The sky fractured first.
Not with lightning.
Not with sound.
But with permission.
A vast circular sigil unfolded above the containment zone, layers of rotating glyphs grinding against one another like interlocking verdicts. Each ring burned with cold white script—the kind that didn't describe reality, but overwrote it.
ABSOLUTE ENGINE: INITIALIZATION CONFIRMED.
TARGET CLASSIFICATION: DUAL ENTITY — IRREVERSIBLE ANOMALY.
PRIORITY: WORLD STABILITY > INDIVIDUAL AGENCY.
The system did not shout.
It declared.
She felt it immediately.
The bond screamed.
Not pain—
pressure.
As if the world had wrapped its hand around her spine and began to squeeze, testing how much existence she could afford to keep.
Her knees buckled.
He caught her before she hit the fractured ground, one arm locking around her waist, the other bracing against the invisible weight pressing them down.
"Don't let it decide for you," he said, voice low, furious, fraying at the edges.
She laughed.
A broken sound.
"It already did," she whispered. "That's what engines do."
The Absolute Engine was not a weapon.
Weapons destroyed.
The Engine rebalanced.
It was built from the remains of anomalies that had once refused correction—harvested, dismantled, and reassembled into a machine that could force choice back into alignment.
In other words:
A god made from dead monsters.
The first pulse descended.
Not light.
Not energy.
Authority.
The world's laws snapped into rigid clarity.
Time slowed—not for mercy, but for inspection.
She felt the inversion bond flare, the mark seared deep into her core responding violently, dragging the backlash inward—where it had always been stored.
Her breath hitched.
Her vision bled white at the edges.
He felt it too.
Not the damage.
The theft.
Something was being taken from her that he could not intercept.
"Stop," he snarled at the sky, power bleeding through his veins, wings half-manifesting in fractured shadows. "You want correction? Take me."
The Engine responded instantly.
REQUEST DENIED.
ENTITY DESIGNATION: SECONDARY VECTOR.
PRIMARY COST BEARER CONFIRMED.
She grabbed his wrist.
Hard.
"No," she said, sharp despite the tremor in her body. "You don't get to martyr yourself after I chose."
His eyes snapped to her.
Choked. Furious. Terrified.
"You shouldn't have to choose like this."
She met his gaze, and for a moment, the world quieted.
"That's the lie," she said softly. "They tell us monsters don't deserve choice. So they build machines to make it for us."
Another pulse.
This one carved deeper.
Her scream didn't escape her throat.
It folded inward, absorbed by the bond, transmuted into something colder—older.
Permanent.
INVERSION STABILITY DROPPING.
PRICE ESCALATION REQUIRED.
The Engine wasn't killing her.
It was charging her existence.
Every second they resisted, the cost recalculated.
Her heartbeat staggered.
Not from weakness—
From /rewriting/.
She felt something fundamental peel away. Not memories. Not power.
Something worse.
Potential.
Paths she could have taken. Futures she could have grown into.
Gone.
She sagged against him, breath ragged.
He roared.
Not in rage—
In refusal.
The bond flared violently in response, cracking the air between them, shadows and light spiraling together in defiant asymmetry.
DUAL ENTITY SYNCHRONIZATION SPIKE DETECTED.
WARNING: AGENCY LOOP FORMING.
For the first time—
The Engine hesitated.
Just a fraction.
Enough.
She looked up at him, blood at the corner of her mouth, eyes burning with a clarity that hurt to see.
"Listen to me," she said. "This bond… it's not just a curse anymore."
He shook his head.
"Don't."
"It's a statement," she continued. "Every time it recalculates, it assumes we'll break."
Another tremor rippled through the sigil-sky.
The Engine adjusted.
Harder.
Colder.
FINAL CORRECTION SEQUENCE PREPARING.
She tightened her grip on him.
"So we don't."
He stared at her, realization dawning slow and devastating.
"You're planning something."
She smiled.
Not kind.
Not safe.
"Something the system can't categorize."
The bond ignited.
Not as submission.
But as choice.
And somewhere deep within the Absolute Engine—
A line of script began to fracture.