The crack didn't spread.
It answered.
Dante felt it the instant his hand cut through the thinning space resistance on one side, pressure on the other, like two forces finally recognizing each other.
Then
impact.
Not against the figure.
Against something else.
A second push.
From the other side.
The void split open.
Light didn't pour through.
Sound didn't follow.
But presence did.
Raw. Unfiltered.
Her.
Dante didn't see her immediately.
He felt her sharp, uncoordinated, pushing without the system smoothing her edges.
Good.
That meant the system wasn't in control of her anymore.
The figure reacted a fraction too late.
Its head snapped toward the widening fracture, calculation spiking, attention splitting again and that was all Dante needed.
He drove forward.
Hard.
This time there was no perfect path to correct him.
No single outcome to force him into place.
Because the moment the second influence pushed in
the system lost its straight line.
