Kaelmoor was gone.
Not burned. Not destroyed. Simply… empty.
After the battle, the villagers fled deeper into the Ashwood, afraid not of the Choral Blades—but of Aeren. Of what he had become.
He didn't blame them.
The Codex inside him pulsed with a rhythmic thrum, mimicking a heartbeat. It had devoured two Fatesongs—Ignis and Sanctus—and their remnants swirled inside him like unstable harmonies. He couldn't fully control them. Not yet. Every attempt to call upon their power felt like playing a broken instrument that wanted to play him instead.
"You need a Songkeeper," said a voice from the trees.
Aeren spun, blade raised, but the newcomer didn't flinch.
She was young—maybe eighteen—with violet eyes and hair braided in woven chords of metal string. A harp rested on her back, and faint musical runes shimmered around her wrists.
"I felt the Dissonance echo. I came to see the freak who silenced a Choral Blade."
Aeren's grip tightened. "Another assassin?"
The girl laughed. "Hardly. If I wanted you dead, I'd have sung by now."
She stepped closer, hand raised.
"My name's Lyssa. Former apprentice to the Aria Choir. Now? A rogue archivist of forbidden Songs."
Aeren lowered the blade an inch. "Why are you here?"
"To help you survive. The Codex is growing, and soon it'll eat you alive if you don't learn how to shape it."
He hesitated. "And why would you help me?"
Her smile faded. "Because I want to burn the Choirs to the ground. And I think you're the only one who can."
---
That night, by firelight, Lyssa opened a scroll laced with gold-threaded notes—an outlawed Fatesong theory from before the Godwars.
She pointed to a symbol Aeren recognized from one of his visions.
"This," she said, "is a Shard Note—a fragment of a divine song ripped apart during the First Silence. You're generating them every time you silence someone."
"And what can I do with them?"
She looked him dead in the eye.
"You can build a new Symphony."
---
Meanwhile, in the spires of Altheris, Veylor stood before a sealed chamber, flanked by high priests.
Chains rattled. A pulse of ancient sound echoed from within—discordant and primal.
"Release the bindings," Veylor commanded. "The Echo Knight awakens."
Inside the vault, a figure stirred—wrapped in broken armor, eyes glowing with mirrored light. His voice, when he spoke, echoed with a hundred tones.
"Whose song must I silence?"