The guardian struck without hesitation.

  It moved with the grace of a current, limbs flowing like sea-smoke, its body carved by water and sealed by time. Blue-white flame rippled across its skin — not heat, but pressure. Its fire did not burn; it crushed.

  Pag ducked low, rolling across slick quartz tiles as the creature's arm arced overhead in a blur of pressure-flame. Where it struck, stone buckled and hissed — melted by abyssal force.

  The others scattered.

  Ellen tried to flank, only to be thrown back by a whiplash burst of water-blade magic.

  Faelan’s arrows dissolved mid-flight.

  Borin charged — but even he staggered as the guardian swept him aside with a seafloor roar of force.

  Pag landed near the pedestal again, the relic fragment pulsing just behind him.

  He summoned a blaze in his palm.

  And it died instantly.

  The water-heavy air choked it out, the flame collapsing in a shimmer of steam.

  Pag's breath hitched.

  No flame.

  The ember inside him howled.

  The Fight Turns

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  The guardian loomed, voice like sediment shifting.

  "You still think fire belongs to you."

  Pag lashed out again—this time with a scatterburst of ember shards, tiny explosive flares—

  Each died on contact with the pressure field. Snuffed like candles.

  The guardian surged forward, seized Pag by the throat, and lifted him from the ground.

  Pag thrashed, vision darkening.

  Then he heard it.

  “Reshape.”

  A whisper, from deep within.

  Not the guardian. Not the temple.

  The ember.

  Pag stopped resisting.

  He stopped forcing fire to be what it always was.

  Instead… he reached into it.

  Deeper.

  Not for heat—but for change.

  He remembered: fire isn’t just destruction.

  It’s transformation.

  It’s what turns clay to strength. Flesh to soul. Light to motion.

  He focused.

  Let the ember flow into pressure, into form, not temperature.

  His hands glowed—not red-orange, but luminous gold.

  Condensed flame.

  Weighted flame.

  Something that did not need to burn to be fire.

  He thrust both palms into the guardian’s chest and released.

  The pressure exploded outward — inward — collapsing the abyssal flame into itself.

  The guardian screamed—voice fractured by centuries.

  "You remember..."

  Pag pushed harder.

  "I remake."

  The guardian collapsed, its seawater shell fragmenting into steam and salt.

  In its place, a dim shape remained—kneeling.

  A man, older than Pag, eyes dull but no longer burning.

  “…You passed it on,” the man said softly. “What I couldn’t finish.”

  Pag nodded, breath shaking.

  “I’ll finish it.”

  Then the ancient Emberkin smiled—and vanished.

  The pedestal quieted.

  Pag stepped forward and lifted the second relic.

  It pulsed softly, now warm. Now still.

  >EMBER CORE VESSEL RETRIEVED<

  >Compatibility: Confirmed.<

  >Environmental Instability: Adapted.<

  Pag turned back to his friends, the dome still trembling above them.

  “We’re done here,” he said.

  “But the world’s just starting to burn.”