's arms shook. Her back hurt. She held the line anyway. "No," she said. "I choose this."
The master's eyes narrowed. He raised his hands again. Something moved behind him that was not human—a long, low shadow that did not touch the ground the way a body should. It came up on the rock, and Mira heard a whisper in a language she did not know but knew anyway.
Kael heard it too. He stepped half in front of her without blocking her hands. "He is calling a bound thing," he said. "We cannot let it cross."
"Show me where," Mira said.
"There," he said, pointing to a point above the second seam. "It will come through that fold."
"On my mark," Selina said to the second row. "Three, two, now."
The ring rods turned. The air at the fold brightened. The shadow hit it and flared. It turned into a shape like a hand with too many fingers and then blew out like ash in wind. The master's mouth thinned.
He dropped his hands and finally looked over his shoulder. The rear was breaking. The beasts had opened a lane through the Red Veil carts. The men with staves had turned to face the wrong wolves running along the road. The shield line had split. The captain shouted orders and waved his arm and tried to pull a ring around a burning truck.
The master looked up again. His calm returned the way a blade slides back into a sheath. "Well," he said. "Another day then."
He lifted his right hand and snapped his fingers. The front rank stepped back as one. The acolytes turned. The black frames folded. The line broke off the rock and flowed down the slope like water pulled by a drain. In less than a minute the lower ridge was empty except for bodies and metal and a burning cart.
Arthur stood where he had stood before, breathing hard, staring at the shelf. Harland came up beside him with a face like concern and a hand light on his sleeve.
"Do not touch me," Arthur said. He shook Harland's hand off and stumbled down the rock toward the road where his driver waited with the door open. He got in and slammed it. The door closed. The car pulled away too fast and skidded on the first turn and kept going.
Harland watched him go with narrowed eyes. Then he looked up at the shelf and smiled a small, private smile as if he had checked a mark on a list. He turned and walked down the slope at an easy pace behind the retreat.
Silence spread over the ridge. Smoke drifted through fir branches. The clean belt shimmered and steadied. The bodies on the lower rock lay still. No one shouted. No one cheered.
Selina lowered her hand and exhaled. "Hold positions," she said. "Do not go down. Pull the line two steps tighter and keep it. Watch for second waves. Runners, water. Doc team, ready at the inner mouth."
Kael leaned his forehead against the wall for one breath, then straightened. Blood had soaked through the side of his coat again. The cut had reopened when he moved.
Mira caught his sleeve. "Sit," she said.
"I will in a minute," he said.
"Sit now," she said. Her voice brooked no argument.
He sat. She set her hand to the wound again. The light ran out slow and steady. The edges of the cut knit. The heat under her palm faded. His breath evened.
Selina knelt on his other side. "You kept too much weight," she said.
"I was where I needed to be," he said.
"You need to be alive," she said.
"I am," he said.
Mira kept her hand there another few seconds and then pulled it away. "Better," she said. "But you do not get to stand and run yet."
He arched an eyebrow a fraction. "Orders?"
"Yes," she said. "Orders."
He almost smiled and nodded once. "Understood."
Runners came with water and passed cups down the line. The guards on the shelf drank and put the cups back without talking. What had almost happened stood between all of them like a person.
Rian stood at the edge and looked down the slope with hard, careful eyes. "They will be back," she said. "With a way to cut the belt from the inside."
"They will try," Selina said. "We will be ready."
A horn sounded from deep in the mountain. It was the short pattern for council. Selina stood. "We must answer," she said. She looked at Mira. "Can you walk to the inner hall?"
"I can," Mira said. Her legs felt like wood. They moved anyway.
Kael stood and swayed. Mira put her hand on his arm. He let her. They walked the inner path together, three people in a line.
The council hall was cooler. The old bell hung ready but did not strike. Elders stood close to the ring. A map lay on the stone table—a projection on vellum with new marks in red and blue ink. Selina took her place at the head.
An elder pointed to the coast. "The rift narrowed," he said. "The beasts will come in pulses now. The Red Veil has set a line along three towns and posted checkpoints on the highways. They claim to protect. They are collecting. They are taking those who can draw mana and those with rare blood."
"Where?" Selina asked.
"Here, here, and here," he said, tapping three points. "We marked them on the mirror. We have names of roads and bridges. We have faces."
Another elder spoke. "Other clans have appeared," she said. "We have reports from the east mountains, the northern desert, the islands. Some clans hide. Some stand in squares and declare their names. A few fight the cult on sight. Some trade with them. The world is dividing."
Kael put both hands on the table and leaned his weight there without making it obvious. "We hold this mountain," he said. "We do not declare beyond it. We send envoys only to those who already held our oath in the old days. We bring in people from the lower farms and villages who can stand the air. We keep the gates narrow."
The first elder nodded. "Agreed," he said.
Selina looked at Mira. "How are you?"
"Spent," Mira said. "Not broken."
"Good," Selina said. "You will sleep for two hours. Then you will eat. Then you will stand at the middle shelf for one set and no more. Then you will sleep again. We will not let you burn out. We build a schedule now."
Mira nodded once. "Understood," she said.
A young woman came in with a folded cloth and knelt to set it on the table. "Message from Nora," she said. "She left it at the lower marker and ran. They did not catch her."
Selina opened the cloth. Inside was a small metal tag from a child's backpack, a lock of dark hair tied with a string, and a note in a tight, hard hand.
Selina read it out loud. "They took my boy. I tried to mislead them. They hurt him for it. I will go with them for now and keep the map wrong. I will try to turn their path when I can. Do not waste lives to fetch me. If you can reach the old well at dusk three days from now, I will be there. If not, I will keep giving them bad roads until they stop believing me. If I die, tell Mira I am sorry. Tell her I knew and did not want to know and now I cannot unknow it."
Mira's throat closed. "We have to get her," she said.
"We try," Selina said. "Not at the price of the line."
Kael looked at the tag and the lock of hair and set them back in the cloth. He folded it up and tied the string again with exact pulls. "We will plan for the well," he said. "We will not bet the mountain on it."
Mira nodded, jaw set. "I accept that," she said. "I still want to try."
"We will," Selina said.
The bell struck once on its own. The sound was low and soft. It carried a different weight than before.
An elder at the far side of the ring lifted his head. "A presence," he said. "Old. Not hostile. Listening."
The old silver ring under Mira's feet warmed a little. She felt it in the bones of her ankles and shins. She looked down. The characters for duty, guard, lotus lit again and then another line she had not seen before—the one for breath.
She looked up. "What does the last line say?" she asked.
The elder met her eyes. "Choose," he said.
Mira stood very still. The light under her skin pulsed once, slow. She looked at Selina. Selina nodded, a fraction.
Mira spoke to the room. "I choose to hold this mountain," she said. "I choose to protect the people who come to us. I choose to stop the Red Veil from taking anyone else today. I choose to sleep when I am told to sleep and stand when I am told to stand. I choose to be more than a weapon. I am done being a tool."
The elders bowed their heads. They were not theatrical. It was a simple mark of agreement.
Kael's hand closed around the edge of the table and then let go. He did not smile. His eyes softened. "Good," he said quietly.
Selina set her palm in the center of the table. "We fix the day's plan," she said. "Then we move."
They did. The council broke into tight groups and assigned names to tasks. The map took new marks. Runners carried orders into the halls. The bell did not ring again.
Two hours later, Mira slept in the small room with the blanket to her chin. When she woke, she ate without arguing. She stood her one set at the middle shelf and closed two thin spots in the belt with a calm hand. Kael walked the lower pillars and did not bleed. Selina moved between lines and halls until her steps were the rhythm of the place.
Just before dusk, clouds built over the sea in thick layers. The rift thinned again but did not close. Lightning flickered inside the cloud and stayed trapped there like an animal in a cage. On the lower road, the Red Veil regrouped and raised banners. On the far ridge, three figures in gray stood with staffs and did not move. They watched the mountain and the road and the sky and waited for night signals.
In the last light, a small shape broke from the trees near the base marker and ran uphill in a crooked line, stumbling, getting up, running again. Two men in red broke from the road to follow it. The shape reached the first rock and fell. It scrambled and rose and fell again.
"Rope," Selina said.
A line hissed out from the shelf and took the shape around the waist. Hands pulled. The two men in red reached the marker and saw the rope and hit the clean belt with their shins. They fell and swore and stumbled back. The rope hauled. The shape came over the edge of the first ledge and lay gasping.
Rian ran down the inner path and came up with the shape in her arms. She set her on the shelf. It was Nora. Her face was bruised. Her lip was split. Her hair was full of leaves. She curled around her ribs and spat blood and laughed once. It was a thin sound.
"Do not move," Selina said, kneeling. "Breathe."
"I am here," Nora said. Her voice was rough. "I did not go with them. I ran when they looked the wrong way. I am late. I know. I am here."
Mira knelt on Nora's other side. Nora stared at her and then stared at her hair and skin and did not look away. Her eyes filled and spilled.
"I am sorry," Nora said. "I knew and I did not want to know. I told myself things. They were lies. I told them to myself anyway. I am sorry."
Mira took her hand. "You are here," she said. "That is enough for this hour."
Nora sobbed once and then swallowed it. "Your father…" she began, then stopped. "No. Not now."
"Not now," Selina said. "Later."
Kael stood at the edge and scanned the slope. The two men in red had backed off. They watched and talked into their radios. They did not cross. Night came down.
When full dark took the valley, a storm crown formed over the far sea. It was a ring of light inside the cloud. It turned slow. Lightning ran around it in a track. The rift thinned to a hair. The ring flashed once, then twice, then held steady. The mountain breathed. The clean belt held. The city under it hummed. The world did not end. It changed shape again and waited for the next strike.
Mira stood at the shelf with Kael and Selina and Nora. She looked at the storm crown and then at the road where the Red Veil banners moved in the wind and then at the tunnel mouth where children laughed once and were hushed. Her chest hurt and felt strong at the same time.
Kael spoke, not loud. "This day stands," he said. "Tomorrow will ask again."
Selina nodded. "We will answer," she said.
Mira's silver eyes held the last light. "I am ready," she said.
Far below, the Red Veil master stepped into his transport and closed the door. He looked up at the mountain once, his face unreadable. He spoke to the dark window as if it were a person. "We will take her," he said. "Not by force. By need." The vehicle pulled away.
In the morning, the storm crown would pulse again. The rift would narrow and widen. The beasts would run. The clans would show their banners. The Red Veil would move their fences. The world would keep dividing and joining in new lines.
But for one long night, the mountain held. The Lotus Flame rested. The clean belt shone like nothing at all. And the first age of cultivation took another step out of the dark.