Time: 04 // 03 Fade (The Deep) Location: The Southern Coast / The Glass Wastes

The journey from the ruins of Mmirabe to the coast of Kjihan was swift and silent. The Thunderwave cut through the water and transitioned to the sand without slowing down. Hanjhit tuned the resonance engines to match the vibrational frequency of the silica, creating a fluidized layer beneath the chassis. The vehicle glided like a sled on ice, skimming the dark dunes under the light of the single moon.

Inside, the mood was tense. They were expecting a blockade. They were expecting the Royal Guard to be patrolling the perimeter.

Instead, they found silence.

"Sensors are flat," Gwen reported, her fingers dancing over the console. "No energy signatures. No active tech. Nothing."

"There has to be something," Romar argued, leaning over her shoulder. "Kjihan is the Archive of the World. The Royal Library alone has a shield generator that can withstand a meteor. You don't just turn that off."

"Look," Val said, pointing out the viewport.

The Thunderwave crested a massive dune. Below them, the horizon opened up.

The cabin went deadly silent.

The capital city of Kjiri, the jewel of the desert, was gone.

It wasn't just conquered. It was erased. The towering spires of glass and gold that had stood for a thousand years were reduced to jagged, blackened stumps. Under the moonlight, they looked like broken teeth. The Royal Library was a smoking crater filled with obsidian glass. The streets were buried in deep drifts of sand.

"They didn't just conquer it," Saje whispered. "They erased it."

"The Council wipes out what contradicts them," Sarode said, his voice cold. "Kjihan held the history of the Elders. The truth of the Old World. Vaelor burned the memory of it."

"Set us down," Val commanded. "In the Palace Square."

Time: 04 // 27 Fade Location: The Palace Ruins

The night air was cold, a sharp contrast to the scorching days of the desert. Val stepped out of the airlock first. Their new Harmonic body glowed softly in the dark, their starlight skin illuminating the rubble around them.

The square was a graveyard. Statues of past heroes lay toppled, their faces smashed into gravel.

"Who would stay here?" Talia asked, her voice hushed as she kicked a piece of broken pottery.

"The one who has nowhere else to go," Val said.

They walked toward the remains of the Throne Room. There, in the shadow of a crumbling wall, was a solitary figure illuminated by a faint, dying lantern.

It was Dava.

She wasn't wearing armor. She was wearing tattered, dust-colored rags. She was on her knees, digging through a pile of heavy masonry with her bare hands. Her fingers were raw and bleeding, staining the white stone red. She was mechanical, pulling stone after stone, tossing them aside, digging deeper into the dark.

"Dava," Val called out softly.

Dava stopped. She didn't turn around. Her shoulders slumped.

"There is no gold left," Dava’s voice was dry, scraping like grinding stones. "The Kassaj took it all. Go away."

"We didn't come for gold," Val said.

Val walked closer. They reached into their belt and pulled out the Honorable Sigil, the heavy, golden crest they had stolen back when they first stepped into the Glasslands.

Val knelt beside Dava. They placed the Sigil in the sand between Dava’s bleeding hands.

Dava stared at it. For a long moment, she didn't breathe. Then, slowly, she looked up. Her eyes were red-rimmed and hollow.

"You came back," Dava whispered. She looked at Val’s new form. "You look... like a ghost."

"I am," Val corrected gently. "And you are the warrior we're looking for."

Dava let out a bitter laugh. She gestured to the ruins. "Warrior of what? Dust? Ash? It's all dead, Valode. Our city is sand now. There is no kingdom."

"A kingdom is not walls," Val said. "A kingdom is people. Where are they, Dava?"

Dava picked up the Sigil. She closed her eyes, and for a second, a spark of blue static electricity jumped between her fingers.

Sar stepped forward. He felt it. A low, rolling pressure in the air.

"You aren't just a warrior," Sarode realized. "You feel like... rain. Before it falls."

Dava looked at Sarode. "I am the leader of the Storm Resistance. I was meant to liberate the light... but now, the desert is thirsty."

"We are building a Court," Val said, standing up. "We have Fire, Water, Life, Shadow, Resonance, and Spirit. But we are missing the Thunder. We need you, Dava."

Dava looked at the team. She saw the way they stood, unified and unafraid. She looked at Val, who shone like hope in the dark.

"You want to fight them?" Dava asked. "The Kassaj?"

"We want to end them," Sarode said.

Dava nodded slowly. A look of vengeance crossed her face.

"Good," Dava said, clipping the Sigil to her chest. "Because I have an army that is very eager to see the sun again."

Time: 03 // 40 Fade Location: The Undercity / The Deep Mines

Dava led them to a hidden industrial grate just outside the kingdom limits.

"They bombed the city," Dava explained as she hauled the grate open. "But they couldn't bomb the mines. The crystal deposits are too volatile."

Below the ruins, the old ventilation tunnels led deep into the earth. The air grew cooler, smelling of stale sweat and ozone.

The Undercity wasn't a bunker. It was a prison camp.

Thousands of Ide were crowded into the massive, bioluminescent caverns. But as the team walked onto the catwalks, Gwen gasped.

"By the stars," she whispered.

It wasn't just Fire Ide. There were Shadow Ide with pale skin and dark eyes. There were Water Ide with dry, cracking skin.

"The public thinks most of them were executed during the Purge," Dava explained. "But Vaelor is practical. He needed miners to dig for energy crystals. He enslaved the 'Heretic Bloodlines' and kept them here in the dark."

Dava stepped to the edge of the catwalk. She raised her hand.

BOOM.

She clapped her hands, and a thunderclap rolled through the cavern. Every head turned.

"The Sun has returned!" Dava shouted. "The Heir has returned!"

Val stepped forward, glowing in the dark cavern like a beacon. A murmur went through the crowd.

"We are leaving the dark," Val announced, their voice projecting into the minds of everyone present. "The Council broke your city. They stole your sky. Today, we take it back."

A cheer erupted. It started low and grew until it shook the foundations of the planet.

"Can they fight?" Sarode asked Dava.

Dava looked at the miners holding pickaxes and shovels like spears.

"They have been breaking rocks for twenty years," Dava said grimly. "They are ready to break bones."

Time: 02 // 11 Fade (The Silence) Location: The Surface / The Thunderwave

The mobilization was swift. The rebels raided the armory caches Dava had hidden. They retrofitted heavy mining haulers into armored troop transports.

Inside the Thunderwave, the Court gathered around the tactical map.

"We have the numbers now," Romar said. "But we can't just march on the capital. They have air superiority."

"We don't need to march," Val said. "We need to ambush."

Val pointed to Tsujan on the map.

"This is their pride," Val said. "The Council presents Tsujan as the perfect society. If we strike there, we shatter their image. We expose the lie to the entire world."

"And it's where my parents are," Val added softly. "If the Kassaj are anywhere, they will be protected by the Light Guard."

"Then we hit them fast," Wren said. "We disable their grid, storm the palace, and take the head off the snake."

"Dava," Val turned to the new recruit. "You know the desert better than anyone. Can you get this army to the Tsujan border without being seen?"

Dava smirked. "I'll take them through the Glass Canyons. The storms there are magnetic. We'll be ghosts until we're at their front door."

"Good," Val said.

Val looked out the viewport at the dark horizon. The army was moving out, a river of dim lights flowing across the sand.

"To Tsujan," Val commanded. "To bringing the truth to the light."

The journey through the Glass Canyons was a navigational nightmare. The wind here didn't just blow; it screamed through towering shards of crystallized silica, creating a constant, dissonant howl that vibrated the hull of the Thunderwave. The air was thick with static electricity, causing arcs of blue lightning to jump between the jagged canyon walls.

Hanjhit fought the controls. The magnetic interference pulled at the steering yoke like a physical hand, trying to drag them into the razor-sharp walls.

"Signal is breaking up," Hanjhit grunted, sweat beading on his forehead. "I'm flying blind here."

"Eyes on the lead hauler," Dava’s voice crackled over the comms, distorted but calm. She was piloting the lead transport, a rusted beast of a machine that chewed through the difficult terrain. "Bear right, Thunderwave. The magnetic shear is lethal on the left wall. Follow my wake exactly."

"Copy that," Hanjhit replied, adjusting the resonance frequency to compensate.

Behind them, the river of retrofitted mining vehicles snaked through the dark twisting labyrinth. It was a silent march of ghosts. The Shadow Ide dampened the noise of the engines, and the Water Ide kept the engines cool in the friction-heavy air. They moved as one organism, guided by the Storm.

Val watched from the viewport as the canyon walls rose hundreds of feet on either side, blocking out the stars. The only light came from the sparks of static and the dim running lights of the army behind them. It felt less like a military march and more like a pilgrimage through the underworld.

"We are clearing the throat," Dava announced, her voice cutting through the static. "Prepare for visual. The White Highway is just ahead."

The canyon walls suddenly fell away. The claustrophobic pressure of the magnetic storm lifted, replaced by the vast, open silence of the plains.

The Thunderwave slowed as they reached the ridge. Below them, stretching out into the dark, was the border of Tsujan. In the distance, the faint, flickering glow of the City of Light pulsed weakly against the horizon, like a dying heartbeat.

"We made it," Romar whispered, looking at the distant city.

"Hold position," Val commanded, their eyes fixed on the border crossing. "Dava, bring the heavy transports into the shadow of the ridge. We cross the line together."

"Copy," Dava replied. "The army is ready!"