Stuck in an Island with Twelve Beautiful Women
Chapter 940

Chapter 940: Chapter 940

"This is will. But it’s also memory. If you consume us, you’ll know what we are. And what we’ll always be."

The heart pulsed faster.

The white moss brightened.

A voice filled the chamber, not from the heart, but from everywhere.

"We remember."

Then, the heart cracked.

Not violently, but like ice splitting under sunlight. A single line down the middle. And from within, instead of blood or shadow, spilled a soft golden light.

Jude shielded his eyes. The wives gasped.

Ashra stepped forward. "It’s giving something back."

The light spread, crawling across the stone, into the carvings, through the vines. The murals shimmered. The watchers in the drawings changed, their eyes glowing gold instead of blue.

Then silence.

The heart dimmed, but did not die.

Ashra looked at Jude. "You’ve changed the cycle."

Jude turned to his wives, overwhelmed by the stillness that followed. "Now we hold it. Together. We protect what it doesn’t understand. So it can never consume us again."

And somewhere, far above, the volcano ceased its smoke.

The morning was strangely warm, like the island itself exhaled in relief. Jude stirred from sleep on the soft moss-laden ground, back aching from the uneven floor of the cavern, but heart steady. The golden glow that had seeped from the heart in the mountain had long since faded, leaving only a trace of warm light that clung to the walls like dusk refusing to die. Around him, the wives were waking slowly, quietly, their movements deliberate, like they didn’t want to disturb the air, or perhaps feared they might break the fragile balance that had been achieved the night before.

Ashra was already awake, crouched near the cavern wall, her hand pressed to a pattern of vines now dried and cracking. Her brow furrowed, lips moving without sound. Jude sat up and watched her for a moment. She hadn’t slept. Not really. Just sat there in the dark, murmuring to the roots.

Susan rolled to her side, blinking against the dim light. "Are we still... safe?"

Jude nodded, but hesitantly. "For now. The heart responded. But it’s still here."

Emma leaned against the wall, arms wrapped around her knees. "It didn’t die, did it?"

"No," Jude said. "It woke up differently."

Layla stretched, brushing debris from her braid. "Then we’re not done."

They packed quietly, leaving their offerings behind like totems of memory. When they climbed out of the cavern and into the morning light, everything felt softer, like the trees breathed slower, the insects buzzed quieter. Even the air was easier to move through, like the pressure had lifted.

Ashra walked ahead of them now, no longer guiding with uncertainty but with a strange sense of direction. When Jude caught up beside her, she didn’t look his way.

"The island is adjusting," she said. "It doesn’t know what to do with what you’ve given it."

"Good," Jude said. "Let it be confused."

"Confusion doesn’t last," she replied. "It either collapses into chaos or sharpens into clarity."

He watched the movement of her shoulders beneath her worn tunic. "Which one should we prepare for?"

Ashra finally looked at him. "Both."

The group moved quietly through the thinning woods, skirting the foot of the mountain. The ground here was different, less cracked, less hot. Where the blue moss once thrived, now small white sprigs had begun to emerge, like the golden light had seeped up through the soil and rewritten the land’s script. Zoey bent to touch one, then looked up at Jude with a smile. "It’s cool. Like real grass."

Natalie pulled her hair into a loose tie and joined her. "The animals will come back here, I think. They’ll feel it."

Jude crouched down beside them and ran his fingers through the soft white growth. "We could build something here. A station. A place to watch the changes."

Scarlet made a skeptical sound behind him. "You’re thinking of settling here? After all that?"

He stood, brushing his hands. "Not settling. Planting roots. There’s a difference."

They traveled west for the rest of the day, circling around the softened edge of the forbidden zone. The corrupted beasts, once drawn endlessly to the border, had thinned out, as if the shifting energy had confused them or called them somewhere else. They spotted a few at a distance, tall, skeletal things with fused limbs and empty eye sockets, but none approached. One even turned and fled when Lucy made eye contact.

That night, they camped by a freshwater stream that hadn’t existed before. It trickled down from the rocky ridge, pooling in a natural basin surrounded by tall ferns and smooth stones. Stella tested it first, dipping a finger in and sniffing it. Then drinking. She looked up and nodded. "Clean."

Jude stepped back and looked around the clearing. "This place isn’t on any of the old maps."

Ashra nodded. "Because it didn’t exist until last night. The island is rebuilding. The way a tree heals after lightning strikes."

They sat together by the fire later, wrapped in blankets, eating from the small stores they’d brought. The sky above was clear, no smoke, no ash, just stars. Twelve wives. One stranger. And Jude.

Sophie leaned her head against Grace’s shoulder. "Does anyone else feel like we’ve woken up in a different world?"

Grace kissed the top of her head. "No. It’s the same place. We’re just finally seeing it."

Stella poked at the fire with a stick. "So what now? We go back? Pretend the corruption is gone?"

Jude shook his head. "We don’t pretend. We document everything. We make sure this doesn’t fade. This was the heart of the island, and we touched it. That means we changed it. Now we watch what grows."

Ashra stood abruptly. "You need to know something else."

Everyone quieted. She stepped into the circle of firelight and looked at each of them, her expression tight.

"That heart was only one of many. The island... it has layers. Depths. Like a mind with too many memories. What we woke was only a gate."