The air shattered.
Aeren launched forward, blue flames trailing behind him like a comet, his body moving to the rhythm of his freshly forged Ashborn Verse. It wasn't perfect—it cracked, faltered—but it was alive, his, and it sang with raw will.
The Dissonant Prototype responded in kind.
It didn't move like a fighter—it glitched across reality, vanishing and reappearing mid-motion, its attacks woven from corrupted harmonics. Red sigils floated around its arms, each one a fractured shard of stolen Codex essence.
They clashed.
Sound against sound. Verse against verse.
Flames met void. Creation collided with erasure.
The first impact turned the ground beneath them into a crater of glass.
Aeren's arms trembled as he blocked the Prototype's blade—a sword composed entirely of rejected notes from the Codex, each swing aimed at unmaking.
> Codex Alert: Resonance Match at 73%. Prototype learning in real-time.
Aeren ducked, twisted, and kicked off a boulder, using the rebound to sing a counter-note. A burst of harmonic flame exploded, singing the trees in a circular wave of blue and white.
The Prototype staggered—its body shifting, trying to recompose its fragmented form.
> "Emotional Deviance Detected," it said, glitching. "Unstable Identity. Unacceptable Composition."
Aeren's eyes blazed.
"That's the point. I'm not a fixed song."
He lifted his Codex and poured his soul into it.
A single, powerful Verse Fragment manifested—unfinished, but pure:
> "Refrain: Phoenix Thread."
(Effect: Reactive Revival. Each time the Composer falters, the Verse weaves stronger.)
The Prototype struck again, slicing across Aeren's shoulder. He roared in pain—but the Verse responded, adapting instantly. The flames around him reknit, countering with greater precision.
Aeren smiled through the pain.
"You're a closed system," he growled. "But I'm the open door."
---
Lyssa watched, frozen at the edge of the crater.
Every note Aeren sang distorted the forest—turning reality into music, reshaping the laws around them. She could barely comprehend it.
He was becoming more than human.
More than a Composer.
He was becoming the first Verseborn.
---
The Prototype's body warped again, now showing a flickering mask—a twisted imitation of Aeren's face.
It spoke in a perfect imitation of his voice:
> "If you win, the Codex falls into chaos.
If I win, order is preserved.
Which failure will you accept?"
Aeren stood tall.
"I'm not afraid to fail. That's what makes me human."
He slammed the Codex shut, forcing a resonance pulse outward. The Prototype reeled as its song faltered.
Aeren sprinted, flames in both hands, and punched the Prototype in the core with all the rhythm his soul could muster.
> Verse Zero Overdrive – Final Note: "Ashborn Crescendo."
A soundless explosion rippled outward. The trees bent inward, the sky dimmed—and the Prototype's body shattered into thousands of glass-like echoes.
Silence followed.
Then… the forest exhaled.
Aeren collapsed to one knee, breathing hard.
He didn't feel victorious.
He felt like a door had been opened—and something far worse was listening now.
---
Elsewhere, deep in Hymnspire…
The Choirs gathered around a floating Codex shard. Veylor narrowed his eyes.
"He rewrote the Verse mid-battle."
A voice behind him, old and crackling, whispered:
> "Then the true Composition has begun."