Ahri awoke before dawn, her eyes snapping open to a sky of cold starlight. No dreams this time—no voices, no shadowed figures. Just a deep, ringing silence that stretched beyond the edge of sleep, like the quiet before something breaks.
She dressed quickly, fingers brushing over the thread-scar on her palm. It hadn't faded. In fact, it was darker now—ink-black instead of red. The golden thread around her wrist pulsed once in warning.
In the courtyard, Jin was already waiting. She looked like she hadn't slept. Her silver-blue threads hung limply around her, as though even they were subdued.
"They're watching us," she said without turning.
Ahri frowned. "The Severed?"
"No." Jin pointed to the sky.
It took a moment for Ahri to understand.
Above the temple, the threads that connected stars and spirits—the very essence of the Weave—were moving. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, they were bending, like silk under pressure. They were retreating from something.
Ahri's voice was quiet. "They're afraid."
Jin nodded. "The Weave is alive. And it knows something is coming."
By morning, the Elder had summoned them to the Threading Hall—a sacred space usually reserved for spirit rites and memory weaving. Its walls were inscribed with ancient glyphs, some glowing, some dormant. At its center floated a single orb of suspended thread—neither gold nor silver, but a deep twilight hue.
"This," the Elder said, gesturing to the orb, "is the Archive Thread. A remnant of the First Weaving. It records echoes of forgotten times… including what was sealed."
Ahri approached slowly. As she neared, images shimmered across its surface—blurred faces, burning skies, broken moons, and deep beneath it all… a door.
"You said the Hollowed were banished," she said. "What are they?"
The Elder's voice was low. "They are not spirits. Not anymore. They are the threads that broke themselves—entities that devoured their own fate to escape the Weave. They exist in the gaps between stories, feeding on untold truths."
"They're parasites," Jin said softly.
"No," Ahri said, eyes fixed on the orb. "They're predators."
The orb pulsed in response.
Later that day, they climbed the temple's northern cliffs to reach a hidden shrine—the Shrine of Dissonance. It was a place the Elder rarely spoke of, carved into the mountain like a scar. The path was overgrown, the air thin and humming.
Inside, runes pulsed red and violet. A wall bore an old mural: a fox spirit, nine tails unfurled, facing a tear in the sky from which dark tendrils poured.
"The fox spirit fought the Hollowed once before," the Elder said. "Alone."
Ahri stared at the painted figure. Its eyes glowed violet—like hers.
"My mother," she murmured.
The Elder said nothing.
Instead, he stepped forward and placed a talisman against the mural's center. A section of the stone slid away, revealing a narrow staircase leading downward—deeper than the temple's foundations.
"What is this place?" Jin asked.
"The Shroud Archive," the Elder said. "It holds what history chose to forget."
They descended for what felt like hours. The walls changed the deeper they went—from stone, to carved bone, to a strange, flexible surface that pulsed faintly beneath their feet.
At last, they reached a chamber lined with mirrors.
Each mirror reflected not their present selves, but a thread of potential—Ahri as a child running through fire, Jin as an old woman beneath a storm, the Elder cradling a glowing spirit.
One mirror was broken.
Through the cracks, a swirling void was visible—threads torn apart, suspended mid-scream.
"This is what happens when a fate is Hollowed," the Elder said. "It doesn't end. It unravels into nothing."
Jin stepped closer to the broken glass. "Why show us this now?"
"Because the door Ahri opened wasn't just to the Severed," he said. "It was to the Hollowed's realm. And now that the seal is broken... they will want her."
Ahri's heart pounded. "Why me?"
The Elder turned.
"Because you carry the same thread as your mother—and she was the last to bind them."
Far beyond the mountain, in the Hollowed's realm, Miran knelt before a cracked altar. The cursed fox mask pulsed on her face, threads writhing like serpents.
A voice whispered from behind the veil of smoke:
"The girl sees the mirrors."
Miran nodded.
"She will come looking for answers."
"Let her.""And when she peers into the void——we will weave her in."