The doors of the final chamber parted without resistance.
Not with noise, not with force—but silence. Reverent, unbroken silence.
Rael stepped through first, her posture changed. She no longer walked with hesitation but with lineage. The Echo of Zareth stirred faintly in her soul, not as a parasite—but a shadow echoing from within. A throne may be empty, but the memory of sovereignty was alive in her.
Iden followed at her side, Kael and Nyra joining moments later, bruised and bloodied—but alive.
The chamber opened like a cathedral beneath the earth. No spikes, no traps, no monstrous guardian waited. Just a single stone dais, surrounded by floating relics—spectral records from a fallen empire. Nine thrones stood in a semi-circle, broken, incomplete. Only one still shimmered with faint silver fire.
"This is where the Age of Crowns ended," Rael whispered.
Iden approached the relics. His gaze scanned the floating glyphs—many still unreadable, encrypted by time. But one responded to his presence. It flared in pale violet light.
[System Interface: Legacy Fragment Recognized]
Unlocking Final Vault Memory…
The glyph expanded—becoming a vision.
A flickering projection of a council chamber. Nine Sovereigns seated in argument. Rael saw Zareth—young, proud, not yet shattered. Beside him, a woman of flame, a man of storms, a child bathed in stars.
Their words could not be heard.
But the ending was unmistakable.
One throne detonated.
The others fractured.
The projection ended with a crack across the floor—the very same mark that lay beneath their feet now.
"They fought each other," Iden said. "Someone triggered the collapse from inside."
Rael's hand gripped her staff tightly.
"Zareth called it a warning. Something ended the Age of Crowns before it could destroy the world."
Far beyond the Vault, in places where stars moved oddly and gods whispered only to the mad, factions stirred.
A priestess screamed mid-ritual as a vision struck her.
"The Ninefold has moved… A fragment has chosen."
Behind her, the chained Primarch stirred in his slumber. His bindings cracked, just slightly.
A skyborne observatory exploded with light. Crystal seers fell to their knees.
"The Echo has not returned to the void. It now walks."
An old king looked up from his dying hearth.
"The throne without crown has found a bearer."
As the last remnants of the Vault's energy pulsed toward Rael, Iden turned to the central dais. A scroll appeared before him—hovering, wrapped in rings of null-mana.
It was not a weapon.
It was a name.
[You have obtained: Edict of Unification – Authority Slot: Empty]
This scroll allows the creation of a Cohesion Beacon—a means of linking fractured soul-based units and stabilizing world fragments into a singular command structure.
Iden exhaled.
"A throneworld system," he murmured. "One that spreads through planes."
Kael stepped forward, his voice hoarse.
"This was never about just surviving Sanctum."
Rael raised her gaze.
"This was about rebuilding what they failed to uphold. And doing it right this time."
The remaining silver throne pulsed.
Then slowly—unfolded.
Not into a seat.
But into a gateway.
Behind it, a sky that wasn't part of this world.
An eternal twilight. Stars spiraling in reverse. Worlds collapsing inward, not outward.
"Where does it lead?" Nyra asked.
Rael looked up, a fragment of Zareth's memory flashing in her eyes.
"To the throne of the one who never fell. The true Sovereign who never died."