Fractured Realms

The Realm of Echoes

Every voice leaves a shadow in the silence.

I awoke to the sound of breathing that was not my own. The air was weightless, the world still. A pale light stretched in all directions, without source or warmth. It felt like standing inside a thought that refused to end. The silence was so complete that it became a sound, pressing against my skull until I could almost hear my own heartbeat echo through it.

Then the whispers began.

They were faint at first, ripples across the silence. I turned, but there was no one. The light around me shimmered like a mirror disturbed by the wind. The whispers grew clearer. Some called my name. Others laughed. Some cried. All of them sounded like me.

I took a step forward, and the ground responded like glass bending under weight. Each movement left behind a faint reflection, an image of myself that lingered for a moment before fading. When I stopped, one of the reflections did not fade. It stood, staring back at me. Its eyes were hollow.

“Where am I?” I asked.

The reflection tilted its head, then spoke in my voice. “Inside what you refused to remember.”

The words hit harder than any weapon. I stepped closer. The reflection did the same. Its face twitched, breaking into fragments before reforming, each piece showing a different version of me. Some looked younger, others older, all carrying the same exhaustion.

“This is the Realm of Echoes,” the reflection said. “Every choice you made, every life you touched, every death you caused, lives here.”

I reached out, but the reflection’s hand shot forward first, grabbing my wrist. Its grip was cold but strong. The surface beneath us cracked, sending shards of light spiraling upward. The reflection smiled. “You cannot hide from yourself.”

Before I could react, it pulled me forward. The world broke.

The ground turned into water made of light. I fell through it, tumbling endlessly, surrounded by flashes of memory. Elara’s face appeared for a heartbeat, smiling at me beneath a burning sky. Then another vision, my hands on a control panel, alarms blaring, the machine I had built shaking apart. A thousand realities blinked by like dying stars. I tried to scream, but the sound was swallowed whole.

I hit the ground hard. The world had changed again. The light was gone, replaced by a vast field of mirrors stretching into infinity. Each surface shimmered faintly, reflecting scenes that did not exist. I saw cities in ruin, oceans burning, and people screaming my name as they vanished into the void. I saw myself walking among them, calm and indifferent.

“No,” I whispered. “That isn’t me.”

A voice answered. “It was.”

I turned. Another reflection stepped out of a mirror. This one carried a blade made of pure shadow. Its eyes glowed with faint blue light, the same light that lived inside me. “You broke the worlds,” it said. “Now face what remains of them.”

It attacked before I could think. The blade slashed across the ground, leaving a trail of darkness that rippled outward. I dodged, barely, feeling the cut of air graze my cheek. My hand rose instinctively, light forming in my palm, brighter than before. The reflection lunged again, faster, more precise. I blocked its strike with a wall of energy that cracked under pressure.

The sound of impact echoed endlessly. My arm burned with effort. The reflection smirked. “You still fight as if you can undo what you’ve done.”

I pushed back, forcing it away. The light flared around me, forming into a weapon of my own, a blade of refracted energy that pulsed in rhythm with my heart. I stared at it, surprised. I had not willed it into existence. It had simply formed, answering something deep inside me.

The reflection circled me. “Power without control. Hope without understanding. You are still the same.”

“I am not,” I said, though I barely believed it.

We clashed again. Each strike sent light and shadow colliding, filling the air with sparks. The reflections in the mirrors moved as we fought, shifting into scenes of chaos and fire. Every strike I landed created another vision. I saw myself shouting, running, reaching for Elara as a collapsing structure fell between us. I saw her disappear into the light. My chest tightened. The distraction cost me. The reflection’s blade slashed across my arm, cutting through the glow that shielded me.

Pain bloomed, real and sharp. Blood ran down my arm, glowing faintly like molten silver. The reflection raised its weapon again, but I met it halfway, locking blades.

“Why show me this?” I shouted. “Why now?”

“Because you still pretend you can save what is already gone.”

The words pierced deeper than the blade. My anger surged. The light in my hands brightened until it burned. The reflection staggered back, its shadow-arm cracking like glass under heat. I stepped forward, every movement guided by instinct. My blade swung in a wide arc, cutting through both shadow and reflection. The world erupted in light.

When the glow faded, the reflection was gone. Only the mirrors remained, silent and watching. My breath came hard, each inhale scraping my throat. The wound on my arm sealed itself slowly, leaving a faint scar that pulsed with light.

Then the mirrors began to move. They shifted like doors opening, revealing more figures inside. Dozens of them. Each one of me.

Some wore armor made of fire. Others bore scars I did not recognize. One had Elara’s pendant around his neck. They stepped out together, surrounding me in a tightening circle. I raised my blade, but my hands trembled. There were too many.

The first moved without warning. I parried, but another struck from behind. Energy exploded around me, heat searing my back. I turned, striking back, but the reflection’s form dissolved and reappeared elsewhere. They fought like thoughts, impossible to predict.

I forced my focus inward, remembering the lessons the City Between Worlds had taught me: the rhythm of power, the pulse of intention. The light responded, forming a shield that curved around me like a sphere. Shadows pounded against it, each hit sending cracks across its surface. I pushed harder, channeling everything I had. The shield expanded, shattering into a burst of energy that sent the echoes flying.

The ground cracked. Light surged upward, forming spirals that reached into the void. I fell to my knees, panting. The silence returned, heavier than before. The mirrors dimmed. One reflection remained standing, the one with Elara’s pendant.

He approached slowly, blade lowered. “You fight yourself, Kael, but you never ask why.”

I looked up, exhausted. “Why?”

He placed the pendant on the ground between us. “Because what you broke was never the world's. It was the promise you made to her.”

The air around him flickered, and for a brief moment, I saw Elara standing where he was. Her eyes were filled with light and sorrow. Her lips moved, but I could not hear the words. I reached out, desperate, but she faded before my fingers touched her.

The silence broke. The ground beneath me trembled. Cracks of light spread outward, and from those cracks rose new shapes, echoes of the people I had known. Friends. Strangers. Enemies. They stared with empty eyes. Their forms twisted, melting into the shadows. The entire realm was collapsing into itself, folding into a storm of light and darkness.

The reflection’s voice echoed one last time. “You will never escape what you are until you face what you lost.”

The mirrors shattered. A blinding light swallowed everything.

When I opened my eyes again, I was lying on the edge of a broken plain. The air was thick with ash, the sky torn open by rivers of light. In the distance, I saw the horizon burning. My blade lay beside me, still glowing faintly. I picked it up and looked at my reflection in its surface. The glow in my eyes was stronger now, steadier, but colder.

For the first time, I understood. The fracture was not only in the world. It was in me.

A faint voice reached me through the stillness. “Kael.”

I froze. The sound was fragile but familiar. I turned toward it. Far beyond the horizon, in the storm of light, a shape moved, slender, glowing, almost human. It looked back at me before vanishing into the storm.

“Elara,” I whispered.

The ground trembled again. The world split open beneath me, and I fell into the light once more, the echoes of her name trailing behind me.