Radeon felt it before he saw it, a pressure that made his soul tremble. Death rose like a tide. Void answered it.

Space split open around him. Above, dark crimson tentacles speared up past the ceiling.

The ground boiled with hands. Pale. Grey. Some still wore rings, with bits of sleeve clinging to them.

The incense altar stayed where it was. Everything else went wrong.

'I played myself.'

His debt was not paid. He knew it like a gambler watching his last coin roll away.

Then a chuckle slid through his soul.

"Sky. Earth. Sea. Dying. Where I stood among the stars. Half consumed. Not an omen. Only information. Attend. Be warned."

His debt was paid. The phantom burn that had ridden his bones like a second skin went quiet, as if it had never been there at all.

Then the altar came into focus. The huge stone statue's arm reached out toward him, palm up, offering.

Resting in that hand was a bottle no bigger than his thumb, clear as a tear.

Radeon did not need a priest to name it. He knew. The cure for forgetfulness.

He took it. The moment the glass met his skin, huge gray hands closed around him.

The same hands that had opened the heavy doors.

They lifted him as if he weighed nothing, and the rough grip did not bother to spare him.

Pain flashed white. Something in his ribs gave, and he bit down a sound that wanted to be a scream.

They carried him through the threshold they had once guarded.

Beyond lay the core disciple's grounds, yet there was not a knot of bodies, nor a single watching eye.

Radeon tried to draw on his qi and found it slow, thick, reluctant.

He could not throw it outward. He could only feel, only probe through touch, thin and careful, his own spirit had been reduced to fingertips.

And there. Through the stone grip and the press of bodies, he found her presence.

Fay. A familiar thread in a room of nothing.

Radeon raised the bottle. is arm trembled. He coughed, and the cough shook his broken ribs hard.

Fay saw the bottle and understood without words.

She drank, small swallows at first, then deeper, like a starving woman tasting bread.

He watched her face change. Recognition returned in waves, softening the blankness, sharpening the eyes.

Fay's breath hitched. Her gaze moved over him, taking in the burnt, wrinkled skin, and the way he hunched.

Then she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him.

"Thank you," she said, voice thick. "For all of it. For the adventures."

Radeon did not hug her back.

Inside him, something cold steadied. A choice made long ago, paid for now.

He drew a dagger and with the last ounce of strength left in his arm, he drove it into Fay's heart.

The impact jolted her body. He stepped in close and twisted, because mercy, here, was never clean.

Blood spilled, dark against gray granite, running in quick lines over the floor like ink seeking a page.

Fay sagged in his arms. Radeon held her for a heartbeat that felt like a lifetime, then let her go.

He only stared at what he had done. His chest rose and fell in broken pieces.

Radeon waited for heaven to answer.

The air in the cave grew tight, as if the world outside had clenched its teeth.

Above, the clouds began to boil, swelling and rolling on themselves in thick, angry folds.

It was no tribulation. There was no clean thunder, no orderly punishment that followed the rules.

This was worse. This was the Heavenly Dao in turmoil, stirred by what Radeon had done.

The betrayal of a heaven's child carried weight. Not in stories. In the bones of the realm itself.

Karmic punishment was coming. Radeon moved.

He dropped to the floor where the spirit gathering array had been carved into the cave stone.

Radeon. dipped his fingers into Fay's blood. It was still warm. Rune after rune took shape under his hand.

Life. Death. Fortune. Misfortune. Resentment. Malice.

Each mark pulled at the air, drawing qi toward the center in thin, hungry threads.

His ribs screamed with every reach, but he kept his hand steady.

He could not afford to shake. Not now.

Then he came to the last part. The last recipe. His own soul.

The dark crystal at Fay's back stirred. It peeled away from her flesh, rising on its own and turning slow in the air.

It floated to the center of the room and hung there, heavy as a judgment, drinking in the gathered energies.

Radeon reached inward. One of the massive maws of his soul closed around something soft and bright, and he pulled.

Fay's soul. He held her there, not letting her drift too far. Not letting her fade.

For a breath, the contact opened her to him. Radeon felt her innocence.

He felt the clean weight of her heart, the parts of her that had stayed gentle in a world that punished gentleness.

There was no barbed resentment waiting for Radeon inside her, no last curse clinging to his name.

Even dying, she did not hate him. That cut Radeon deeper than any blade.

He was not a machine. Guilt rose in him, thick and sick, and for a heartbeat he wanted to loosen his grip.

But guilt was not a tool. Heaven did not care why a man sinned. Heaven only counted.

And if Fay knew she was going to die, the Dao would begin to eat away at her blessings.

The pure fortune tied to her name would sour into ruin.

The last thing he needed was her heart turning against him, even by accident.

So, Radeon held Fay close. He had kept her ignorant for this moment.

Then the heavens themselves lit above, their bright lights searching for the perpetrator.

When they saw Radeon, they seared marks into his very soul.

A sinner. A murderer. One who went against the heavens.

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