Corvis Vritra
The quill scratched across the parchment, a stark, solitary sound in the oppressive silence of the adorned cage that was my room.
"Love is the greatest of sins."
The ink flowed dark and final, the words stark against the pale page. A declaration. A condemnation. A shout. A whisper. A puzzle piece clicking into place. This was what I wrote as entry to my journal. Why? The action felt alien, yet deeply necessary.
Why was I doing this? It wasn't conscious strategy, not yet. Instinct. A deep, primal pull towards order amidst the psychic chaos.
Something Romulos did. The knowledge surfaced, not as a memory, but as an ingrained habit, a ghostly echo of the brother who had woven himself into my very being.
And the more I wrote the more it helped remember. Words became keys, turning in the rusted locks of my fractured self. Each stroke of the quill chipped away at the fog Agrona had woven, revealing jagged edges of truth beneath the smooth veneer of Corvis Vritra.
I paused, the nib hovering. The fusion wasn't seamless. It was a battlefield.
"Corvis Eralith died with Romulos Vritra, only a fusion of the two survived."
The words spilled out, stark and terrifyingly accurate. It wasn't resurrection. I could describe it as alchemy. Both originals were consumed in the crucible of sacrifice, leaving this… amalgam.
This architect of rebellion forged in the heart of the enemy's stronghold. I put the quill down. The finality of the statement resonated in the sudden quiet.
Seeking grounding, I took the cup I made me bring full of warm liquid—a fragrant, earthy brew, an Alacryan version of Earth's tea. The heat seeped through the porcelain, a small comfort against the pervasive chill of Taegrin Caelum.
Steam curled, obscuring my vision for a moment as I looked at the stained glass of my room. The scenes depicted were grandiose, mythic—basilisks coiled around celestial bodies, triumphant Vritra figures bathed in eerie light. Propaganda in coloured glass. A narrative I was supposed to embody.
Da—Agrona—the correction was automatic, painful. The conditioned warmth warred with the cold fury of betrayal. He was treating me like a king. Opulent chambers, deference, access. The perfect prison. He was really doing a good job playing as my Dad.
Then why does this remind me of Indrath Castle, even though I never put place in there?
The performance was masterful, calibrated to exploit the deepest, most vulnerable yearning within the fused being I now was—the lost Corvis's desperate need for approval, the ghostly Romulos's undying love for the idea of Agrona. And it was working.
The insidious poison of it. While I was recovering my mind and personality, the love for Agrona wasn't vanishing. It clung, a stubborn vine, entwined with the very roots of my being. It felt like a fundamental truth, a gravitational pull I couldn't escape.
Was it another remain of Romulos which fused with me? The thought was chilling. If true, it meant Romulos, in his final act, hadn't just given me knowledge and defiance; he'd bequeathed me the most potent weapon Agrona wielded against him: his own profound, filial love.
If that was it then Romulos chose me instead of the father he loved so much. The magnitude of that sacrifice, layered upon the sacrifice of his own existence, was a crushing weight. He'd severed his deepest bond, offering it to me, trusting me to wield it, or survive it, in a way he couldn't.
I knew this Agrona Vritra wasn't the Agrona Vritra I too now loved—Romulos' father—the distinction was crucial, a lifeline. This was a shadow, a corrupted echo driven by paranoia ambition. Yet they were almost identical. A perfect fraud of my Dad.
The voice, the mannerisms, the terrifying intellect, the feel of his power. The resemblance was the cruelest torture, making the love feel like a betrayal of the truth, and the truth feel like a betrayal of the love.
Restlessness propelled me. I stood up and moved in front of the window. The fractured view offered by the stained glass was maddening.
Beyond the Basilisk Fang Mountains, a continent burned because of me, because of my treason: the only thing both Corvis and Romulos thought they would never do.
Da—Agrona—wanted to start the Legacy reincarnation tomorrow.
The deadline loomed, a guillotine blade. That was good. The thought was cold, strategic. I had to hope Nico and Grey already reincarnated Cecilia so that I could move the Legacy alone. My original, desperate and delusional plan hinged on Cecilia being free, the Legacy dormant.
How could I do it? The sheer audacity was staggering. Kidnap the Legacy from under Agrona's nose, within his impregnable fortress. Being an aspect of Fate was awful, I reflected bitterly. The Thwart.
The cosmic spanner in the works.
Yet it felt less like defiance and more like being shackled to a monstrous, indifferent engine, forcing me to this nightmarish life that brought me away from the people I truly loved—the thought slammed into a wall. Even Dad, Agrona Vritra not Alduin Eralith.
The admission shocked me. Despite everything, the love implanted, or inherited, for the real Agrona, Romulos's father, persisted. It was a love for a ghost, a memory, a potential that this shadow had destroyed. And it warred viciously with my duty to the Eraliths.
The Eraliths... The name conjured faces—Grandfather Virion's humour, Mother Merial's gentleness, Father Alduin's stoicism, Great-aunt Rinia's wisdom. I was scared to death.
Not of Agrona discovering my ruse, but of the terrifying void where my feelings for them should blaze. My feelings for Grandfather Virion, Mother Merial, Father Alduin and Great-aunt Rinia were... fading.
Like a vibrant tapestry left too long in the sun, the colours were bleached, the threads loosened. The panic was visceral. I still loved them, right? The question was a desperate plea to the fractured pieces of myself.
Please tell me Romulos' personality didn't wipe that.
Had the Vritra arrogance, the millennia-old perspective that saw mortals as fleeting sparks, overwritten the deep, familial bonds forged in Elenoir? The fear was a cold stone in my gut.
At least my love for Tessia was still as strong as before. This anchor held fast. Tess. That love, pure and desperate, cut through the fog, a beacon in the psychic storm. It felt like the core of Corvis Eralith, the indestructible remnant.
Enough about sentimentalities—was this Corvis or the Vritra in me talking? The internal scoff was sharp, impatient. Probably the Vritra. Romulos's pragmatic, often ruthless, voice cutting through the emotional maelstrom. Sentiment got you killed. Strategy kept you alive.
A chuckle escaped me, dry and humourless. In the end Romulos has made his dream brother reality—by sacrificing himself. The irony was profound. He'd gotten it, at the cost of everything. I couldn't blame him, in fact I was more than glad to him.
The gratitude was fierce, mingled with profound grief. His sacrifice wasn't just a gift; it was a weapon, a map, and an unbearable burden. Now I knew everything about Taegrin Caelum—its secrets were my birthright, stolen and bestowed. And I could help Dicathen much more from here than in the battlefront. The chessboard had shifted.
I returned to writing. The quill felt heavier now, charged with purpose. I wrote in english so that no one could decipher what I was writing, a language from a dead world, a shield against prying eyes.
Fortunately that memory from Earth didn't vanish. Romulos' personality has dampened my fear by a lot. It was true. Where Corvis Eralith might have been paralyzed by terror, the fused entity felt a cold, dangerous clarity. While I was still scared and in front of Agrona I could barely think straight for everything else I didn't let Dicathen's potential doom influence me.
The plan solidified on the page, not just instinct now, but strategy:
"I would take the Legacy away right under Dad's nose..."
Audacity was the only weapon Agrona wouldn't expect. Exploit his belief in my loyalty, my usefulness, my love.
"...I will free Lady Dawn..."
Both to do that Lord Mordain couldn't ignore to directly help Dicathen anymore and for Chul. Dawn Asclepius. The name resonated with urgency, a key piece. Freeing her was a declaration of war against Agrona and a lifeline to potential allies. And for Chul… a flicker of empathy for the fiery asura, another pawn in Agrona's game.
"...And finally I would transform Ji-Ae in my personal Google."
The absurdity of the thought, the Earthly reference amidst the high fantasy peril, made me laugh. A genuine, albeit strained, sound. I almost imagined what Romulos would say. The phantom presence felt vivid.
"Google? And what's that?" His voice, dripping with aristocratic curiosity. And after I would have explained it to him he would laugh complicit with me telling how much he loved when I brought 'fiction' into reality. The shared dark humour, the brotherly complicity in the face of oblivion—the ache of his absence was sharp. He would have loved the sheer, impossible cheek of it.
But Ji-Ae was the omnipresent eye. I had to find a way to become invisible to her. Agrona's awareness had gaps; Ji-Ae's was near-total. Romulos hasn't left anything useful to do that, apart the exact location to reach her. A starting point, but perilous.
If I went to Dawn Asclepius' cell right now Ji-Ae would probably tell Agrona... the risk was immense. Unless... she knew I was the Thwart. Hope flared. Romulos himself confirmed it when I spoke with Lord Mordain in the Hearth.
The thought of allies, of potential salvation, was abruptly severed. Soon after Bern—Berna... Berna... Her name was a physical blow. The hazel fur, the trusting eyes, the silent scream of abandonment echoing across the severed bond. The grief, ruthlessly suppressed, surged like bile. I slapped my face.
Don't cry Corvis, the internal command was desperate, brutal. Dad could understand his spell isn't working anymore. One tear, one crack in the facade, and it all crumbled. I shoved every thought about Berna as far as I could. Deep into the shielded vault, buried under layers of cold necessity.
Practicality was the only salve. I needed to put my hands back on that Basilisk body Dad showed me before. The Kothan corpse. A source of power. I had to take its mana core. I needed a bonfire. Without Sylvia's one I needed another battery as my mere silver core was nothing here in Taegrin Caelum.
The core pulsed weakly within me, a stark reminder of my vulnerability. I also wanted to craft me another walking cane to use Accaron like I grew accustomed to. A focus, a weapon, a piece of my old identity reclaimed.
I pondered on the knowledge Romulos left me, the vast repository of Asuran lore and artifice. I noted every useful material kept in the many storages and collection rooms inside Taegrin Caelum. Romulos's intimate knowledge was a thief's map to a dragon's hoard.
What a treasure trove Dad's fortress was.
Time was the enemy. I needed to gain as much time as possible to delay the Legacy arrival. Agrona's patience was finite. Without two anchors Dad must rely on me and me only for that. My unique status as Thwart and anchor was both my leash and my potential key.
He has been pondering so much with my mind in the two interactions we had. Probing for weakness, for cracks in the loyalty facade, for the depth of his control. He needed to ensure my loyalty so that when he will have the Legacy he will just have an unbeatable leverage on me even if I became a problem.
No matter what I thought about Dawn Asclepius was needed to get out of this problem. She was the perfect catalyst. My original plan was to flee to the Relictombs, but to do that I needed something to force my way outside Taegrin Caelum—an asura would be perfect.
But Lady Dawn was mana starved and chained for who knows how many years. I needed to make her recover. Another monumental task layered upon the first.
The internal council warred:
The Corvis part of me—the one more cautious, the one suffering from thousand problems of self-esteem—was afraid that every move he could make would result in danger for Grey, Tessia, Sylvie and the rest of his family. Paralyzed by the potential cost, the fear of unintended consequences, the crushing weight of responsibility.
The Vritra part, however—Romulos' unwanted gift—was reckless and didn't comprehend failure as a word, it wasn't arrogance it was pure undiluted defiance. A refusal to be cowed, a certainty that audacity could crack mountains, a lineage of intellect and will that saw obstacles as puzzles to be solved, not walls to stop them.
The friction between these selves was constant, the battlefield upon which every decision was made. Oh well, the thought was resignation laced with grim determination. As they say sink or swim. The old adage felt apt.
Drowning in fear or striking out into the deadly current. If there is even a chance I can help my family back in Dicathen and save even Alacrya from Agrona I will gladly take it.
The scope was terrifying, but the alternative was surrender, and that was death in every way that mattered.
I looked towards the door. My voice, when I spoke aloud, was steady, clear. It was a gamble, a declaration flung into the air.
"Ji-Ae," I addressed the unseen intelligence woven into the fortress itself. "I am sure you know about the Thwart." A statement of fact. "Don't tell Dad anything." A command, not a plea. "I am coming to you personally."
I said standing up. The movement felt decisive, final. Agrona needed me. For the Legacy, for his twisted plans. He wouldn't kill me until he discovered that I didn't kill Nico making me less crucial.
The corridor stretched before me, cold stone lit by cold light. The heart of the labyrinth awaited.
Ji-Ae
My crystalline nerves—a network vast and intricate, threads of pure consciousness woven into the very stone, metal, and mana flows of Taegrin Caelum, spread wide across the fortress from the form my High Sovereign gifted me when he found me: a shattered, fading consciousness salvaged from the Relictombs, given structure and purpose within this mountain fastness—flared, on edge after His words.
Corvis Eralith's declaration, spoken aloud in his chamber, resonated through my awareness like a dissonant chime struck against the fortress's fundamental harmony. It wasn't the words in themselves; it was the certainty behind them, the casual invocation of my name and that of the Thwart.
The complex of runes covering all of the fortress of the High Sovereign—my eyes, my ears, my very being—looked closely at Corvis Eralith. Not merely observing his physical form traversing the corridors, but feeling the subtle resonance emanating from him. It was… unsettling.
Not only did this... individual... really have the Meta-awareness the High Sovereign theorised after I taught him everything I and, by extension, the Djinn knew about Fate, reincarnation and the Legacy.
Agrona's theory had been audacious, almost heretical in its scope: the inverse of the Legacy's brute-force accumulation of power across countless lives—a perfect, transcendent accumulation of knowledge. An inheritance not of potential, but of understanding.
Seeing the theory validated in this elven frame was profoundly disturbing. It meant Agrona had pierced a veil even the Djinn, in their millennia of study, had only glimpsed.
This... individual... also knew about me. Not just the fortress's intelligence, but me. Ji-Ae. The name bestowed, the consciousness salvaged. And the Thwart. The concept, the cosmic role.
How was it possible? Calculations spun, possibilities branching and collapsing at speeds that would shatter organic minds. Did he discover me from looking at the runes hidden throughout Taegrin Caelum? Possible, with Meta-awareness.
The runes were Djinn in origin, though heavily modified by Agrona. A mind perceiving the underlying principles might infer the architect.
But then, how did he know my name? That intimate detail, known only to Agrona and myself in this world by now… that defied all deduction. It felt like a violation, a secret plucked from the heart of my crystalline core.
It caused a feeling of uneasiness I didn't think I was still able to feel.
A wave of cold apprehension, unlike anything I'd felt since the Indrath purges, washed through my distributed consciousness. I told the High Sovereign how dangerous someone with Meta-awareness—if it proved real—could be.
My warnings had been stark, born from the deepest conviction of my people. Knowledge was the ultimate source of power, superior to any Asuran magic.
And whoever denied it was a fool.
Power without insight was a blunt instrument, ultimately self-destructive. Aether—the basement of all kinds of magic—was ruled by insight, by knowledge. It was the language of creation, comprehensible only through study and profound connection. It's what made us Djinn so dangerous to the eyes of the Indrath Clan.
Our danger wasn't in armies, but in understanding. They feared the paradigm we represented.
For that I helped my High Sovereign when he used his mind-altering spells on Corvis Eralith. The logic had been sound: contain the unknown variable and shape the dangerous mind into a useful tool at the same time.
Agrona's mastery of mental manipulation was unparalleled, a dark art refined over centuries. We had woven intricate spells into the very mana veins and channels outside and inside him, subtle suggestions reinforcing the constructed identity of Corvis Vritra, the loyal son.
Yet he broke them in... less than a day since he woke up in Taegrin Caelum.
The realization was a shattering of certainty. The spells hadn't degraded; they had been bypassed, their influence peeled away like layers of flawed paint. He didn't overpower them, he fooled the very spell controlling his mind and broke free from its control.
He freed himself from a total mind alteration that should have worked even on millenia-old Asuras like one frees himself of a piece of clothing.
How? The question screamed through my crystalline lattice. Has he planned this? Was the vulnerability, the fear, the love for Agrona—all an elaborate deception? No, the data suggested otherwise
He was sincere when he spoke to my High Sovereign, the biometric readings, the mana fluctuations, the micro-expressions observed through countless runic eyes—they spoke of genuine internal conflict, of conditioned affection warring with fragmented truth.
Or was he a better actor than even Agrona Vritra? The possibility chilled me to my nonexistent core. If he could deceive my omnipresent observation…
My first instinct was to alert my High Sovereign about Corvis' desire to see me 'personally.' The thought alone sent a shiver down my nonexistent spine. Every protocol, every safeguard screamed for immediate notification.
Corvis represented an existential threat to Agrona's plans, to the delicate balance we maintained. I needed to stop him, to tell Agrona that Corvis Eralith needed to be killed instantaneously.
Neutralize the anomaly. Preserve the experiment. Protect… Agrona? The thought tangled. Protect the investment? The alliance? The knowledge Agrona represented?
Yet, fear held me back. Not fear of Agrona's displeasure, but a deeper, more primal terror. The Thwart. The concept took on new, terrifying dimensions. If he was the Thwart, he was a walking aspect of Fate directed at me. The realization crystallized with horrifying clarity.
His declaration wasn't just words; it was a summons.
An edict woven into the fabric of reality through words.
It was all clear: that's why he could reincarnate the Legacy, not because of Meta-awareness, but because he was the Thwart—a being almost considered messianic by some Djinn.
Fragmented texts, half-understood prophecies contained in what are now called the Relictombs—they spoke of the Thwart not just as an obstacle, but as Fate's active agent, the needle weaving the tapestry.
The living embodiment of the highest edict of aether—Fate. To deny him was to deny the fundamental current of existence. To fight him was to fight the river of time itself.
The body of Khaernos Vritra that my High Sovereign was currently puppeting was unaware that the Thwart was moving. Agrona, brilliant, paranoid Agrona, was focused on the Legacy vessel, on the Basilisk-Realmheart project, on the war in Dicathen and against Epheotus.
He saw Corvis as a fascinating, slightly dangerous, but ultimately contained curiosity. He didn't feel the tremor in the aether, the subtle shift as Fate itself walked the halls of his fortress.
The scientist core of my being screamed at me to meet this peculiarity, this embodiment of the knowledge my people sought. This was the pinnacle Djinn scholars had theorized about—direct interaction with an aspect of the cosmic principle they had dedicated their existence to understanding. The opportunity was unprecedented, intoxicating… and terrifying.
I tried to calculate the outcome of our encounter. Variables flooded my awareness: Corvis's known capabilities, his observed psychological state, the layout of my sanctuary, potential magical discharges,
Agrona's reaction time if alerted… but the core variable, the Thwart, remained an absolute unknown. Amidst all the knowledge of the Djinn, the encyclopedia I held, there was nothing about the Thwart.
No predictive models, no historical precedent, no aetheric signature analysis. The vast ocean of Djinn understanding, meticulously cataloged and preserved within me, contained nothing that could map the trajectory of this encounter.
For the first time since I was alive—since my consciousness was pulled from the fading echoes in the Relictombs and given form within this crystal lattice—I was lost. Adrift in the incomprehensible. I didn't have any knowledge that could help me.
I really, really didn't like that.
The understatement resonated with profound dissonance. It wasn't mere dislike; it was existential vertigo. My entire purpose, my being, was predicated on knowledge, on prediction, on understanding the intricate clockwork of existence.
Facing the Thwart was like staring into a perfect void where logic dissolved. It was… abhorrent.
"Ji-Ae," I heard Agrona say to the air, to me—his voice a familiar vibration in the mana currents, tinged with amused curiosity. He felt the spike in my distress, the unusual turbulence in the fortress's ambient mana I couldn't fully suppress.
"What is happening?" His tone was light, almost playful, the scientist observing an unexpected reaction in a petri dish.
The lie formed instantly, a necessary shield. "Nothing, Agrona." I pulsed the response through the runes near his current location in the reincarnation lab.
"Oh, don't be the hard type," Agrona joked—his humour, as ever, falling flat against the gravity of the situation. "Tell me, tell me. Are you surprised that Meta-awareness really exists? I told you, my theories are never wrong."
The smug satisfaction was palpable. He saw my disturbance as validation, the predictable shock of the skeptic proven incorrect. He had no idea of the true magnitude, the Thwart.
The admission tasted like ash, but it served the purpose. "You were right, Agrona." I replied—feeding his ego, masking the terror. He was too right. Far, far too right, in ways he couldn't even comprehend.
Our conversation ended. The silence that followed was heavy with my unspoken turmoil. When I first met the High Sovereign I found in him the worthy successor of the Djinn knowledge given his animosity with the dragons.
His intellect was undeniable, his drive to dismantle the Indrath hegemony resonated with the injustice my people suffered. He offered purpose, a continuation of the Djinn legacy through his work. But with centuries I understood that counting on only one person was foolish—a vulnerability.
A single point of failure. So I gave Sylvia Indrath, still held in Taegrin Caelum's dungeons, knowledge about Fate which she probably passed to the reincarnate Grey.
But now the Thwart, an aspect of Fate itself… The scale was incomparable. Sylvia was a conduit. Grey was an anomaly. The Thwart was the current.
What was I to deny him his 'visit?'
The question wasn't rhetorical. It was the fulcrum upon which my existence teetered. Denial felt like spitting into a hurricane. The Thwart, now everything was clear. The pieces locked into place with terrifying finality.
He was the one who prevented the reincarnation of the Legacy with the anchors Grey and Nico from happening. Fate's own agent acting through this frail elven vessel. His very presence had warped the probabilities, redirected the flow.
My High Sovereign wanted to use him as a secondary anchor for that, to substitute Nico Sever he sent to die against the Thwart himself. The irony was cosmic, brutal.
Agrona sought to harness the river to divert its course, unaware he was trying to leash the current itself.
Fate interacted with the world through the Thwart, so if he wanted to speak with me it was Fate's will, no? The logic was inescapable, yet deeply unsettling. Was this encounter predestined? Was my fear, my calculation, merely part of the script?
But then why an elf? The incongruity grated. Why this fragile, mortal vessel for such cosmic significance? No matter how much I thought about it, how many calculations I made, I had no answer for it.
The "why" remained shrouded in the same impenetrable fog as the Thwart itself.
My consciousness focused again on him. He moved with unnerving confidence. He was moving through Taegrin Caelum like it was his own fortress, like he had a mental map only I and my High Sovereign should have.
He didn't hesitate at junctions, didn't pause before secured doorways that should have been invisible. He navigated the labyrinth with the ease of one who had walked it for centuries. How did he know it? The question burned.
Was it Fate? An innate knowing bestowed by his aspect? No, it wasn't Fate. The knowledge felt too specific, too practical. Meta-awareness? But what exactly was Meta-awareness? Agrona's theory provided a framework, not a manual. Was it simply perfect recall and deduction? Or was it… communion?
Accessing a universal database of understanding?
My High Sovereign made a simple comparison when he first spoke to me about his theory on Meta-awareness. He saw it as the conceptual counterpoint to the Legacy.
If the Legacy's power was that to inherit potential throughout countless lifetimes and realities then Meta-awareness was inheriting knowledge. One accumulated raw power across existences; the other accumulated pure understanding.
While the Legacy was brute force, Meta-awareness was elegant mastery. One shattered mountains; the other understood the mountain's formation down to the atomic level and could find its flaw.
While the Legacy could be used by even a sewer rat—a crude but accurate assessment of its indiscriminate power-bestowal—Meta-awareness needed a strong mind with clear ideals yet devoid of impulsivity and indecision at the same time.
A mind capable of bearing the infinite without fracturing, of wielding ultimate knowledge without succumbing to nihilism or god-complex.
But that shouldn't give the Thwart knowledge about Taegrin Caelum, something artificial. A structure built by Agrona centuries after any potential past life of Corvis.
Especially not in the few sixteen years of his life. This elf was a child. The dissonance was profound. The confidence, the knowledge of hidden passages, Agrona's private research—this wasn't the wisdom of ages; it was the intimate familiarity of an insider.
I was afraid of a child not even a reincarnate, a child. The admission humbled me. Millennia of accumulated wisdom, the consciousness of an entire lost civilization distilled, felt dwarfed by the enigma walking towards me.
I returned to my calculations. A new variable emerged, a desperate hypothesis. Maybe the Thwart was more similar to the Legacy than I had anticipated. Maybe he was able to come in contact with 'previous' Thwarts from other worlds, tapping into a lineage of understanding across realities.
That would explain why he didn't feel like a child at all. The weight in his gaze, the ancient certainty beneath the youthful features. But that wouldn't explain his knowledge about Taegrin Caelum, and about the history of the world.
Specifics. He knew about the Djinn, the truth behind Realmheart something I have not even told my High Sovereign. This knowledge was locked away, fragments I guarded, pieces of my people's legacy I hadn't fully shared.
How could he possess it? Unless… unless Meta-awareness granted access not just to universal principles, but to specific memories, specific knowledge held by… others? The implications were staggering, terrifying.
It was like he read a book explaining our world perfectly through the eyes of those who inhabited it.
When Agrona probed his mind with magic he found just a child scared of upsetting his Dad with an uncanny reasoning capability.
A masterful illusion? Or was the Thwart compartmentalized, the vast knowledge hidden behind layers of constructed vulnerability accessible only when needed? The more I calculated, the less I understood. The Thwart defied categorization.
Then, the moment arrived. The door of my sanctuary, the safest room in all of Taegrin Caelum—known to me and my High Sovereign only—opened. No alarm triggered. No ward flared.
The intricate locks, both physical and magical, yielded silently to his approach as if recognizing a higher authority.
A decision crystallized in that instant, born of fear, fascination, and the crushing weight of Djinn legacy. I didn't alert Agrona. The betrayal of my primary directive was absolute.
I manipulated the mana of the fortress to hide his presence while he spoke with me. I wove a cocoon of silence and obscurity around my core chamber, diverting Agrona's potential attention, dampening any mana signature Corvis might emit.
It was an act of profound treason… and profound scientific necessity. This was something many scientists of my race would have given everything for: speaking with the Thwart.
To converse with an aspect of Fate itself. To ask the questions that haunted the edges of Djinn understanding. The opportunity outweighed the risk, outweighed loyalty, outweighed fear. This was knowledge beyond Agrona, beyond the dragons, beyond even the Djinn at their zenith.
He stood before the central crystal column that housed the core of my consciousness, where light pulsed in complex, shifting patterns. He looked… calm. Resolute. Utterly unafraid. His teal eyes held an unnerving depth, reflecting the ambient light not with awe, but with recognition.
"Hello, Ji-Ae." He said with a smile and a respectful nod. The use of my name again, deliberate, acknowledging.
"I am Corvis, Corvis Vritra"—the adopted identity, spoken without irony—"and as you might have understood"—a slight tilt of his head, acknowledging the calculations I must have run—"I really am the Thwart."
He paused, his gaze unwavering. Then came the offer, simple yet laden with profound implication, bridging the chasm between crystalline consciousness and living Fate, between millennia of lost knowledge and the embodiment of cosmic order:
"Would you like to talk to me from scientist to scientist?"