The Call of the Silent Core
The streets of Edenfall were silent, but not for lack of life: the silence was thick, as if the city itself were holding its breath. From the Tower of Unfinished Remembrance, a faint signal expanded. It wasn't sound. It wasn't light. It was the Dark Founder's very consciousness, growing ever more awakened.
Akihiko stood at the center of a floating platform, generated by his Void. Lirea and Naeya accompanied him, each carrying the linked fragments of the Original Memory. They had restored continuity, but had not yet closed the loop on the threat.
"Do you feel it?" Naeya asked. "There's no noise, but he's screaming at me."
"It's not a scream," Lirea murmured. "It's… the echo of something long lost."
The Eighth Fragment Awakens
Among the fragments, one began to spin. Its light flickered, and suddenly, a dark flash emerged. It wasn't evil energy, but a complete absence of presence. Akihiko understood immediately: that fragment contained his own echo.
The Void reacted. It expanded, as if wishing to merge with the fragment. Akihiko was swallowed up by a vision.
He saw his childhood, but not as he remembered it. Everything was in black and white. His parents' voices were inkless drafts. The Void hadn't been born yet, but the space where he would grow already existed.
On that plane, Akihiko found a figure. It was himself… but without emotions. Without memories. Without the desire to exist.
"You are what happens when memory fails," the figure said.
"And you are what happens when the pain decides to stay."
The figure attacked him, using combat techniques identical to his own. It was a battle of reflexes. A clash of wills with no spectators. Just two versions of the same being fighting to determine which was the real one.
Akihiko didn't win by hitting harder, but by remembering why he fought: for Edenfall. For Lirea. For Naeya. For himself.
The Void responded, enveloping the figure and absorbing it. It didn't destroy it. It integrated it.
III. The Awakening of the Tower
Outside the vision, Lirea and Naeya watched as the Tower of Incomplete Remembrance began to glow with increasing intensity. At its peak, a figure rose: a woman wrapped in black robes, her eyes like floating rifts.
"I am Atherys, the Chronicler of the Throne. She who never forgets."
Atherys possessed the ability to turn any memory into a physical weapon. With her first movement, she launched crystallized fragments of history: painful moments materialized as daggers.
Naeya was hit by one of them. Upon impact, he relived the loss of his sister, but with an added twist: in that version, Akihiko hadn't saved her. He was on the verge of an emotional breakdown.
Lirea intervened. She used Reflexive Resonance to enter the memory and modify it from within, returning it to its true form. The damage was reversed, but the warning remained clear: Atherys could manipulate history.
"She's the opposite of what we did. We reconstruct. She distorts."
The Battle for True Memory
Atherys descended, facing Akihiko, now more complete than ever. His Void didn't just erase, it cleansed. It was a force of clarity, not destruction.
The battle was fierce. Atherys split into multiple versions of herself, each embodying a different timeline: in one she was the savior of Edenfall, in another its executioner, in another an innocent child.
Akihiko had to confront each one, not killing them, but deactivating them with understanding. Each version required a restored memory. Lirea and Naeya assisted, connecting fragments with specific emotions, weaving a web of meaning.
Finally, only the real Atherys remained.
"You think remembering is enough. But forgetting is also human."
"Yes," Akihiko replied. "But we choose what to forget... not you."
With a final effort, Akihiko released the Inner Void in the form of an expanding circle. It didn't destroy Atherys, but rather disassembled her, allowing the fragments to return to their original owners.
Atherys fell to her knees. She was no longer an enemy. Now she was... archive.
"What if no one needs me anymore?"
"Then you will finally rest."
The New Horizon of Edenfall
The Tower began to crumble slowly, without a sound, as if it knew its purpose had been fulfilled.
From above, Edenfall could be seen stretching out, each neighborhood returning to its own time. The zones were no longer loops or distortions. The narrative flow was back on track.
A new emblem appeared in the sky, formed by particles of the Void and memories: a spiral that moved inwards and outwards.
"It's the mark of choice," Lirea said. "Of the power to remember, and to let go."
Akihiko felt the weight of everything he had experienced. There were still battles to come. There were still hidden mafias, unrevealed plots, betrayals to be uncovered. But for the first time, Edenfall wasn't at the mercy of oblivion. It was in the hands of those who chose to remember