The battlefield had healed, but the scars beneath it hadn't.
Days had passed since Kael drove back White Diamond. Earth was safe — for now — but peace, as always, was fragile. Kael could feel it: something beneath the surface stirring. The shadows whispered restlessly, and the throne within him pulsed with unease.
"I don't think it's over," Kael said, standing on the edge of the warp pad.
Steven handed him a pouch of snacks. "It never is. But you handled yourself like a pro out there. You're not just strong — you're good, Kael."
Kael gave a faint smile, but his eyes were distant. "I'm going to the Kindergarten."
Steven's brow furrowed. "The Prime Kindergarten? Why?"
Kael's voice was quiet. "Something's calling me from there. I think it's… one of us."
Warp travel was jarring at the best of times. Kael emerged at the Prime Kindergarten with his cloak swirling and shadow trailing his steps like smoke. The place was a monument to ancient sins — walls pierced with broken Gem holes, dust forever settling where life had once been forcibly extracted.
Lapis Lazuli and Peridot were already waiting.
"We don't get many visitors," Peridot said, adjusting her limb enhancers. "Unless you count corrupted Gemworms and the occasional minor collapse of geological integrity."
Lapis tilted her head. "You feel it too, don't you?"
Kael nodded.
"It started yesterday," Lapis continued. "A distortion in the shadows. Not just magic — consciousness. Something thinking. Watching."
Kael's heartbeat slowed. He knelt, placing a hand on the cracked stone.
The darkness stirred.
And then — a voice.
"Child of Obsidian…"
The shadows around them deepened, warping the air like heat haze.
Kael stood abruptly. "It's here."
They followed the pulses of energy through broken tunnels, deeper than even the Kindergarten's original foundations. Down into an ancient root system — once a vein for forced Gem emergence, now quiet and undisturbed.
Until now.
They reached a cavern.
In the center was a single Gem embedded in a blackened tree stump — pulsing with violet energy.
A figure stood near it.
At first, Kael thought it was a projection.
Then it turned its head — and he saw her.
She had long, jagged hair like shards of flint, and skin the color of obsidian with faint streaks of silver across her arms. Her Gem sat in the center of her sternum — cracked, but glowing.
She looked at Kael, unblinking.
"You are his," she said.
Kael's voice was calm but wary. "You know Black Obsidian?"
"I was Black Obsidian's blade," she said. "A Gem born not from the Earth, but from the shadow it cast. My name is Shadelace."
Peridot raised a brow. "That's not in any Diamond registry."
Lapis narrowed her eyes. "That's not surprising. The Diamonds didn't record what they tried to erase."
Kael stepped closer. "Why did you call me here?"
Shadelace's eyes glowed faintly. "Because the throne cannot rule alone. And the throne you sit upon… is awakening others."
A pulse echoed through the cave.
The tree stump trembled.
Roots cracked.
And a second Gem — dull, black, and cracked in half — twitched.
Kael stepped back. "That's—"
"An echo of the Cathedral," Shadelace said. "Its roots spread far beyond what the Diamonds feared. You are only the first… but not the last."
Kael's breath caught. "There are more like me?"
"Not like you," she said. "But connected to you. Fragmented remnants of Obsidian's experiments. Hybrids. Shadows. Wills given form."
Peridot whispered, "You're saying… the Cathedral isn't just a place."
Shadelace turned to her.
"It's a seed. And Kael is its core."
Back at the Temple, Steven stared at the cracked mirror Kael had once stepped through.
It had started pulsing again.
A faint violet glow shimmered across the surface.
"I think… it's happening again," Connie said, placing her hand gently on it.
Steven nodded. "Yeah. And this time… I don't think it's just Kael being called."
In the cavern, Kael reached out toward the second cracked Gem.
It pulsed when he touched it — alive, in some strange way. Not sentient… yet. But filled with potential. Power.
"It's waiting for a host," Kael realized.
Shadelace nodded. "The Cathedral doesn't create. It chooses. And you… you are its voice."
Kael swallowed.
He turned to Lapis and Peridot. "This… changes everything."
"No kidding," Peridot muttered.
Lapis looked up at the sky filtering in through a crack in the stone. "And if there are others like her… or worse…"
Kael nodded.
"Then I need to build more than an army."
He turned to Shadelace.
"I need a kingdom."
She bowed slowly. "Then I will serve you, Shadow Monarch."
The second Gem pulsed again — and a tendril of darkness slithered into Kael's shadow.
Another soldier. Another secret.
Another step closer to whatever he was becoming.