Chapter Two: Sync or Shatter
Part Three – To Hum What Wasn't Yours
Location: Veilmark Chamber, Upper Rails – Observation Ring
The chamber had stopped breathing.
No pulselines flared.
No glyphs hovered.
Even the dust forgot to settle.
Buta stood at the highest ring, overlooking his students as if they were echoes he once believed in and had learned to fear again.
He didn't speak.
Not yet.
Because in this moment—it wasn't his voice the Veil was waiting for.
It was theirs.
—
Zephryn stood alone at the center of the glyph-ring.
His ∞ mark had gone still again, coiled beneath his skin like a serpent waiting for a name.
Selka stood at his right, water at her fingertips—not swirling, not dripping, just watching.
Kaelen to the left, halberd still grounded, the metal faintly pulsing in rhythm with his breath.
Yolti behind them, her light not cast—but reflecting.
A prism. Not a weapon.
—
"This isn't a drill," Buta said finally.
His voice didn't cut. It lowered. Like a curtain dropping before a scene no one rehearsed.
"This is the part Doctrine never taught you. The moment where pulse becomes person—and you don't get to choose which one you are."
He turned.
"You want to know what sync is?"
Zephryn lifted his eyes.
Buta pointed at him.
"Tell me something you've never said."
Zephryn froze.
"I—"
"No glyph. No flare. Just the truth. Right now. Or the Veil won't let you pass."
—
Zephryn's throat dried.
He looked at his squad.
At Selka.
At Yolti.
At Kaelen.
Then, voice barely more than a breath:
"I don't think I survived the Choir."
The room didn't react.
Not with pulse.
With silence.
Selka blinked.
Yolti stepped forward—but stopped.
Kaelen's jaw tensed.
Buta said nothing.
Zephryn continued.
"I don't mean I died. I mean… I think I came back wrong. I think something else remembered me better than I did. And I think I've been walking around hoping no one would notice."
—
And the ∞ glyph flared.
Not bright.
But deep.
It split. Then coiled. Then formed a ring within itself—like a second heartbeat syncing beneath the first.
Selka stepped beside him.
Water rose around her wrist—not summoned. Summoned her.
She didn't speak.
She placed her hand over his.
Not for drama.
For memory.
And whispered:
"I noticed."
—
The Veilmark Chamber pulsed once.
And the glyph beneath them changed.
No longer ∞.
Now it was a chord.
Layered.
Four strands.
Four harmonics.
Four truths that never had to be spoken, but were finally heard.
Kaelen's halberd didn't flare.
It bowed.
Yolti's light broke into color—not white.
But the first note of sync.
—
Buta turned.
Walked.
And said quietly to the empty air:
"Good."
"Now we can begin."