A week passed. The skies above Hollowdeep no longer bled darkness. The forge still smoked, its outer walls scorched, but the flame at its heart, rekindled by Kael and Selune’s sacrifice, now burned steady. People returned to the broken courtyards. They cleaned. They sang. They remembered.But some memories came in fragments. And one name, no one could say unless they were holding something once touched by him. Kael Smith. The boy who had no destiny, and yet chose to change the world. Only the Memoryborn still remembered him fully. And she could not bear to speak his name aloud. Not yet.I. A City Without a ShadowThe people began to rebuild. Layari led them in creating new flamewards, not just for protection, but for remembrance. Each rune told a story now: of the gate, of the Unshaped, of the sacrifice made to seal it. Flamebound from across the continent sent emissaries. They had seen the sky crack. They had felt the gate’s pulse in their bones.Some came to help. Some came to claim

Ashen stared at her hands. Black fire danced across her palms, burning without smoke or heat. It did not hurt her-but it didn’t obey her either. It pulsed in time with something deeper. A second heartbeat. One not her own.The others still slept. Only the gate watched. Only the stars-those misremembered lights in the sky-seemed to understand what she had become. And deep within her mind, Kael’s voice whispered again: “You’re changing. Be careful.”But another voice rose beside it. “No, Ashen. You’re returning. This is what you were meant to be all along.”I. The Echoes DeepenAt dawn, the group moved closer to the Oblivion Gate. Gideon scouted the path ahead while Rye traced forgotten sigils in the earth, trying to understand how the gate had awakened. Ashen trailed behind, her eyes vacant. Thorne noticed. “You’re not with us,” he said. “What’s happening?”Ashen didn’t respond. Her gaze had fallen to a mirror-like shard of obsidian embedded in a tree. She saw herself in it. But her re

The white flame hovered in silence. No wind touched it. No heat radiated from it. Yet all of Hollowdeep, and the world beyond felt it. Birds stopped mid-flight. Mountains groaned beneath their roots. The stars shifted in their constellations, ever so slightly.And across the world, every gate sealed, buried, forgotten-listened. Because this flame was not from the Archive. Not from the Voidheart. Not from Oblivion. It was something new. Something the world had never seen before: A Gate of Creation.Ashen stood before the white flame. Kael at her side. Rye, Eris, Thorne, and Gideon formed a loose circle around it, keeping others at bay. Soldiers and mages had arrived from the neighboring cities, those who had sensed the collapse of the Oblivion Gate and feared its aftermath.But there was no chaos here. No destruction. Just this impossible thing: a flame that pulsed not with memory, but potential. Layari arrived last, breathless and wide-eyed. She knelt beside it.“This… this is beyond

The sky of Azreth was not meant to open. It had been stitched shut-not by war, not by nature, but by intention. By those who had known what lay beyond. But now, above the forgotten city where the First Flame flickered and the Gate of Creation hovered it split.Not like torn cloth. Not like a shattered dome. It peeled, like skin, revealing a swirling void beyond, neither night nor day. And within that void, stars spun like eyes. Watching. Judging. Waiting.Ashen stood beneath it all, her eyes alight with gold. The white flame at her side had fused with the flickering heart of Azreth. It hovered above her open hand, trembling not unstable, but aware. She saw everything.Past. Present. Even what could be. But her voice came soft. Shaken. “It’s too much.”Kael stepped toward her, wary. “You need to let it go.”Eris raised her bow. “She’s not the same.”“I’m still me,” Ashen said, but even she didn’t sound certain.Because within her now was Selune, yes. But also Ashen Flame, the reborn. A

The city of Azreth stood quiet again. The sky, once split by fire and laughter was whole, but fragile. Its silence was not peace. It was mourning. For what had almost returned. And for what had been remembered too clearly. Ashen stood at the threshold of the Emberwake, her gaze fixed toward the north.Kael joined her, wiping soot from his blade. "You're thinking about the Vault," he said.Ashen nodded. “It’s next. The flame pointed that way for a reason. The names buried there… they matter.”Thorne came up the gangplank, pale. “They’re not just buried. They’re erased. If we open the Vault…”Rye spoke softly, finishing the thought. “They might not stay forgotten.”Ashen didn’t look back. “Then let them remember why they were sealed.”The terrain changed quickly. Azreth’s unnatural vibrancy faded into a dead zone, a realm where no fire burned, no magic stirred, and no sound echoed. The land of the Vault had no name on any map. Even the sky refused to shine above it. Eris wrapped herself