The evening air of the Eastern Zone didn't just feel cool; it felt like a liberation. As Sol moved further away from the hollow iron-bark tree where Vurok's cooling corpse lay, he felt a physical lightness that was almost intoxicating. It was as if a massive, jagged stone that had been strapped to his chest for years had finally been unchained, sinking into the forest floor and leaving him to breathe—truly breathe—freely.
The "Modern Sol" was a fading echo, a ghost of a man who belonged to a world of ethics, safety nets, and moral hand-wringing. The "Cripple Sol" was even more distant, a memory of a victim who had been successfully buried in the soot and rot of that tree. What remained was something new, something forged in the dark laboratory of the Western fringes and baptized in the blood of his enemies.
