Valen passed the broken trial room like a shadow.
He didn't look at the shattered Mirror Echo dust still lingering in the corners.
He didn't pause at the cracked seal where the Guardian had once stood.
He moved with purpose.
And the weapon in his hand pulsed like it wanted to be used.
> Unmaking Thread: Silences-Two
Status: Stable
Codex Interference: Low
Target: Lyle Greenbottle + Bonded Unit (Ravyn, Juno)
A low vibration ran through his bones.
He was close.
But the Codex was closer.
---
The next door should've opened.
It didn't.
Instead, a phrase shimmered in the air, drawn in fractured glyphs across his path:
> "You were not invited."
And yet you came.
Valen sneered. "Get out of my way."
He drew the Thread.
Swung once.
And the glyphs screamed.
Not in sound.
In memory.
Images flashed—
His failure.
The Council's lies.
The day he was told he'd never be worthy.
Then: Lyle's face.
Not smug.
Just present.
Living the life Valen was denied.
He grit his teeth.
"I'm not here to be tested. I'm here to finish what I started."
---
He stabbed the Thread into the glyph structure.
And for a moment… it worked.
The pathway flickered, then began to re-stabilize.
But not as expected.
Instead of forming a new clean bridge—
The path fractured.
Bled memory.
Coughed echoes.
Released something that was supposed to stay buried.
---
From behind him came a whisper.
Not the Codex's.
Not a ghost.
Just a presence.
> "You should not have brought that here."
He turned.
No one there.
But his Thread was melting.
The glyphs were rewriting it mid-cast.
Twisting the function.
Trying to turn a severing tool into…
> A mirror.
Valen snarled.
"No. I command this spell!"
But the Codex didn't obey.
It never did.
---
Far ahead, in the Truth Layer, Lyle gasped suddenly—his Codex flickering in his hand.
Juno grabbed his arm. "What is it?"
"I… I don't know. Someone's casting inside the Root, but the spell doesn't make sense."
And then…
They both heard it.
Not with ears.
With memory.
> Valen is here.
> And he's already broken something important.
---
Back in the tunnel, Valen fell to one knee, his weapon shorting with sparks of untranslatable glyphs.
His vision blurred.
And for the first time, he heard the Codex whisper to him:
> "You're not the enemy."
> "You're the consequence."