The invitation arrived without warning, appearing on the council's communication network during an otherwise ordinary afternoon, there was no sender attached to it, no recognizable signature, and no coordinates that could be traced through the usual pathways between universes, there was only a short message, Our universe is dying, please come before it disappears.Markus had been the first person to see it, and by the time Axel reached the council chamber, he had already pulled up every available record."I can't find it," he said, staring at the empty archive.Axel looked at the display."You mean the coordinates?"Markus shook his head."The universe itself."He brought up the historical archives, searching through records that went back to the earliest known civilizations, but nothing appeared, there was no name, no creation record, no historical reference, and no trace of a civilization belonging to the universe that had supposedly sent the invitation.Lumen stood beside them, stu

The image of the enormous structure remained in Axel's mind long after the projection disappeared, he kept thinking about the connections between the universes and the strange doorway hidden at the center, but the future civilization had given them one more piece of information before they left, a location that existed outside normal reality, somewhere they believed another Tree of Origins had appeared after the Final Rewrite.Axel traveled there with Markus and Lumen, following the coordinates through a region where space gradually became difficult to recognize, the stars disappeared one by one, then even the usual sense of distance seemed to fade, their vessel continued forward until the darkness ahead began changing into a pale silver landscape, there was no ground beneath them, yet somehow they could walk, and when Axel stepped outside, he immediately felt something moving through the air, it wasn't energy, it was possibility.Markus looked around in amazement, "This place isn't e

Axel followed the fading branch through the Second Tree, the strange fragment still resting inside his palm, its energy pulsing softly against his skin, Markus and Lumen stayed close behind him as the path carried them farther away from the main branches, deeper into a section where the possibilities became thinner and harder to understand, the images no longer showed entire civilizations, instead, they showed small moments, a child laughing, someone opening a door, a family sitting around a table, ordinary pieces of lives that could have happened somewhere in the endless possibilities of reality.Then the branch stopped.A small image appeared in front of Axel.A distant universe.It looked peaceful, almost completely ordinary, there were no massive structures surrounding it, no signs of the old Systems, and no traces of the battles that had shaped Axel's existence, yet something about the universe immediately caught his attention.The fragment in his hand became warm.Axel stepped c

The words stayed in Axel's mind long after the strange vision disappeared, He was hiding me from you, Axel couldn't understand why Aether would ever need to protect the boy from him, especially if the boy carried a fragment of Aether's consciousness, but something deep inside him told him that this wasn't a simple misunderstanding, there was a reason Aether had kept this child hidden, and if they wanted the truth, they would have to follow the memories instead of forcing them to appear.Markus carefully examined the remaining energy in the room, the fragment had disappeared, but a faint trace of its presence still remained around the boy, almost like a doorway that had been opened and then suddenly closed."Whatever Aether did," Markus said, "he left a trail."Axel looked at him, "Can you follow it?"Markus nodded, "I think so."Lumen stepped closer to the boy, who was still sitting quietly on the bed, his expression distant, as though he was trying to understand his own memories."Yo

The new branch continued growing in the center of the Second Tree, twisting slowly through the darkness, yet there was something deeply unnatural about it, unlike every other branch that carried images of possible lives, this one carried nothing at all, no civilization, no person, no event, not even a distant glimpse of a future, it was simply darkness wrapped around a faint silver glow, as though reality itself had started building something it didn't understand.The boy stood several steps away from it, staring at the strange branch with uncertainty written across his face, he had only wanted to reject the futures the Tree had shown him, he hadn't expected his choice to leave something behind, and the longer he watched it, the more he began to realize that the Tree wasn't simply reacting to him anymore, it was struggling with him.Markus slowly moved around the roots, examining the shifting energy, his device repeatedly changing readings before settling on another impossible result,