The New Era Star Sea welcomed its first morning without an alarm in one hundred and sixty years.
The Prismglass Civilization's river of colors spread across the heart of the star sea. Sixty-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-seven colors had been restored, and the final color was still condensing—a deep, nearly transparent blue that had once appeared in Lin Ye's pupils when he accepted the Gatekeeper. The Prismglass weavers named it "Ember Blue."
Harmonic Leaping Note stood at the end of the river of colors as fifty layers of harmonics slowly played an unnamed tune. It was neither a battle prelude nor an alarm, but a lullaby. The Iron Curtain Universe's first batch of passage Guardians had rotated back just yesterday. One hundred warriors had been stationed in the Definition Sea for a hundred years, and when they returned to their home universe, their silvery-white outlines had become covered in variegated colors—not chaos, but experience. They brought back a message from the Gatekeeper deep within the Definition Sea: "The gate is well guarded. Don't worry."
Steel Curtain stood behind Harmonic Leaping Note, the variegated colors in his silvery-white outline now nearly obscuring its original hue. He stared at that streak of Ember Blue in the river of colors for a long time before suddenly saying, "I kind of want to cry."
Harmonic Leaping Note did not stop playing. "Then cry. No one's stopping you."
"Warriors of the Iron Tomb Universe don't cry."
"You're Steel Curtain of the Ember Era now. People of the Ember Era can cry when they want to." Harmonic Leaping Note paused. "Lin Ye said so."
Steel Curtain fell silent for three seconds, then began to cry. There was no sound. Tears merely seeped from his silvery-white outline, turning into tiny fragments of definition that drifted toward