Kael froze.Nyra’s silhouette emerged fully from the shadows, lit by the flickering torches that lined the black walls of the passage. Her body was the same—same slender frame, same curve of her jaw, same posture he had memorized through too many battles—but her presence was not.Something else wore her skin.Her voice, when she spoke again, was layered, as if two things were speaking through the same mouth. One cold. One ancient.“You brought it with you,” she said. “The shard. The seed. The echo of the Archive’s last breath.”Lira stepped in front of Kael, dagger raised. “That’s not Nyra.”Kael’s sword was already in his hand, though he had not consciously drawn it. His muscles were tight, ready, but his chest ached at the sight of her. His memories clashed with the reality before him.“Where is she?” he asked.The woman tilted her head. Her eyes shimmered like oil. “She is not gone. She is watching. And screaming.”Lira growled, “You possessed her.”“No,” the voice said. “She invit

Kael dropped to one knee as the illusion of stars crumbled around him. The air returned, thick and sharp, filling his lungs like glass. The vault was still there, cracked and torn, but real. Beneath the altar, the seal was gone. In its place stretched a chasm of roiling black mist, pulsing with life that did not belong to this world.The Hollow King was no longer a shape of flesh and runes. He floated above the pit, his crown of bones spinning faster now, humming with impossible energy. With every turn, it bled silver threads into the air, stitching reality together and ripping it apart in the same breath.Kael rose slowly, sword in hand. His fingers trembled, not from fear, but from something deeper. Recognition. The thing above him was not just a king. It was an anchor. A wound. A key to something older than Vareth, older than the wyrm, older even than the gods whose bones whispered in the deep places.Lira stood behind him, hands outstretched. She had not spoken since the veil tore

Kael stood beneath the broken sky, his breath shallow, chest rising with quiet disbelief. The spiral etched into his palm glowed faintly, not hot, not cold—just there, like it had always belonged.Lira stepped forward first. Her eyes roamed over him as if searching for the man she had known before the cradle opened. “What did it show you?”He didn’t answer right away. Words felt too small.Nyra crouched beside the remnants of the pit, running her fingers across the sealed shell. “It didn’t just test you,” she said. “It changed you. The cradle is older than language. It doesn't give gifts. It awakens.”Kael opened his mouth, but no sound came out. Instead, he lifted his palm and held it toward the nearest obelisk.The spiral flickered.The obelisk responded.Stone groaned as a slit formed in the black surface, a thin vertical line like a sealed eye cracking open. Beyond it, there was no interior—only more sky. A different sky. It shimmered silver-blue, laced with streams of light that

Kael met the dead man’s blade with a roar.Steel rang through the tower’s throat, and the pulse beneath the living stone quickened. Every clash of metal was like thunder inside the hollow bones of the chamber. The corpse moved like a revenant, fast despite its ancient frame. Its sword screamed with each swing, crying for something lost, echoing the rage of a soul that had refused its throne.But Kael did not yield.The spiral on his palm burned brighter with each strike. The blade he carried was not just a weapon—it was memory given form, history remade. Each swing was guided by something deeper than instinct. It was as if he had already fought this battle in another life. As if this duel was written in the marrow of the world.Lira circled to the edge of the black pool, eyes wide, sword drawn but unused. “That thing is holding back.”Nyra’s gaze sharpened. “He’s testing Kael. The corpse wants to see if he’s worthy.”The air thickened. The throne behind the dead man trembled. From the

Kael stepped through the bone door and entered a place no map had ever named.The chamber beyond was cold, not with winter, but with memory. A cold that reached into the joints, into the marrow. The floor was formed of mirrors that reflected nothing but darkness. The walls were stitched from tendrils of ash and light, and overhead, a sky of stars hung, but each one wept black fire.Kael stopped just beyond the threshold. Lira followed, silent. Nyra came last, a flicker of unease curling in her breath. The door closed behind them without a sound.No echo followed.The stillness here felt absolute. Like nothing dared to move unless summoned.Kael’s footsteps were weightless. Yet each one cracked something beneath.The mirrors.They did not show his face.Only fragments. Memories. Lives he did not know. Battles he had not fought. A child laughing beside a man in black robes. A woman screaming as a city burned. His own hand, dripping with blood that smoked in silver threads.Then the voic