The three of them resembled a family portrait, warm and bright in a room that had been full of shadows just a few minutes ago.
The chat was scrolling at a speed that made individual messages nearly unreadable despite being in membership-only mode.
"So that's the story," Kaiden said to the camera. His voice was easy, conversational.
Magnus's knuckles went white against the desk.
Then the donation alert fired.
A war horn tore through the stream audio, deep and long, the kind of sound that rattled in the chest and carried the promise of violence. The stream overlay darkened. A sigil bloomed across the center of the feed in ink-black lines and ember-red light, intricate and serpentine, a demonic design that pulsed twice before fading to the edges of the frame. Beneath it, the donation scrolled: Natasha_V — 100 Chronos.
