Chapter 135: Forge the Door - Leah
The membrane breaks open from the inside.
It doesn't shatter—more like an eggshell being pushed apart from within. Silver pieces rain down on me like snow, but with a faint electric tingle.
I crawl out of the pod. My legs are weak, knees hitting the stone platform hard enough that the pain clears my head.
Kael is beside me. He looks worse than I do—the leg wound goes down to the bone, at least three ribs broken, one wing completely collapsed, like crumpled paper. But he's still alive. Through the blood bond, his heartbeat sounds like an old engine, uneven but still running.
Xiao Qi leans against the stone wall, her spine broken, no feeling below the waist. But she's still clutching the Anchor-Breaker device like it's her last card to play.
"Did you hear?" Kael asks. His voice sounds like sandpaper.
"I heard," I nod. "Forge the door. Get bound to it. Trapped here forever."
I look down at my belly.
The glow has faded to almost nothing. The twins' heartbeats are still there, but muffled, like mouths covered over, slow and weak. They're starving. Side A's energy can't get through, Side B's rules don't work for them. They're like fish thrown onto land, struggling, suffocating.
"Is there any other way?" I ask Xiao Qi.
"No," Xiao Qi shakes her head. "White Box's headquarters sank, the Exile Door closed, all the passages are cut off. Unless you want to watch the babies die."
I look at Kael.
His ice-blue vertical pupils are completely bloodshot. He's looking at me too. No mind control, no orders, just waiting. Waiting for me to decide.
"What do we need to forge the door?" I ask.
"Blood," Xiao Qi says. "Yours. His. Mixed together. Pour it into the anchor point under the castle. Then say the spell. The spell is in the control panel wreckage—Adrian left it there."
I walk over to the control panel.
It's still smoking, but under the shattered screen, a hidden compartment is exposed. I kick the debris aside—inside is a metal card with ancient vampire writing carved into it.
"The door-forging spell," Xiao Qi translates. "'Blood for nails, bone for frame, love for lock. The gatekeepers live forever, the door lives forever.'"
"Forever?" I frown.
"Yes," Xiao Qi says. "Once you forge it, the door shares your life. If the door stands, you stand. If the door breaks, you die."
I grip the metal card. The edges cut into my fingers.
"Then let's forge it," I say.
"Leah—" Kael starts to say something.
"There's no other choice," I turn to him. "You've saved me three times. Four times. Too many times to count. Now it's my turn. I want to save them."
I point at my belly.
"Besides," I smile—it tastes bitter—"the castle has a kitchen, right? A pot? I can still teach you how to make oatmeal. The hundredth time. We'll get it right eventually."
Kael looks at me.
For a long time.
Then he reaches out his hand.
"Together," he says.
I take his hand.
We walk to the center of the stone chamber. There's a circular indent there, where the control crystal used to be. Around the indent, the stone is carved with runes—the de Noct family crest.
I kneel down. Kael kneels too, though his broken bones make him grunt in pain.
"How much blood?" I ask Xiao Qi.
"A lot," Xiao Qi says. "Enough that you might go into shock. But the Gatekeeper bloodline and the Progenitor bloodline are both strong, so you probably... won't die."
"Probably?"
"Probably."
I laugh. This time for real.
I bite into my own wrist. Progenitor blood flows out, silver with a faint glow. Kael uses the Kin-Slayer Blade to cut his own wrist—it's the only blade he has left. Dark red blood pours out.
We let our blood drip into the indent.
Silver and dark red meet on the stone, like two rivers joining. They don't mix—they twist together, like the double helix of DNA, like two snakes mating.
I recite the spell.
"Blood for nails."
The stone trembles. The runes start to glow.
"Bone for frame."
The castle walls shake. Not an earthquake, but something deeper waking up. Ancient structures in the foundation coming to life.
"Love for lock."
The blood in the indent starts to boil. Silver and dark red merge into a new color—not purple, not black, but something in between with a metallic sheen—
Dark silver.
Light shoots up from the indent like a pillar, punching through the ceiling of the stone chamber, rising up through the castle, through Side B's sky.
The door forging has begun.
But just as the light reaches halfway—
Explosions outside the castle.
Not from the void, not from the anchor. From the surface. Human weapons. Artillery, or missiles.
"Sweepers!" Xiao Qi's face changes. "They found the castle! White Box's headquarters may have sunk, but the Sweepers' ground forces are still out there!"
A second explosion.
Closer this time. The castle's outer wall shakes, debris falling from the ceiling.
"How did they know we're here?" I ask.
"The Gravekeeper," Xiao Qi says through gritted teeth. "He didn't die. He sent out a signal. The Sweepers are here to clean up—kill you, take blood samples, bring them back to what's left of White Box to keep the experiments going!"
A third explosion.
The stone chamber wall cracks. Fissures spread like a spider web. Light from outside floods in—not sunlight, the red glow of artillery fire.
The door-forging light is still rising, but it's disrupted. The light flickers like a bulb with bad voltage.
"The door can't be stopped!" Xiao Qi shouts. "If it's interrupted, the backlash will kill you both!"
"Then what do we do?!" Kael grits his teeth, blood still flowing. "If they get in here, they'll kill us anyway!"
Night Walkers pour into the stone chamber from outside.
The last five. Golden vertical pupils flickering in the artillery fire. They don't run—they form a circle, protecting us—and the door-forging light—at the center.
"They're protecting the door," Xiao Qi sounds surprised. "Their evolved instincts are telling them the door will help their species. They're protecting the future."
Sweeper troops flood in through the cracks. Black combat suits, masks, carrying automatic weapons and UV cannons.
They see the door-forging light and freeze for a second.
Then the leader raises his gun.
"Kill them," he says. "Take blood samples. Dead bodies work fine."
The Night Walkers attack.
The final battle. Five evolved Night Walkers against twenty Sweepers. Claws against bullets. Fangs against armor.
One Night Walker takes a UV cannon blast to the chest, its golden scales instantly charring black as it falls. Another lunges at two Sweepers, teeth tearing through their masks, but gets shot in the head by a third.
They won't last long.
"Keep going!" Xiao Qi shouts. "Don't worry about them! Keep forging the door!"
Kael grips my hand. Our blood keeps flowing, dripping into the indent. The light steadies and keeps rising.
I close my eyes, focusing on the spell.
"The gatekeepers live forever—"
A massive explosion. The stone chamber door blows apart.
A huge figure walks in through the smoke. Not a Sweeper. It's—
The Gravekeeper.
Only half his body is left. The left side completely corroded, exposing metal bones and cables. The right side still looks human, but the skin is like melted wax.
He's not dead. Or rather, White Box technology keeps him moving even half-dead.
"You're... forging the door?" He laughs, the sound like grinding metal. "Perfect. Saves me the trouble of doing it myself. After you're dead, this door is mine."
He raises his remaining right hand. Void energy gathers in his palm.
"Goodbye, de Noct."
He fires the energy blast.
Not at me. At—
Kael.
Kael doesn't dodge. He can't. He's forging the door—if he moves, the backlash will kill us both.
The energy blast hits his back.
I hear bones shattering.
Kael's body lurches forward, blood spraying from his mouth into the indent. Our blood mixes together, more of it, thicker.
"Kael—!"
I catch him.
He's still breathing. But barely. There's a hole blown through his back, his shattered spine visible.
The Gravekeeper walks closer. He stands in the door-forging light, void energy forming a shield around him.
"Perfect," he looks at the blood in the indent. "The forging is almost complete. Just one more step. The Gatekeeper's willing sacrifice—"
He looks at Kael's body. Or rather, the body about to become a corpse.
"He's dying. His dying heartbeat is the final key."
The Gravekeeper reaches out toward Kael's neck.
I throw myself between them.
But I have no weapons. No strength. The Progenitor bloodline is drained from the forging.
The Gravekeeper's fingers close around my throat, lifting me up.
"Silver Moon," he says. "Who do you think you are? You think your love can change anything? Before eternity, love is just fuel. Same as blood."
His grip tightens.
I can't breathe. My vision goes dark.
But in the moment before I lose consciousness—
I feel it.
The twins' heartbeats.
No longer weak. Strong. Furious.
They're fighting back. Protecting their mother.
Silver light explodes from my belly. Not the protective field from before—something sharper, more violent—
An attack.
Light shoots out like needles, stabbing into the Gravekeeper's arm. He screams, lets go, stumbles back.
His metal bones smoke in the silver light, melting, like acid eating through them.
"This... is impossible..." he stares at his severed arm. "The fetus... how can it have attack power..."
I drop to the ground, clutching my throat and coughing.
Kael's hand weakly closes around my wrist.
He's still bleeding. But he's talking.
"...The door... almost done..." he breathes, barely a whisper. "One more... step..."
"What step?"
"...Kiss me..."
I stare at him.
"The last line of the spell..." he says, blood at the corner of his mouth. "...You don't say it... you do it..."
"Love for lock..." I murmur.
I lean down and kiss him.
The kiss tastes like blood. Like ash. Like death.
But it's warm.
The door-forging light explodes in that kiss.
A dark silver pillar of light shoots upward, through the castle, through the clouds, forming a massive door in Side B's sky. The frame is made of light, and beyond the door is not Side A, not the void, but something warmer, safer—
A space of its own.
Energy pours through the door, flowing into the castle, into the stone chamber, into Kael's body and mine.
Wounds close. Bones knit back together. Blood replenishes.
The Gravekeeper screams in the light. His body—that mix of metal and flesh—can't hold up against this energy. He melts, crumbles, turns to ash.
"No—!" His final cry. "White Box will not fall—! The door will open again—!"
Then ash.
The Sweepers see the massive door in the sky, see the Gravekeeper die, and start pulling back. Retreat orders crackle through their communicators.
The Night Walkers kneel. Facing the door, facing us, facing—
The future.
The door is forged.
I hold Kael and sink to the ground. His breathing steadies. His wounds seal shut. He falls asleep.
My hand is still over my belly. The twins' heartbeats are back to normal. Strong and steady. Like two little drums beating.
Xiao Qi drags herself over. Her spine hasn't healed, but she's smiling.
"You did it," she says. "You're the new Gatekeepers. The door lives as you live. Within a kilometer of this castle, you are the law."
I look up at the door in the sky.
Dark silver. Still. Like a lighthouse.
"What about the people on Side A?" I ask. "The Moon-Eater? What's left of White Box?"
"They can't get through for now," Xiao Qi says. "Forging the door reinforces the barrier between the two worlds. Nothing can cross without your permission."
I nod.
Then I close my eyes.
I'm so tired.
But just before I fall asleep, I hear a voice.
From inside the door. From deep within the dark silver light.
A familiar voice. Ancient, worn down, but gentle—
"Well done, child."
Adrian? Or someone even older?
I don't have the strength to figure it out.
I sink into the dark.
And the door stays in the sky, quietly shining over both worlds.