The assault begins across the colleges. Mage hunters feed on magic, force students into defensive pockets and create a living perimeter around the Biblioplex. The Founder Dragons descend to burn openings through the creatures, but the pattern reveals the invasion's real purpose: the campus battle is cover for a smaller force moving inside the library.
Rowan and Will find one another amid the attack, then encounter Professor Onyx. Instead of sending them to shelter, she recruits them. An old Witherbloom maintenance route bypasses the siege. In the tunnels, a collapsing bridge makes the twins act without debate; Will catches Rowan, and the simplest promise between them survives everything their arguments obscured.
Inside the Biblioplex, Extus discards his own followers whenever they become inconvenient. He reaches the Hall of Oracles with stolen texts and binds his ritual to the Snarl, the primordial knot of mana suspended there. Onyx and the twins arrive after the spell has begun. Stopping an invasion is no longer enough; they must prevent an ancient power from taking shape.