Cross-chain interoperability has been crypto's holy grail from day one, yet the gap between promise and reality remains wide. Bridges solved the speed problem, sure—but at what cost? They dragged in new trust assumptions and expanded the attack surface in ways many didn't fully grasp. It's a tradeoff that's haunted the space. Now there's a different approach emerging: settling cross-chain trades natively, completely sidestepping the bridge dependency. No middleman layer, no additional trust requirements—just direct settlement across chains. That's the kind of rethink the ecosystem needed.