[Level Four — 3:15 PM]
Level Four was silent.
Not the silence from before the fight — that one had tension underneath. This one was different. The silence of after, when the noise stops and the body doesn't yet know what to do with the stillness.
The fractured symbol on the floor.
The lines extinguished.
The countdown pulse stopped definitively.
The Heralds gone.
The Veil on the floor.
On his knees, the mask one meter away from him, his violet eyes looking at the broken symbol in front of him. Less bright than before. With visible white at the edges — Fragment 4 withdrawn, the bearer beneath present in a way he hadn't been throughout the entire fight.
The team around him. All damaged. All standing, except for Kira who was still on the ground with her hand on her side, though the seal's pain was already diminishing with the ritual fractured.
Alex approached the Veil.
---
"Do you have a real name?"
The Veil looked at him.
"I already answered that."
