Group One: Zaraya, Jaxen, Plo, and Drex
The shattered ruins groaned under collapsing gravity.
Walls twisted at impossible angles.
Time flickered — one moment a hallway was whole, the next it was rubble.
Distantly, Anomalous Guardians howled through broken corridors.
Zaraya moved first —
dragging Jaxen up, steadying him.
Plo clutched Drex tightly, eyes wide but determined.
"The fracture storms are distorting everything," Plo said, checking her scanner. "If we don't get clear soon, we'll be torn apart."
Jaxen grimaced, holding his side.
"First poisoning, now interdimensional storms.
I'm starting to think the universe hates me."
Zaraya clapped him roughly on the back.
"Nah. You're just the favorite punching bag. Means you're special."
Jaxen coughed — maybe a laugh, maybe a groan.
Together, they pressed forward —
dodging rift bursts, evading drifting Black Circuit remnants lost in madness,
moving closer to the ruins' central archive dome.
Group Two: Kaelen, Iselyra, and Aerin
Far deeper inside the fractured station,
Kaelen led the way through corridors flickering between realities.
One moment stone and steel,
The next shimmering fields of starlight and shattered illusions.
Iselyra moved at his side, quiet and focused.
Aerin followed closely —
eyes wide, hands gripping her staff tightly,
murmuring protective prayers.
They reached a chamber where the walls themselves bled starlight —
and there, buried under fallen debris and cracked technology,
was an ancient Cult outpost.
Long abandoned.
But not empty.
Kaelen froze —
feeling the familiar, oily tug of Kain's influence beneath the stone.
"This was theirs," he said, voice low. "The Cult came here before.
Studied the fractures."
The First Major Discovery: The Prime Echo
Inside the Cult ruins, they found surviving data-nodes.
Flickering, barely readable.
Plo had taught Kaelen enough about ancient systems to pull the fragments free:
"The Great Axis…"
"The Prime Echo…"
"Control of the Axis grants dominion over the strands of existence."
Iselyra leaned in.
"What does it mean?" she asked quietly.
Kaelen's shadow deepened subtly.
"It means whoever holds the Axis… doesn't just rule a galaxy."
"*They rule reality itself."
And etched into the floor, hidden beneath the dust:
A symbol matching the faint engraving on Jaxen's mysterious cipher.
The pieces were starting to align.
The universe's greatest treasure wasn't just wealth.
It was power over reality.
Meanwhile: Group One's Struggles
Zaraya's group fought their way through collapsing corridors —
only to be cornered by an Anomalous Guardian far larger and more twisted than the others.
This one moved like living void.
Every punch Zaraya threw cracked its form —
but it reformed, snarling with echoes of a thousand voices.
"Not good," Jaxen muttered, diving for cover.
Plo, heart hammering, realized something:
"These creatures… they're anchored to the fractures!
If we sever the fracture pulse — we can banish them!"
Zaraya grinned.
"Then let's break their anchors."
Using cosmic fists, Plo's gadgets, and Drex's teleport-bursts,
they smashed the local rift nodes —
causing the Guardian to scream and implode into starlight.
But not before Plo caught something:
A faint map —
etched inside the collapsing Rift's light.
A map pointing to hidden gates scattered across the universe.
And next to the map…
a symbol.
The same cipher Jaxen carried.
Group One: Zaraya, Jaxen, Plo, and Drex
The shattered ruins groaned under collapsing gravity.
Walls twisted at impossible angles.
Time flickered — one moment a hallway was whole, the next it was rubble.
Distantly, Anomalous Guardians howled through broken corridors.
Zaraya moved first —
dragging Jaxen up, steadying him.
Plo clutched Drex tightly, eyes wide but determined.
"The fracture storms are distorting everything," Plo said, checking her scanner. "If we don't get clear soon, we'll be torn apart."
Jaxen grimaced, holding his side.
"First poisoning, now interdimensional storms.
I'm starting to think the universe hates me."
Zaraya clapped him roughly on the back.
"Nah. You're just the favorite punching bag. Means you're special."
Jaxen coughed — maybe a laugh, maybe a groan.
Together, they pressed forward —
dodging rift bursts, evading drifting Black Circuit remnants lost in madness,
moving closer to the ruins' central archive dome.
Group Two: Kaelen, Iselyra, and Aerin
Far deeper inside the fractured station,
Kaelen led the way through corridors flickering between realities.
One moment stone and steel,
The next shimmering fields of starlight and shattered illusions.
Iselyra moved at his side, quiet and focused.
Aerin followed closely —
eyes wide, hands gripping her staff tightly,
murmuring protective prayers.
They reached a chamber where the walls themselves bled starlight —
and there, buried under fallen debris and cracked technology,
was an ancient Cult outpost.
Long abandoned.
But not empty.
Kaelen froze —
feeling the familiar, oily tug of Kain's influence beneath the stone.
"This was theirs," he said, voice low. "The Cult came here before.
Studied the fractures."
The First Major Discovery: The Prime Echo
Inside the Cult ruins, they found surviving data-nodes.
Flickering, barely readable.
Plo had taught Kaelen enough about ancient systems to pull the fragments free:
"The Great Axis…"
"The Prime Echo…"
"Control of the Axis grants dominion over the strands of existence."
Iselyra leaned in.
"What does it mean?" she asked quietly.
Kaelen's shadow deepened subtly.
"It means whoever holds the Axis… doesn't just rule a galaxy."
"*They rule reality itself."
And etched into the floor, hidden beneath the dust:
A symbol matching the faint engraving on Jaxen's mysterious cipher.
The pieces were starting to align.
The universe's greatest treasure wasn't just wealth.
It was power over reality.
Meanwhile: Group One's Struggles
Zaraya's group fought their way through collapsing corridors —
only to be cornered by an Anomalous Guardian far larger and more twisted than the others.
This one moved like living void.
Every punch Zaraya threw cracked its form —
but it reformed, snarling with echoes of a thousand voices.
"Not good," Jaxen muttered, diving for cover.
Plo, heart hammering, realized something:
"These creatures… they're anchored to the fractures!
If we sever the fracture pulse — we can banish them!"
Zaraya grinned.
"Then let's break their anchors."
Using cosmic fists, Plo's gadgets, and Drex's teleport-bursts,
they smashed the local rift nodes —
causing the Guardian to scream and implode into starlight.
But not before Plo caught something:
A faint map —
etched inside the collapsing Rift's light.
A map pointing to hidden gates scattered across the universe.
And next to the map…
a symbol.
The same cipher Jaxen carried.
Separated, battered, but burning stronger:
Group Two carried the Cult's secrets.
Group One carried the map — and the confirmation that Jaxen's artifact was far more important than any of them knew.
Above all, both groups knew:
The Wrecked Light Belt wasn't just history's graveyard.
It was the first battlefield of a war for reality itself.
And the Dawnbreakers were right at its heart.