The Solaris Crucible demanded every ounce of focus, patience, and resilience from the Crimson Glyph team. The radiant labyrinth twisted endlessly, waging a campaign of chaos against their unity. Floating platforms shifted unpredictably, radiant projections attacked without warning, and glowing glyphs—both treasure and bait—drew the surviving teams further into danger.
But for the Crimson Glyph team, their greatest threat was not the Crucible itself—it was already there, wound tightly within them. It was not the chaos beyond the glowing paths, but the chaos boiling between Merir and Lux Solaris.
It began when the team approached another shard of the Crucible: an immense suspended platform, wide enough for all five team members to stand on, but riddled with pulsing glyphs that warned of approaching danger. Above the platform, floating columns of light spiraled, marking the location of a glowing radiant artifact—a glyph they needed to claim.
"They won't make it easy," Fallon, the branch family member, muttered nervously, glancing at the glowing columns of energy. Their faint hum resonated louder and louder with each passing second. The projections that guarded them were already forming, emerging from the light as pulsating orbs of radiant energy, the largest the team had faced yet.
"They're getting stronger," another teammate observed grimly, his shield glowing faintly at his side. "We need a real plan for this."
Lux stepped forward, her whip forming in her hand as golden light spilled from her fingers. Her voice cut sharply through the group, carrying authority but also bitterness that lingered like poison.
"The plan is simple. I'll draw their fire while the rest of you go for the glyph. If I can hold their attention, the rest of you won't have to deal with as many of them."
"Don't be stupid," Merir interrupted, his calm tone betraying the tension behind it. He had heard this kind of overzealous, self-assured tone from her before. It never ended well.
Lux turned to him sharply, her whip flicking the ground.
"What?"
"You'll get surrounded," Merir said plainly, gesturing to the projections above them. "You're not fast enough to hold all of them off at once. The Crucible's forcing us into a choke point—if you push ahead like that, you'll put yourself in their crossfire. You'll be deadweight, not bait."
The insult landed. Lux's jaw tightened, and her fingers gripped the hilt of her whip until her knuckles turned white.
"You don't get to talk to me about being deadweight," she snapped. "You do what I tell you, and maybe—maybe—you'll survive like you always do: by hiding behind the people stronger than you."
For the first time, Merir's neutral mask faltered ever so slightly. His hazel eyes narrowed as he tilted his head, his voice dropping to a quiet edge.
"Then lead, Lux," he said flatly. "If you're so sure of yourself, don't let me stop you. Show us all how it's done."
It wasn't just a challenge—it was a dare.
The tension between them was suffocating, enough to silence Fallon and the other teammates as they hesitated, unsure whether to speak up. Lux, unwilling to back down under his infuriating calmness, turned her back on him with a harsh flick of her whip and began moving toward the glyph.
"I'll clear the path," she called over her shoulder, not looking back. "Try to keep up."
Lux darted forward, her golden whip slashing outward toward the first projection. It shattered instantly in a burst of glowing fragments, fueling her momentum. Her movements were sharp and precise, aggressive yet elegant. She struck again, another projection bursting apart, her whip's powerful arcs slicing through the energy surrounding her.
But the radiant projections weren't mindless.
Three of them shifted their formation, circling her from different angles. One surged to her left, baiting her into a strike while the others flanked her blind side. Lux slashed at the first, obliterating it effortlessly—but her focus left her vulnerable to the others.
The moment she turned to aim another strike, the largest projection slammed into her side with brutal force.
Her shield materialized in an instant, barely absorbing the impact, but the platform beneath her tilted dangerously. She stumbled, barely able to regain her footing as another projection darted toward her. Lux lashed out wildly, but she wasn't fast enough.
The second strike hit her squarely, sending her reeling toward the platform's edge. The golden whip slipped from her grip as she struggled to stabilize herself. For a brief, terrifying moment, she was weightless—falling, her body twisting as the Crucible's abyss loomed below her.
"Lux!" Fallon shouted, his voice trembling with panic.
Merir had already moved.
His blade emerged in a flash of golden light, a narrow, predatory edge that hummed faintly in the air. Without hesitation, he sprinted toward the edge of the platform, light pooling beneath his feet as his body flickered—and vanished.
The Crucible pulsed with radiant energy as Merir reappeared just below Lux's falling form, his arm reaching out. His fingers closed around her wrist, gripping her tightly. The force of her fall jolted him dangerously toward the abyss, his boots sliding against the edge of a glowing stone platform.
For a moment, it seemed like they would both fall.
But Merir gritted his teeth and planted his blade into the platform, using it as leverage to swing them both upward. With a sharp pull, he hauled Lux back onto solid ground, her body collapsing heavily onto the uneven surface.
Merir followed, rolling onto the platform's edge and rising to his feet immediately. Another projection surged toward them, but before it could land its strike, Merir's blade slashed clean through it, scattering it into harmless motes of light.
He turned his back to her, his expression unreadable as he faced the remaining threats.
"Stay down," he said coldly.
Lux lay still for a moment, her chest heaving as she caught her breath. Her hands trembled as she pushed herself upright, her thoughts spinning in chaotic loops.
He had saved her. Of course he had—Merir was predictable in that way, always playing the martyr. Always doing the right thing. And yet…
She hated him. And somewhere beneath that hate was a guilt she could never fully suppress.
Lux's fingers brushed the edge of her whip, her grip tightening on its hilt as her mind drifted back to that old, unbearable memory.
Her mother's face, pale and motionless, disappearing beneath the ceremonial shroud. She had been six at the time—barely old enough to understand the words the adults around her whispered so carefully: "Complications during birth. The baby lived. The mother didn't."
The baby. Her brother.
The tiny thing everyone cooed over, bringing him gifts and blessings as if he hadn't stolen the one person in the world Lux had loved more than anything.
She remembered the first time she had held him, her little hands trembling as their mother's nursemaid gently handed her the blanketed infant. She'd looked down at his sleeping face, so small, so fragile.
"I'm going to take care of you," she had whispered. And for a while, she had meant it.
But over time, that warmth withered under the shadow of loss. The house was colder without their mother. The laughter, the softness she had brought into their lives, was gone. And there, crawling in the emptiness, was Merir—a frail, stumbling child who seemed to embody all of it. The pain. The failure.
Her mother had died so he could live.
Lux had tried to love him. She had. But every time she looked at him—at his hesitant smile, at the weakness their father barely tolerated—it felt like betrayal. She had lost everything. And what remained felt… useless.
Sitting there now, staring at Merir's back as he held off another attack, that old bitterness roared back stronger than ever.
He wasn't supposed to be the one catching her when she fell.
And yet, he had.