The night deepened, but the clearing only grew brighter—not from torches or engineered lights, but from the fierce, unmanufactured glow of spirit. The ground itself seemed to hum, rich with life awakening after too long a slumber.
Around Cruzer, the gathering began to shift once more. Groups formed and reformed—natural, organic—as people found others whose dreams resonated with their own. Plans would be made. Journeys decided. Seeds planted. Not dictated by one mind, but dreamed into being by many.
Tesia remained beside him, silent but steady. Others drifted past—Marin, who tucked his terminal into his pack and began speaking excitedly with a small cluster of archivists; Charlotte, her hands weaving through the air as she sketched new maps of possibility; Nero, arms crossed but eyes soft, already carving the first lines of a new code in his mind.
