Amber stared, at a loss for words. No persuasion was going to be necessary. The depth of Rainie's feelings for Ethan was painfully obvious. If someone told her slitting her own wrists would bring him back, she'd probably have the blade in her hand before the sentence was finished.

"Amber, you… you should go," Rainie said, swiping at her cheeks and drawing a shaky breath after she'd shucked her jacket. Even willing to offer her virginity for Ethan's sake, a thread of modesty remained. She and Amber were close; she knew about Amber's past with Ethan. That's why she'd caught Amber's meaning instantly.

But Amber didn't leave. Instead, she rose and began to undo the delicate ties of her own sheer gown.

"Amber, you…" Rainie's face flooded with color as understanding hit her.

"He's basically a corpse right now," Amber said, a soft, knowing curve to her lips. "Without my help, you won't get anywhere."

As she spoke, she flicked her wrist.

HMMMMMMMM.

A fierce, gold-orange light erupted from Ethan's lower abdomen, instantly sheathing his entire body. The clothes he wore dissolved into a flurry of silken scraps, fluttering away like moth wings. Ethan lay bare before them.

Rainie's cheeks burned. She touched her own face, feeling the heat even in the biting cold. "See? Told you you'd need me," Amber murmured, lowering herself to her knees beside Ethan.

"But… how? He's… gone. There's no… there's nothing there," Rainie stammered, fresh tears spilling over. She understood the plan now, but the practical reality seemed impossible.

"If he hadn't taken my Sacred Body Essence before, I'd be stuck too. But now…" Amber's voice dropped to a whisper. She parted her lips, and a faint, gilded haze began to spill from them.

Under Rainie's stunned gaze, Amber exhaled a stream of that pure, primordial energy directly onto Ethan's…

From the point of contact, ripples of gold-orange light spread across Ethan's skin in concentric waves. A moment later, Ethan's eyes snapped open. But they held no awareness—just two orbs of solid, molten gold.

Rainie's heart hammered against her ribs. Watching Amber, a tremor went through her, stirring a strange, deep warmth in her own core.

Amber lifted her head. "Alright, Rainie… your turn." Her gaze flicked meaningfully toward the other girl.

Drip.

Something fell, freezing into a tiny, crystalline bead on the stone floor.

"Tsk tsk… Unbelievable luck, this guy. You really are something else, aren't you? This worked up already?" Amber chuckled, reaching out to pull Rainie closer. A dome of golden light expanded from her, sealing them in a sphere that swallowed the icehouse's chill, leaving behind a thick, palpable heat.

A sharp, muffled cry of pain marked the beginning. Soon after, Amber's voice floated through the gilded haze. "Don't hold it in. Let it out."

Her words seemed to break a dam. Soft, melodic cries began to echo within the luminous dome.

Some time later, Rainie's weak, pleading voice emerged. "Amber… don't… please, not there… Ah!"

The final cry was one of… shattering release.

BOOOOOOOM!

Outside, the anxious group of men jolted as a peal of thunder, sound so ancient it felt ripped from the dawn of time, rolled across the sky above them.

In the next heartbeat, two colors of light bloomed in the heavens—a brilliant gold-orange and a deep, royal violet. The moment they appeared, they coiled around each other, swirling and weaving before the awestruck onlookers into a perfect, pulsing circle of intertwined light.

But something was off. At a glance, the symbol looked… unfinished. Like a lock missing its key, or a circuit with one connection left open.

Before Victor and the others could scrutinize it, the circle of light convulsed and shrank violently, condensing to the size of a soccer ball. Trailing long streamers of violet and gold light, it shot toward them with impossible speed.

Blackie didn't even have time to flinch. They all yelped in unison.

In the next instant, it passed through them as if they were made of smoke and slammed into the ground. Yet there was no impact, no crater. It simply… sank into the earth.

"Holy hell! Nearly gave me a heart attack!" Blackie gasped, clutching his chest.

"Was that… the Boss?" Micah asked, his eyes wide.

"Going by the trajectory… yeah," Victor confirmed, his voice tight. The spot where the light had vanished was directly above the icehouse they'd just left. Blackfin nodded nervously; he knew the layout of his own compound better than anyone.

Blackie shot them an incredulous look. "That's not what scared me! It's that Primordial Sun and Abyssal Void energies actually merged without blowing this whole hemisphere to kingdom come! That's the terrifying part! They're fundamental opposites. They annihilate on contact!"

Hearing this, Micah nodded vigorously, his face pale. "Right! How is that even physically possible?" Coming from different worlds, they had no common reference for the symbol. Blackfin and Victor, however, natives of Earth, stared with dawning, deeper horror.

Blackfin looked at the two strangely. "You've… never seen a Convergence Sigil?" The words slipped out before he could stop them. He immediately shrank back, realizing he'd spoken out of turn.

Just as Blackie turned, curiosity piqued and ready to pounce with questions, Victor cut in, his voice low with a kind of reverence.

"What we just saw wasn't the Sigil. Not a true one."

His statement made even Blackfin pause. He'd seen it clearly—the violet and gold weaving into that classic, eternal knot. What else could it possibly be? But he kept his mouth shut, grateful Blackie's attention had shifted.

Seeing their confused looks, Victor explained, his tone that of a man reciting a dangerous theorem. "The Unformed Potential collapses into the First Principle. The First Principle fractures into the Duality. The Duality gives rise to the Trinity of Forces, which unfolds into the Four Pillars, which crystallize as the Five Sovereign Elements, and so on down the chain of creation to the Ten Directions of reality. It's the cosmic clockwork."

"Whoa, whoa, hold up!" Blackie waved his hands in a time-out signal. "Victor, speak English, man!"

While Blackie was utterly lost, Micah's eyes narrowed, a flash of dawning comprehension followed by frustration, as if he'd almost grasped a concept just out of reach.

Blackfin, emboldened by Victor's lecture, ventured cautiously, "Are you saying… that was the raw stuff before the First Principle? The Unformed Potential itself?"

Victor looked at him, genuinely surprised. "You know the old theories?" He found it odd—Blackfin seemed every inch the gritty mercenary, not a scholar of foundational metaphysics.

"Ah, don't remind me," Blackfin sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "I know of them. Could never get the hang of it. My grandfather was an antiquarian, obsessed with pre-cataclysm mysticism. Made me memorize a bunch of that stuff as a kid. Figured it was garbage."

Victor nodded slowly. True understanding of those principles was said to shape one's very connection to reality. He was a student of such arts himself—not just a dabbler, but a capable practitioner walking a razor's edge. The fact that Blackfin had even heard of it meant his grandfather had known more than just stories.

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