Rowan's grip locked around Aiden's arm with the precision of someone who had restrained monsters before—but never someone who _felt_ like one. His fingers tightened just enough to stop Aiden from slipping into the shadows, but not enough to provoke a defensive response.
Not yet.
The air hummed with pressure.
Aiden's shadow-mantle twitched violently, sensing a threat it didn't fully recognize.
The parasite whispered like a blade pressed to his ear:
**Guild interference detected.
Remove obstacle.**
Aiden breathed out slowly.
"No," he murmured under his breath. "We are not killing Rowan."
Rowan's eyes narrowed. "Who are you talking to?"
Aiden winced. Right. Rowan Vance could hear microtones. Heartbeats. Stress fractures in voices. He didn't just hear words—he heard _truth_.
"I'm fine," Aiden said.
Lie.
Rowan's grip tightened.
"Aiden," he said quietly, "your pulse is oscillating like you just walked through a Rift storm. You're drenched in hostile resonance. And your shadow—"
He glanced at the flickering mantle.
"—is moving like it has a mind of its own."
Great.
Exactly what Aiden needed—
a human instinct engine trying to diagnose him like a ticking bomb.
He pulled his arm free. "It's nothing."
Rowan's voice sharpened like steel. "Aiden. Look at me."
Aiden turned.
Rowan studied him with unsettling intensity, reading him layer by layer.
"What did you do?" Rowan asked softly. "What did you _become_ down there?"
Aiden swallowed.
"I walked into the Rift. I survived. That's all."
Another lie.
Rowan flinched—not visibly, but internally, a microreaction Aiden recognized too well.
"You're lying," Rowan whispered.
Aiden cursed silently.
Before Rowan could say anything more—
The ground trembled.
A distant alarm blared across the night sky, echoing through the tunnels like the howl of a dying beast.
Rowan's head jerked upward.
Aiden felt his pulse spike.
No.
Not now.
Not this early.
A colossal rumbling crackled through the city overhead.
Rowan's expression went pale.
"That's—"
Aiden finished for him.
"The **Moonfall Alarm**."
The city's emergency system activated only under one condition—
When the twin moons detected catastrophic Rift instability.
Rowan grabbed Aiden's wrist again, this time in urgency rather than suspicion.
"Aiden, what did you do?"
But Aiden wasn't listening.
The parasite surged violently inside him.
**GLOBAL ALERT CONFIRMED.
TIMELINE DETERIORATION ACCELERATING.
MOONFALL ARC: COMMENCING EARLY.**
Aiden froze.
Moonfall wasn't supposed to begin until **Day 37**.
This was **Day 2**.
Rowan shook him.
"Aiden—listen to me! If you know what's coming—if you know anything about this—you have to tell the Guild before—"
Aiden ripped free.
"No! You don't understand! The Guild can't stop this!"
Rowan stepped back.
"Then _who can_?"
Aiden's answer tasted like ash.
"…Me."
Rowan's face twisted in confusion and disbelief.
"What are you talking about? You're barely awakened—"
Aiden's shadow flared behind him, splitting into jagged wings of black flame.
Rowan stumbled back in shock.
Aiden tried to speak—
But the sky outside spoke first.
A blinding burst of silver-blue light erupted through the tunnel entrance.
The ground shook.
The air distorted.
Then—
**BOOOOOOM**
A shockwave rippled across Twin-Moon Metropolis.
Rowan braced himself against the wall.
Aiden's eyes widened.
He knew that sound.
It was the sound the world made in the last timeline
ten minutes before its first extinction zone appeared.
Rowan pulled out his Guild communicator, voice shaking.
"This is Lieutenant Rowan Vance—requesting immediate clearance! The Twin-Moons just registered a Tier-2 Rift emergence above the city—no, not scheduled—yes, anomalous signature—"
Aiden whispered:
"No. Not a Rift."
Rowan turned sharply.
"What do you mean NOT—"
Aiden looked up at the sky.
A crack tore across it—
a glowing fracture stretching from one moon to the other
like a scar being reopened.
Silver dust rained down in shimmering arcs.
The moons pulsed as if struggling to stay whole.
The parasite purred, delighted.
**MOONFALL CONVERGENCE: PHASE 1
BEGINS.**
Aiden felt panic, dread, and a familiar, horrific recognition flood into him.
He staggered backward.
"It's not a Rift," he whispered.
"It's the first **Moonfall Pulse**."
Rowan's face went white.
"That's impossible," Rowan said. "Moonfall isn't predicted for another—"
"A month?" Aiden finished. "Yeah. I know."
Aiden's heartbeat thundered.
This wasn't a deviation.
This wasn't a glitch.
This wasn't corruption.
This was—
**Someone accelerating the apocalypse.**
Rowan stared at him.
"Aiden… how do you know that?"
Aiden's shadows writhed.
The parasite whispered:
**Tell him nothing.**
Aiden whispered:
"…Because I've lived through this before."
Rowan froze.
The world froze with him.
The sky cracked again.
And the Moonfall Alarm screamed a warning the timeline should not have reached this soon.
Rowan stared at Aiden as if he had just declared himself the architect of the universe. His pupils tightened. His stance shifted. All instinct, all training, all Guild conditioning aligned into one conclusion:
**Aiden Crowe is not normal.
Aiden Crowe is not safe.
Aiden Crowe knows too much.**
Aiden felt the tension sharpen like a blade between them.
"Rowan," he said quietly, "please. Not right now."
"Not right—?" Rowan stepped forward, voice breaking between authority and panic. "You just said you _lived through_ this! That's not something a person says, Aiden!"
Aiden backed away, shadows rising unbidden.
"I can explain—"
"You will explain," Rowan snapped. "Because if Moonfall is happening a month early, the Guild needs every—"
"Rowan." Aiden held up a hand, trembling. "The Guild can't stop Moonfall. You know that."
Rowan's jaw set.
"No. What I know is that you've walked out of a forbidden Rift with corruption levels higher than any initiate should have, your shadows are behaving like independent entities, and you're talking like someone who's been reading prophecy scrolls instead of training."
Aiden clenched his teeth.
He didn't have time for this.
Not with the sky fracturing.
Not with Lyra awakening too fast.
Not with the parasite vibrating under his skin like a creature ecstatic for blood.
Rowan took a step closer.
"Aiden… what happened to you?"
Aiden swallowed.
He wasn't ready to answer.
Not honestly.
Not fully.
But he didn't have time to lie.
"I regressed," Aiden said softly. "I was sent back."
Rowan blinked.
"What?"
"I lived through the world ending. And now I'm back at the start."
Rowan stared at him, waiting for the punchline.
It didn't come.
"You expect me to believe that?" Rowan demanded.
Aiden didn't flinch.
"I expect you to look at the sky."
Another crack tore across the moons—wide enough this time to let a pulse of silver energy roar outward like a shockwave.
Rowan shielded his eyes.
"What IS that?!"
Aiden's voice was steel.
"The beginning of Moonfall.
The world-ending event we're not supposed to reach for another month."
Rowan shook his head, stepping back, refusing to accept it.
"No, that's impossible—our astronomancers track every fluctuation—"
"Your astronomancers have never seen a corrupted timeline," Aiden snapped. "They've never measured a paradox fracture. They've never dealt with recursive Shadow evolution. They've never—"
He broke off as another pulse hit, this one deep enough to make dust rain down from the tunnel ceiling.
The parasite spoke:
**TIMELINE COLLAPSE ACCELERATION: 8%.
HOST INTERVENTION REQUIRED.
IMMEDIATELY.**
Rowan lowered his arm slowly, fear etched into his features.
"Aiden… if what you're saying is true… then we're already behind."
Aiden exhaled.
Finally—
Rowan was starting to understand.
But the relief was short-lived.
A ripple tore down Aiden's spine, violent enough to make him stagger. His mantle lashed the air like smoke spikes.
Rowan stepped toward him.
"Aiden? Aiden, what's happening to you?"
Aiden braced himself on one knee, vision warping.
"It's the parasite," he hissed. "It reacts to Moonfall energy. It's… feeding."
Rowan took another cautious step.
"Are you in control?"
Aiden's laugh came out broken.
"Barely."
The parasite surged:
**UPGRADE PATHWAY UNLOCKING.
RESONANCE EXPANSION ENABLED.
HOST EVOLUTION ACCELERATING.**
Aiden's fingers dug into the floor until it cracked.
Not now.
Not again.
Not while Rowan watched.
He forced himself upright.
"Rowan… listen to me carefully."
His voice shook but stayed sharp.
"You need to get to Guild Tower. You need to warn them the Convergence has started."
Rowan stared, torn between instinct and duty.
"What about you?"
"I'm going to stop the first Moonfall fracture from expanding."
"You? Alone? Aiden—"
Aiden's eyes snapped open, glowing with fractured violet light.
"Rowan.
Go."
Rowan hesitated only a heartbeat longer—
then nodded, turned, and sprinted down the tunnel.
Aiden exhaled shakily.
He had bought himself a moment of solitude—
But the parasite didn't let him enjoy it.
**HOST.
THE PULSE SOURCES ARE MULTIPLYING.
MOONFALL WILL NOT WAIT.**
Aiden clenched his fists.
Fine.
If the world wanted to start ending early—
He would start saving it early.
He sprinted toward the surface, shadows tearing through the tunnel behind him in jagged waves of black flame.
Aiden burst out of the Shadow Market's concealed entrance and into the night air—
and the night was already **breaking**.
Twin-Moon Metropolis had always been a city of light: two glowing moons overhead, neon towers, Rift-lamps carved from star-crystals. But now the sky looked like a cracked mirror reflecting a dying star.
A massive **silver fracture** stretched from the left moon to the right, pulsing like a beating heart. Each pulse sent shimmering dust raining across the skyline, drifting over rooftops like falling snow.
People stopped in the streets.
Pointed.
Panicked.
Screams rose from multiple districts.
Guild alarms howled from every tower.
Moonfall had begun.
Aiden's shadow-mantle snapped outward like wings, reacting instinctively to the cosmic pressure rolling across the city.
The parasite whispered, thrilled:
**MOONFALL ENERGY DETECTED.
CORE SLOT EVOLUTION POSSIBLE.**
"No," Aiden hissed. "We're not doing that. Not now."
It purred anyway—because it didn't need permission.
Aiden pushed forward, sprinting across the empty plaza. His boots hit stone hard. The shockwaves vibrated through his bones. Every breath tasted like metal and ozone.
Then—
A deafening BOOM cracked the sky.
Everyone stumbled.
Aiden skidded to a stop and looked upward—
—and saw the first **Convergence Rift** form.
Right above the Guild Tower.
A jagged tear of silver and black opened like a wound, spiraling outward, twisting in a way no natural Rift ever would. Electricity of unknown origin danced along its edges, and a deep, hollow sound echoed from within—
not like a monster,
not like wind,
but like a voice dragged through corrupted memories.
Aiden's blood turned to ice.
"That's not a Rift," he whispered. "That's a worldline tear."
The parasite's tone sharpened.
**TIMELINE COLLAPSE: 11%.
HOST INTERVENTION REQUIRED.**
Aiden ran.
He vaulted a railing, leapt onto a fire escape, kicked off the side of a building, and used his shadow-fangs to climb the next structure with inhuman speed. His mantle twitched as he pulled himself onto the rooftop, eyes locked on the expanding tear.
In the last timeline, the first Moonfall tear didn't appear until the 37th day.
He had time then.
He had allies.
He had a plan.
Now?
He had **none** of that.
He sprinted across rooftops, shadows trailing behind him like comet tails.
As he neared the Guild Tower, a shockwave slammed the building's side. Glass rained down like shining daggers. Aiden shielded his face with his mantle and kept going.
Then—
He saw it.
A creature began pulling itself from the tear.
A thing of silver bone and unraveling shadow.
A being that did not breathe, did not walk, did not obey the rules of gravity.
A **Moonfall Harbinger**.
His heart dropped.
"No. No, not now—this is too early—"
The Harbinger's eyes snapped open.
Twin voids.
The same eyes the **Shadow-God Echo** had worn in his vision.
Aiden froze.
The Harbinger lifted its head—
—and spoke without a mouth.
**"REGRESSOR."**
Aiden staggered backward.
"No."
The Harbinger extended a bone-spike arm toward him.
Reality warped around its gesture.
**"THE CYCLE IS BROKEN.
THE END BEGINS."**
Aiden felt his lungs collapse under the pressure.
The parasite screamed.
**HOST—EVASION REQUIRED—
MOONFALL ENTITY LOCKING ONTO YOUR CORE—**
Aiden snapped back into motion as a lance of silver light detonated the rooftop where he'd been standing. The explosion threw him across the next building, slamming him into a ventilation unit.
Pain flared down his ribs.
His vision blurred.
His mantle spasmed.
He forced himself to stand.
The Harbinger was climbing the tower—
a skeletal aberration crawling down vertical walls like gravity was optional.
Every movement made the fracture widen.
Every second pushed the world closer to collapse.
Aiden wiped the blood from his lips.
Fine.
If this was happening early, he would deal with it early.
He readied his stance. Shadow-fangs curled from his mantle. His fingers ignited with violet flame.
"Hey!" he shouted up at the Harbinger. "Look at me!"
The creature stilled.
Turned.
Its void-eyes locked onto him.
Aiden felt the sky ripple.
He lifted his chin.
"You want the regressor?" Aiden said.
"Come claim me."
The wind went still.
Everything went still.
Then the Harbinger leapt from the tower—
a streak of silver doom hurtling toward him.
Aiden braced.
The parasite roared:
**HOST COMBAT ENGAGEMENT CONFIRMED.
BEGINNING SHADOW-CORE OVERRIDE.**
Aiden's pupils dilated.
His heartbeat synced with something ancient.
His mantle exploded outward like wings made of midnight flame.
And the city screamed as the first battle of Moonfall began.