A single crown can weigh more than an entire mountain, especially when three different kings are trying to force it onto your head.Three foreign delegations had crossed the cosmic sea since dawn, their massive soul steel sky vessels moored to our eastern cliffside. Now, the main council hall of Oakhaven smelled of spilled wine, wet wool, and pure, concentrated panic."You must take the mantle, Soren!" Lord Vane of the High Spires shouted, slamming his ringed fist onto our polished oak table. His silver cloak rustled as he stood up, his pale eyes wide with terror. "The Devourer is gone, but the void is still vast and cold! If you do not claim supreme command over our three worlds, who will organize our defense when the next nightmare wakes?""He speaks the truth," Lady Yven of the Iron Reaches added, her dark leather ar

 The world folded in on itself, turning from ash and stone into a blinding sheet of white parchment.The heat of the caldera vanished. The roaring sirens of Ember Reach died away, replaced by a sound I knew better than the beating of my own heart. The wet, heavy thud of a blade cutting through flesh, followed by the quiet gasp of a dying man.I stood in the muddy square of Oakhaven. Rain poured from a flat, blue sky that was not real.At my feet lay Kenji. His chest was torn open. Dark static bled into the mud. His violet soul-light flickered out like a candle submerged in cold water."You failed again, Soren," a voice whispered from the rain. It was my own voice, twisted and hollow. "You dragged him into another war. You always drag them into your wars."No, my mind screamed. We destroyed the furnace. Kenji is in the lower levels of the forge.I tried to turn, to run, but my legs moved on their own. The scene reset with a sicke

 The sky vessel cut through the void at breakneck speed, its engines screaming as we pushed them past every safety limit. I stood at the bow, my knuckles white against the railing, watching the stars blur into streaks of light.Kenji stood beside me, his jaw tight. Lyra worked the controls behind us, her hands moving faster than I had ever seen. Marcus paced the deck, his hammer resting against his shoulder, ready to swing at a moment's notice.We were too far. We knew it. But we pushed anyway."How long?" I asked, not turning around."Eighteen minutes," Lyra replied, her voice strained. "If we don't burn out the engines first.""Burn them," I said. "Burn them all the way down."The communicator crystal at my belt had gone silent. No more frantic flashes. No more desperate calls. Just cold, dead quiet. That scared me more than anything.Oakhaven was burning. I could feel it in my bones.Master Kael stood at the cen

The sky was changing.I noticed it first when I stepped out of the archive building. The stars above Oakhaven were shifting, moving in patterns that made no sense. They were not falling. They were rearranging themselves like pieces on a board."What is happening?" Lyra asked, walking up beside me. Her grey eyes were fixed on the heavens.I did not have an answer.Over the next three days, the change grew worse. The air grew thick and heavy. The sunlight turned pale and weak, like a candle burning low. People began to slow down. Their movements became sluggish. Their eyes grew distant.It started with the farmers. They would stop mid-step, staring at their hands as if they had forgotten what they were holding. Then the children. They stopped playing in the streets. They just sat in the dirt, staring at nothing.At first, I thought it was sickness. But it was not sickness. It was something worse."They are losing themselves," Kenji said, his voice quiet with fear. "I can feel it. Their

 The map burned in my mind like a brand. The Crown of the Primordials. The place where all realities were drawn together. I knew where it was now. And I knew what waited there.The Prime Architect was not going to wait forever."We need help," I said, standing before the Vanguard in the central plaza. "More help than Oakhaven can give. We need every liberated world. Every soul that broke free from the loops. We need to build an armada."Marcus looked at me. "You want to ask strangers to leave their homes and fight a war that is not theirs?""It is theirs," I said. "The Prime Architect does not care about borders. It will consume everything. Every world. Every soul. Every choice. We fight together or we fall alone."The Vanguard was silent. Then Lyra stepped forward."Where do we start?" she asked.We split up.Lyra went east, toward the crystal realms where the sky was made of light. Marcus traveled north, to the m