The pulse still echoed in the sky when Kael emerged from the hollow beneath the boulder. Though the sun had long since abandoned this place, the horizon bled red, and the ashclouds churned like wounded beasts.
Kael's legs felt stiff, his joints aching from sleep—but his breath came steadier now. The fear hadn't vanished, only changed shape. Before, he'd feared what he didn't know. Now, he feared what waited to be remembered.
[Status Effect: Fractured Duality – Active] Warning: Memory recall may destabilize personality cohesion.
He exhaled sharply, ignoring it. "Good morning to you too," he muttered.
The terrain before him had shifted. Where once there was a barren cliff, a jagged fault had torn open the land, revealing a crumbling path spiraling downward into a basin choked with mist and bone. Black trees jutted from the earth like charred fingers reaching skyward. In the distance, flickers of violet flame danced across the surface of shattered stones.
[New Location Unlocked: Mourning Hollow] Echo activity detected. Proceed with caution.
Kael descended slowly, each step kicking up motes of ash and soot. The air grew warmer as he went—humid, close, the scent of scorched cloth and old blood clinging to everything. He passed remnants of shattered armor embedded in the rock. Symbols long since blackened by fire. Shields with no wielders.
As he reached the basin's heart, a stone circle came into view. Ten standing pillars, arranged like sentinels around a cracked slab of obsidian. At its center, a single flame burned—not ember-orange, but pale and flickering blue.
Kael stepped into the ring, heart pounding.
And the sky opened.
It wasn't thunder that split the air, but a scream—a long, low cry of something ancient and in pain. Lightning forked through the ashclouds, bathing the hollow in momentary clarity.
And there, between the flickers, stood a figure.
Lyra.
But not the Lyra he'd followed.
This version wore a crown of thorns. Her eyes bled silver. Her arms were outstretched, and fire—pure white and wild—burned behind her ribs, visible through translucent skin.
"Kael," she whispered, and the ground cracked beneath him.
He fell—through the stone, through the ash, through himself.
When he landed, he was standing. Again. Somewhere else.
A memory? A dream? Another fragment?
He stood in a field of glass, the sky a frozen swirl of violet and crimson. He wore different clothes—lighter, unfamiliar. Around him, dozens of others stood in a circle, faces half-remembered, some warm, some cold.
A girl stood beside him. Not Lyra. Younger. Eyes fierce. She pressed a blade into his hand.
"You have to choose now. Before it's too late."
The blade shimmered with heat. In the distance, a city burned.
"Who do you save? Who do you burn?"
Kael's grip tightened.
The sky fractured again.
And he was back in the circle of stones, gasping, knees on fire from the impact. The blue flame in the center guttered low.
[Warning: Instability Surging. Memory Convergence Incomplete.]
Kael stood slowly, the echo of the field still clinging to his senses.
He looked around the ring of stones, half-expecting the crowned Lyra to return.
But only the flame remained.
Kael reached out.
When his hand touched it, it didn't burn.
It wept.
A single tear of flame traced up his palm. Warm. Familiar.
And a voice—not Lyra's, not the System's—but one he could almost name:
"Don't forget who you were, even if you don't like it."
The flame went out.
Kael stood alone in the hollow.
And overhead, the sky bled a little brighter.