The bones appeared at sunrise.
Lena found them in the crater. A skeleton, ancient beyond measure, curled around the dark crystals like a child seeking warmth. The bones were black—not burned, not stained. They had absorbed the void's essence over millennia. They pulsed faintly, as if they were still alive.
She knelt beside them. Her fingers hovered over the skull. "Who were you?"
A voice answered. Not from the bones. From the air itself. From the space between heartbeats.
"I was the first. The one who built the cradle. The one who created the anchors. The one who failed."
Lena looked up. A figure stood at the edge of the crater. Translucent. Flickering. A ghost made of memory and regret. Its form shifted constantly—sometimes human, sometimes abstract, sometimes nothing at all.
"Your
