The silence inside the vast abandoned warehouse wasn't peaceful, but one of exhaustion and contained tension. It was a precarious refuge, a makeshift hiding place in the forgotten belly of the opulent city, but it was all they had.

  Hadrik Fenrel's body lay where it fell, an uncomfortable presence no one yet had the strength or stomach to move. Around him, the group spread out, each dealing in their own way with the aftermath of the battle and the desperate escape from the Blind Desert.

  Kael, leaning against a corroded wall, cleaned his own wounds with slow, painful gestures, using torn strips from his cloak and a little of the water still left in their canteens. His shoulder, injured in the confrontation with Thorne Varkas weeks earlier and reopened in the fight against the Glass Circle, throbbed with a deep ache. After tending to himself, he moved with difficulty towards Andrel, who sat on the floor, pale and trembling, eyes shut tight as if trying to contain the static threatening to fragment his mind.

  "Drink some of this," Kael offered a canteen, his voice low. "It's not much, but..."

  Andrel opened his eyes, gratitude mixed with suffering. He accepted the water, hands still unsteady. The runes he himself had inscribed on his skin for stabilization seemed faint, almost erased. The confrontation with Ilian Meret, the code dismantler, and the use of forbidden magic had taken a heavy toll.

  "Thank you, Kael," he murmured. "I feel like... the threads are coming loose again. That bastard from the Circle... he almost... undid everything."

  "Rest," Kael advised, placing a hand on the fragmented mage's shoulder. He murmured an old prayer of restoration, more out of habit than real faith, but perhaps the intention, the focused energy, could offer some relief. "We need you whole. Or as whole as possible."

  On the other side of the cavernous space, near an opening overlooking the dark docks, Selene tended a shallow cut on Nox's arm. She used herbs found nearby. Nox accepted the treatment with a stoic scowl, his gray eyes constantly scanning the warehouse's makeshift entrances and exits, alert as a wolf in enemy territory. Rukk remained outside, a perfectly still stone sentinel among the ruins' shadows, its amber eyes the only living thing in that statue of contained power.

  The silence was broken by Kael's voice, directed not at Andrel, but at Hadrik's body in the center of the hall.

  "His confession..." Kael began, his voice heavy with a weight beyond physical fatigue. "That he also tried. That the System broke him for it... It doesn't make what he did right. But..." He hesitated, searching for words. "It makes you question. How many like him are there? Victims who became tools of the very oppression that crushed them? Are we fated to follow the same cycle?"

  Andrel nodded slowly, gaze lost in the floor dust. "I understand. The feeling of being too small. Of having your spark of rebellion extinguished not by fire, but by... emptiness. The System doesn't just kill; it empties. It turns you into an obedient gear in the machine that devours you. Hadrik was a dark reflection of what I could have become if I hadn't found you."

  Nox, whose arm was being bandaged by Selene, snorted disdainfully. "Cheap sentimentality. He made his choices. Tried to kill us to earn scraps from the System. Chose to be the hunting dog instead of the prey. We made our choice: survive. He lost. End of story. Save your pity for those who deserve it, not for monsters who give up the fight."

  "And who decides who deserves it, Nox?" Kael retorted, his voice suddenly firmer. "Us? The System? The line between victim and perpetrator in this world is thinner than a spider's thread. Hadrik was a monster, yes. But a monster created by the same order we fight. Ignoring that is dangerous. It's starting to think like them."

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  "Maybe thinking like them is necessary to survive them," Nox countered, standing up and testing his bandaged arm. "This world doesn't reward compassion. It rewards strength. Decision. Hadrik hesitated in his rebellion and was broken. We can't afford that luxury."

  Lysa, who had been sitting silently in a dark corner, observing the interaction and cleaning Veyla's dagger with a rag, finally spoke. Her voice was calm, cold, devoid of Kael's passion or Nox's cynicism.

  "Hadrik was a name on my list," she said, and the weight of that statement hung in the air. "He treated me like trash. Sold me for boots. Watched children die and did nothing. His failed attempt at rebellion doesn't erase what he became." She raised her gaze, meeting Kael's and Andrel's. "I understand your hesitation. The System creates monsters. But we choose not to be one of them. And we choose to fight those who accepted monstrosity. Hadrik made his choice. I made mine." She pointed to the body. "He's the past. We are the present. And we need to focus on surviving the immediate future."

  The finality in her voice ended the discussion, though the tension remained. The moral complexity of this world was too heavy a burden to carry openly, especially under constant threat.

  Nox nodded approvingly at Lysa's practicality. "Speaking of the immediate future... I took a look outside while the healer here" — he indicated Selene with a quick gesture — "was playing with herbs. The situation isn't good."

  He walked to the group's makeshift center, his military posture tense. "Lysendar is under almost total lockdown. The Purification here is more intense than anything we've seen elsewhere. System Guard patrols on every main corner. Checkpoints with runic detectors even in the poorest places. Saw two mass arrests just in the last hour – low-Value people being dragged away for 'suspicious behavior.' There are posters with your face, Lysa, everywhere. And it's not just the guards. There are hunters. Mercenaries. Minor nobles with their own militias trying to curry favor with the Throne or the Major Houses. The air smells of fear and opportunity. Every shadow could hide an enemy or an informant. Getting out of here unnoticed will be nearly impossible. And staying here isn't an option either. This warehouse is too big, too visible."

  Nox's words painted a grim picture. They were trapped in a hostile city, wounded, running low on supplies, and actively hunted not just by organized forces, but by anyone seeking reward or survival through others' misfortune.

  "We need food. Clean water. Decent bandages. And a better hiding spot. Underground, maybe," Kael said, practical despite his earlier anguish.

  "And information," Andrel added. "About the Purification. About the Tyrons, since we're in their territory. And any clue about the Living Map or the Echoes that might exist here. My connection to the Code is weak, but maybe I can try accessing a local connection if we find an abandoned node point."

  Lysa listened silently, the internal conflict intensifying. Tyron. The name echoed. They were here. So close. The chance to cross off two more names, to confront Vareth and Lina, was a burning ember beneath the layer of ice she projected. Revenge seemed within reach, a dangerous but terribly tempting distraction from the larger, almost impossible mission ahead.

  She stood up, walking to one of the warehouse's broken windows, observing the distant lights of wealthy Lysendar gleaming coldly against the approaching night sky. She clutched Aion's tuning fork in her pocket. The crystal was silent now, far from the Blind Desert's flaws, but its weight was a constant reminder of the elder's sacrifice and the path he urged them to follow. "You carry two songs. Don't let one silence the other."

  She took a deep breath, the air thick with dust and sea salt from the docks. The song of revenge was loud, almost deafening right now. But the song of survival, of responsibility for Kael, Andrel, Selene, Nox, Rukk... that had to prevail. For now.

  "Nox is right," she said, turning to the group, the decision (at least the external one) made. "This place isn't safe. And we're exposed. We need to move before dawn. Search the drainage tunnels, the forgotten catacombs under the old city, anywhere the System doesn't like to look. Kael, you and Andrel need to rest as much as possible. Nox, Selene, you're with me. We'll scout for essential supplies and a new refuge. Absolute discretion."

  Her gaze was firm, betraying none of the storm raging inside. The proximity of the Tyrons was a double-edged sword – an opportunity and a deadly trap. She needed to be smarter, more calculating than ever. The hunt in Lysendar wasn't just against the System; it was against her own ghosts. And she couldn't afford to lose either battle.

  Night fell over the dry docks, bringing the river's damp chill and the tense silence of a city under siege. In the abandoned warehouse, five renegades and a stone beast prepared for another night of survival, unaware that the threads of fate and vengeance were tightening dangerously around them in the very pulsating heart of power and decay that was Lysendar.