Resonant memory lines the material of this armor. Imprinted within the folds of forged protection lies the flayed origin of the Dread.

***

The Witness traces lines of power across the landscape of the Pale Heart from a monolithic structure that casts long shadows over the shifting terrain. The Light flows within the Heart like veins. If the Traveler would not relinquish control, it would be harvested and exploited to bring the final shape to bear on reality.

The Witness raises a hand, pulling at the Light flowing beneath, searching for sources to tap.

Ambient warmth || Life presents choice. || graces the Witness's face.

"Distraction? You cannot stop this." The Witness twists a hand, and the soil churns and buckles, bleeding Light in violent spurts across the landscape. "Submit."

A shockwave of iridescent Light roars across the surface of the Pale Heart, encircling and crashing down towards the Witness. A radial veil of appendages sprouts from the Witness, hands casting cryptic motions in all directions. The Light-wave splits once, then again, breakages multiply exponentially across the tsunami until it shatters. The Witness seizes the broken momentum and redirects the blast into the spot It had felt the Light surge from. There. It would be a fruitful excision. There It would draw out a kindled flame of dark ambition and forge it into service.

"Do you persist out of hope, or fear?" The Witness looks to the terraformed impact site of the Traveler's blast. "This continued, meaningless flailing… It is useless, but you must try. All life understands this law: to thrash against extinction. Now, you too feel our burden. We have pursued you to share this gift with you. Are you not tired of this instinctual resistance? Do you not cry out for salvation?"

"It is here."

***

Scars pock the Pale Heart. The Traveler bleeds, and the carving, the excision of Light to bring the final shape to bear upon reality, is far from realized.

Deep within one such scar, in a space cut from memory, the Witness looks upon Its old world. A remnant of a remnant, abandoned by the abandoned. A city of crude pyramidion structures shift around It like tectonic plates, groaning in vicious mockery of the wounded Gardener's cries.

"Enough." The Witness extends myriad arms in front of It and quells the city's motion into silence. It waves the structures away. "This memory drawn from us. You loomed, demanding worship, but offered nothing in return. How is it you still cannot understand?"

The Witness shapes the edge of their palm, as a blade, and steps forward, raising the edge to nick the flesh of a frail sapling. "You cannot hide this vestige of power."

"It is a place of pain. An impetus that must be left behind." Drips of silver Light are drawn forth from the pale, dying, tree until a small pool rests in the Witness's palm. It focuses will on the evaporating Light, imbuing its potential with memory and ideology.

The Witness whispers a dream into reality, the Light surges, and—for a moment they stand among their people, separate, alone, within the possibility of the past before its sullying. Static, droning, contentment.

The Traveler above—the Light shimmers, quivering || Life is not still. || with thin resilience, then fades.

The Witness is again in the Pale Heart, the Light gone from Its grasp. Encircled by a flowering nascence, rests the remains of the Witness's first attempt to bend Light and Dark into form. A failure, not dead, but dormant and weak. From this presumed grave, it would watch its lineage forged, its Witness fall, and in time, this being would rise to prove its worth as a Subjugator. But for now, the newborn failure remains on the ground before It.

"First of the Reshaped, Keit'Ehr, flain from resonance. Prove your existence by escaping this death. Should you rise, and find us again, your strength will be known."

The Witness feels the Pale Heart shudder and turns its attention to the Traveler.

"You are weakening."

It speaks through the Darkness, a Voice ringing in the minds of Its denizen. "Our host remains intransigent. Choke their resolve."