"Please, let's just stick to the track we're on," Velrock said, stepping forward before the argument could splinter further. He folded his hands, eyes calm but hard. "We need to decide: are we going to push Vaeliyan into the Below? From everything we've heard tonight, it seems worth the attempt. I can only assume the gods would have reason for wanting an Aberrant as a contender."

"Only Steel chose me to be her contender," Vaeliyan corrected softly from where he stood, though his voice carried. The correction did not weaken Velrock's point.

"That changes nothing," Velrock said. "A god chose you. An Aberrant chosen by a god. That obliges us to trust that she knows more than we do. I have faith in Steel. She has shown me no reason to doubt her."

Vaeliyan straightened and spoke for himself. "If this goes poorly, Imujin, can you break my binding between my friends and I?" His question was blunt, practical, and heavier than it sounded.

Imujin's face tightened. "It will be difficult, but yes. If this goes badly and you become a nightmare upon us, we will end you. I will do what I can to spare your friends from the backlash."

The meadow grew still. Even the stream nearby seemed to hush, and every cadet present shifted uneasily, the possibility of that outcome pulling their expressions taut. Velrock cleared his throat and broke the silence. "What do you need? What will help you make the dive deeper?"

Vaeliyan hesitated, lips pressing together before he shrugged. "What do I need? Do I get one of those cookies, Imujin? Or maybe some of Velrock's incense?" He glanced between them, trying to mask uncertainty with practicality.

Lambert stepped in sharply, cutting him off with a grin that carried no warmth. "That's precisely the problem. The cookie and the incense are carriers. They're built from derivatives, diluted and safe enough for casual use. They're not the maximum your body can handle. We are not using those."

Vaeliyan frowned, thrown by her interruption. "So, what are you suggesting?"

"We're going to use pure Mitochol," Lambert said, voice clinical, confident, and just a little thrilled. "We'll inject you with an intravenous solution of the compound. It will push you deeper, hold you longer. It will take you further into the Below, and you'll stay under for hours instead of minutes."

A ripple of unease traveled through the group. Even the instructors exchanged small glances, weighing the risks. Vaeliyan's throat bobbed as he swallowed. "Will it… hurt?"

Lambert's eyes flicked to him, studying every detail of his face as if cataloguing him. "It will be intense. We will drug you to the teeth. You will feel it in your bones and in your teeth, literally in your teeth. That vibration, that pressure… when your teeth feel like they can touch the sun, tell us. That's the sign. When you feel that, you're about to fall flat on your ass."

Vaeliyan blinked, then gave a short, incredulous laugh. "That sounds miserable."

"It's the most direct way," Lambert replied. "And the only way that gives us a clear picture. We will monitor you closely. We'll set up here, where you're comfortable, with your friends close."

Her words caught, and then her expression shifted as the realization struck her. "Damn it." She exhaled hard, frustration in the sound. "We can't take him to my lab. Imujin, I need your permission to build a facility here. This is the only place in the entire Citadel that isn't under constant monitoring. If we're going to keep this safe, and secret, we need to do it here."

Imujin's brow furrowed. His deep voice carried both reluctance and understanding. "I hear you. But this place is my sanctum. My peace matters. I cannot have you running wild experiments here without restraint."

Lambert nodded quickly, voice sharp with conviction. "I won't. No illicit projects, no side experiments. Only this. Only what is necessary for Vaeliyan."

Imujin studied her a long moment, then inclined his head. "Then fine. Bring the equipment you need. I will find a place here where we can build you a lab."

Lambert's shoulders eased, though her eyes still burned with focus. "Good." She turned to the others, her tone shifting into crisp command. "Josaphine, Wirk, you'll help me gather the equipment. You both know enough to understand what I need, and I trust your hands to handle it."

They both nodded, a little stiff but resolute.

Then Lambert's gaze moved to Lisa, softening despite the pressure. "Lisa. I know this isn't what you wanted. But you're bound to this, same as the rest of us. And right now, I'm the most level-headed one here, which is unusual, I admit. Normally I'm the one who needs to be told to calm down. But I can see you're stressed. Come with me. Help me move the heavy loads. You know it helps. My friend, we need you."

Lisa's jaw tightened, and for a long moment it looked like she would refuse. Then she nodded, slow and reluctant, but the fire in her eyes steadied. "Fine. I'll help."

And with that, Lambert gathered her small team: Josaphine, Wirk, and Lisa. Together they moved off into the shadows to prepare, leaving Velrock, Imujin, and the others to hold the meadow. Already, the first outlines of their makeshift lab began to take shape in their minds, a fragile plan built of necessity and trust, lit by the quiet understanding that whatever they were about to attempt could change everything.

"Is it a good idea they took Josaphine to the lab?" Jurpat asked from the back, voice edged with worry, his tone wavering as though the thought had been gnawing at him for some time.

Isol lifted his head and gave a small shrug, though his eyes flicked in the direction Lambert had gone. "They know her problems. They will handle it. I trust Lambert and the others. She needs Josaphine's hands for this, and Lambert is not careless. If Josaphine is with her, then she is there for a reason." He settled back as if that settled everything, though the crease in his brow did not ease.

Velrock moved closer to Vaeliyan and lowered his voice, his presence suddenly heavy in the quiet meadow. "Sit for a moment, will you? There is something I have been turning over since you told your story. I do not want to trigger anything, and I am not certain of the truth, but you should hear it."

Vaeliyan lowered himself onto a low stone, shoulders tense, the night pressing around them. "Alright. What is it?" he asked, his voice cautious, his gaze fixed on Velrock as though bracing himself.

"Your chip," Velrock said directly, his words deliberate. "You received it in a very unorthodox way, did you not?"

Vaeliyan rubbed his thumb along the rough edge of the stone beneath him, eyes distant. "I thought it was strange when I got it. As far as I know, chips do not separate when the host dies. They are fused to the spinal column." He looked up at Velrock. "So why was mine different?"

Velrock watched him for a long beat, studying him with the patience of someone weighing each word. He did not answer with certainty. He only asked, "Wirk has explained micro-markers to you, yes?"

"Yes. We have worked with them for some time. I even have access to a Telia Loom now, so I understand how the tech reads these things," Vaeliyan said, his voice tightening as if repeating the fact made it more real.

Velrock nodded once and let the question hang there, his silence intentional. He had offered a prompt and then stepped back. He was not about to hand Vaeliyan an explanation. That belonged to Vaeliyan alone to find, and the weight of it pressed heavily on his chest.

The word hollow rose in Vaeliyan's chest without invitation. The Emperor had once said that Warren was hollow at one point. It had not been an accusation, not an insult meant to cut. It had been a simple observation. Vaeliyan had not understood it then, but now the memory returned with cutting clarity.

He thought of Mara, of his mother pressing the scavenger's code into his life, of the way it had filled a void inside him with rules and purpose. He thought of the other children. He had not moved for them. He had watched Lucas's recruits fall to Reggie's cruelty and done nothing. Not until it was Anza, someone who had shown him kindness, did he step forward. That had been the hinge. That was the turning point where he risked everything, killing Reggie, stealing his chip and driving it into his own neck.

Chips do not come out whole from the dead. Everyone knew that. You pulled fragments, not complete implants. Yet the chip he had taken had been whole. He had never understood how. He had been too desperate to ask questions. He had only acted.

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Now, with Velrock's quiet question as the match, the pieces slid into a new order in his head. Hollow. That emptiness the Emperor had seen. It explained the cold blankness he had carried before Mara. It explained why the scavenger's code had mattered so much, why it had filled him, why it had bound him to purpose. But the chip remained its own mystery, a separate knot he could not untangle.

Whatever the chip in his neck was, it was something different. Vaeliyan did not have answers for it. He only knew that he had been hollow, and something had been placed in him that had altered the entire axis of his life. The two facts sat side by side, each heavy, each undeniable. They might be connected, or they might not. He had no certainty, only questions.

Velrock cleared his throat, finally breaking the silence that had drawn taut among the cadets. He stepped back into the circle, voice pitched low so only those near could hear. "Fragments are fractured pieces of a soul. We know that when a creature leaves behind a fragment and they had a Soul Skill, that Skill is contained in the fragment." He let the words sink in, watching faces lean forward with interest.

"What if," he continued slowly, "the chip you buried in your neck had enough micro-markers to carry its own Soul Skill? One that was not simply overridden by Reggie when you took it."

Vaeliyan felt his breath catch, his mouth going dry. "Why don't you think it was Reggie's Soul Skill?" he asked.

"Because if Reggie had possessed a Soul Skill at that time, he would have killed you when you tried to take it. His power would have asserted itself instantly. The fact that you survived means something else was at work. That line of thinking has too many hard answers to be comfortable." Velrock's voice dropped to almost a whisper. "It is not certainty, but it is a direction to consider." He let the idea rest, like a stone dropped into deep water, ripples spreading unseen.

The silence stretched. Then Jim, who had been still as stone until now, spoke, his words startling in their bluntness. "So, if we took one of these chips that already had a Soul Skill in it and implanted it in the Red Widow, would that save her? Could it make her whole again?"

Velrock turned his eyes to him, expression guarded, almost pained. "I would not give Wirk that kind of hope. I do not know. It might be madness. It might be nonsense. It is only a hypothesis I have come to, nothing more."

The cadets exchanged glances. Some nodded, some frowned, doubt and curiosity mixing in their faces. The meadow seemed to hold its breath again, the sounds of night suddenly distant. Vaeliyan felt the threads of possibility tighten around him like a net, fragile and dangerous, each strand leading to futures he could not yet see. He sat very still, trying to breathe through the weight pressing down on him, knowing that whatever path lay ahead, it would not be simple, and it would not be safe.

Vaeliyan looked up, his expression clouded, and spoke slowly, as though the words had been weighing on him for some time. "There is one more thing that has always bothered me. When I saw the message the System gave for Wren's Soul Skill, it said her skill was created. But when I unlocked Rain Dancer, it said Rain Dancer had been unleashed. Like it was always there, buried and waiting. Not something new, not something forged in that moment, but something older. Something that felt like it had always belonged to me, or perhaps had been waiting for me."

The group shifted slightly, the tension tightening. Isol's brows drew together, his gaze sharp. "You did not tell me that," he said, his voice more than surprise, edged with concern.

Vaeliyan rubbed the back of his neck and gave a small shake of his head. "I did not really tell anyone who wasn't there at the time. I… I did not think it was important. I had only seen one other skill at that point, and I thought perhaps all the messages were different in their own way. I just accepted it. I knew it was mine, or at least I thought it was. But now I cannot help wondering… is Rain Dancer truly my own? Or am I carrying something far older than I understand?"

Gwen shifted her weight, folding her arms across her chest. Her voice was calm, though her avian eyes were thoughtful. "I am not certain that matters. Whether it was created for you or merely released through you, it is yours now."

Imujin inclined his head in agreement, his voice deep and steady. "She is correct. It does not matter whether the Skill was or was not originally yours. The only thing that gives it importance is that it rests with you now. That truth alone defines it."

Vaeliyan exhaled, raking his fingers through his hair as his frustration and uncertainty bled through. "I do not know what to say. This is far more than I thought we would uncover in a single night. And I have not even taken the dive yet. We are only at the stage of speaking in theories, all of them stacked on top of one another."

Deck stepped forward then, placing a steady hand on Vaeliyan's shoulder. His voice was firm but carried no judgment. "Vaeliyan, listen. These are speculations, nothing more. For all we know, we could be completely wrong, chasing ghosts in the dark. Without further testing, without pushing deeper, there is no proof that Velrock's ideas hold weight. Do not let it crush you. Stay seated. Do not stress over it. You are not carrying this burden alone. We are here to help you carry it."

He gave Vaeliyan's shoulder a reassuring squeeze before continuing. "The next step is clear. You need to dive. That is the only way forward. Speculation has taken us this far, but until you confront what lies inside yourself, we cannot move forward. Perhaps in the Below you will find clarity. Perhaps you will finally understand something real about your soul, about Rain Dancer, and about why it feels the way it does."

Vaeliyan nodded slowly, his throat tight, the weight of the night pressing hard on his chest. Around him the meadow seemed to sink into silence again as they waited for the instructors to return with the equipment. Even the streams that cut through the grass seemed quieter, as though the world itself was holding its breath. Through the bond with the other cadets, he felt emotions ripple toward him: curiosity, fear, but also trust. Their questions circled around him, wondering if he was truly alright, but beneath that worry was a steady undercurrent of hope. No doubt lingered that they would follow him, that they believed he remained worthy of their faith. They simply wished him well and believed he would endure.

That warmth seeped into him like a balm, bolstering him against the dark tide of uncertainty. He steadied his breathing, felt his shoulders straighten, and let that shared trust anchor him. Whatever the truth waiting in the Below, he would face it, not alone, but with the weight of their faith bracing him. The meadow stretched around him, the night deepened, and Vaeliyan closed his eyes for a brief moment, gathering the courage for what came next.

By the time Josaphine, Wirk, Lisa, and Lambert returned with the equipment, the atmosphere in the meadow had shifted noticeably. The cadets had gone from restless whispers to a subdued silence, and even the night sounds of insects seemed quieter as the instructors came back into view. Lambert strode forward, her lab coat brushing against her knees as she carried herself with a mixture of authority and urgency. She clapped her hands once to get everyone's attention. "Alright, we have all of the equipment we need. At least, as much as we could bring without disrupting other projects back at the Citadel. This will suffice for what we must attempt tonight."

Lisa followed close behind, burdened with an almost absurd load of gear. The weight bowed her arms and shoulders, and the sight of her stacked so high made several cadets wince, expecting something to topple. But Lisa bore it without a word of complaint, her strength carrying the load easily even as sweat dotted her brow.

"Do you need any assistance setting up?" Imujin asked, his calm, even gaze settling on Lambert as though he already knew her answer but chose to ask anyway out of courtesy.

"No, we should be fine," Lambert replied, shaking her head briskly. Her tone was clipped, focused entirely on the task. "But you should tell us where to go. We cannot simply set up in the open without purpose."

Imujin's deep voice cut across the meadow. "Come with me. All of you, up. We will not linger here by the stream. There is a place more fitting." The weight of command in his words pulled the group to their feet, and they followed in silence as he led them along a narrow path that wound deeper into the trees.

The walk was brief, though the quiet stretched it, every footfall crunching against the grass and soil. After a short while, Imujin stopped in a small clearing. His eyes lingered on the far end of the space, his expression darkening. "This place… it was cleared of the only thing that mattered here."

The cadets looked where he gestured. The remnants of a broken bench still littered the ground, splintered wood, rusted nails, and twisted bits of iron half-buried in the grass. Weather had worn them, but they were unmistakably the remains of something once whole. Imujin's jaw tightened as he continued, his voice quieter now. "I could not bring myself to repair it or replace it. I really liked that bench, more than you might understand. Sitting here brought me peace, and knowing that it is gone hurt more than I expected. But this space is perfect for a laboratory, at least for the time being. Before we do anything, I will gather these remnants."

He bent down with serene gentleness, gathering the shattered pieces one by one, stacking them in his hands with the care one might give to sacred relics. No one interrupted, and even Lambert, usually quick to press forward, remained silent, watching as he carried away the shards of memory.

Vaeliyan shifted uneasily, the silence pressing against his ears. "Is there anything I should do?" he asked at last, his voice breaking the tension.

Lambert straightened, brushing her hair back from her eyes with the back of her wrist. "Yes. Please lie down for a moment. I need to run some basic vitals checks, and it's easier if you're on your back while I do them." She gestured to a patch of flattened grass.

Vaeliyan obeyed without protest, lowering himself carefully onto the ground. The cool grass pressed against his back, and he stared upward at the canopy as Lambert crouched beside him. She moved quickly, her hands steady as she set out a compact array of instruments, each one whirring softly as it came to life. The glow of their lights illuminated her concentrated face.

She ran through the checks with clinical precision, measuring pulse, oxygen levels, and other readings. Her brows drew together as she studied the results, though her movements never faltered. She placed a final sensor against his wrist and waited, her eyes flicking across the readouts.

"Your heart rate is elevated," she said at last, glancing down at him. "But that is not surprising. I assume it is mostly due to the anxiousness of what we are about to attempt." Her tone was steady, not reassuring but matter-of-fact.

Vaeliyan gave a small nod, but no words came. His mind was still a storm, caught between the word hollow and the mystery of the chip embedded in his neck. Doubt and confusion flooded through him, threatening to choke him in their tide. Yet through the bond with his squadmates, he felt another current pushing back, trust, hope, belief in him. Their certainty that he was still the one they would follow. Their steady emotions pressed against the darkness, anchoring him in place.

He closed his eyes briefly, let out a long breath, and felt that warmth seep through the storm. The bond was proof he was not alone. The doubts still whispered, but they could not overwhelm the faith surrounding him.

He could do this.

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