The silence after the tremor was more unsettling than the quake itself.
Aelric stood still, hand clenched around the hilt of his sword, feeling the subtle hum beneath his boots fade into stillness. Beside him, Kael's face was pale but determined, his gaze focused on the strange fissure that had appeared in the air like a wound—hovering just inches above the forest floor.
It was not a physical tear in the ground, but rather a shimmering ripple in space itself—an anomaly that vibrated like a mirage. It pulsed faintly, glowing with iridescent hues that shifted from lavender to indigo, then vanished again.
"What is that?" Kael murmured.
"Something... ancient," Aelric replied. "And angry."
Liana approached carefully, her steps cautious, lips whispering a protective incantation. She extended a hand toward the rift, then flinched as a sudden voice echoed from within.
It wasn't a voice they recognized—not Elira, not Riven, not even one of the Watchers. It was a whisper, cold and fragmented.
"Aelric... he should not have remembered..."
The blood drained from Aelric's face. That voice—it sounded like...
"My mother," he breathed.
Kael stiffened. "Your mother is—"
"Dead. Yes. But I'd know her voice anywhere."
The rift trembled, and then—another whisper.
"You must not follow the Seraph's path. The cycle will end in fire."
Liana turned sharply. "This is a trap. Whatever's speaking—whatever is imitating your mother—it knows you."
"No," Aelric said slowly, eyes still on the rift. "It's not imitation. That's a memory. One I shouldn't have access to."
He took a step forward. The rift expanded slightly, welcoming, almost like a breath drawn inward.
"Don't!" Kael reached for him, but Aelric stopped.
"I need to understand what this is. These memories... I've been seeing flashes of another life, another version of myself. This isn't madness—it's connected to the rift. To Elira. Maybe even to the whole convergence."
Liana frowned. "Even if that's true, you don't know what's on the other side. You could disappear. Or worse—bring something through."
But Aelric shook his head. "Whatever's calling me—it's already inside me."
He closed his eyes and stepped into the ripple.
It was like plunging into water without wetness. Cold, silent, heavy. The moment he crossed, the world blinked away.
He awoke in darkness.
Not the absence of light—but the presence of shadow. It pulsed with a weight of its own, pressing against his lungs, his thoughts. He was floating, suspended in a void stitched together by fragments of dreams and voices he couldn't name.
Then came the vision.
A city in flames. Not Ardent Vale, but something older—built of black stone and golden fire. At its center stood a massive obelisk, etched with symbols that pulsed like veins.
Aelric watched himself—another self—kneel before the obelisk, hands raised in supplication. Around him, figures with wing-like halos stood in silent judgment. They were not angels. They were something else.
"You were the Herald once," a voice said behind him. "Before you betrayed us."
He turned.
A girl stood there. She looked barely sixteen, but her eyes were centuries old. Her hair floated around her like ink in water, and her feet didn't touch the ground.
"Who are you?" Aelric asked.
"I am the memory you buried," she replied. "The one Elira tried to erase."
"Elira?"
"She feared what you would become if you remembered everything."
Aelric's mind reeled. "This is... this can't be real."
The girl smiled, and the void pulsed.
"You think you were just a prince. Just a warrior. But you were never truly mortal. You were created."
"No."
"By the Primordial Concord. To bind the rifts between worlds."
"No!"
"You were the Seal, Aelric. And now that you've broken, the collapse has begun."
A blinding pulse threw him back.
He opened his eyes with a gasp, coughing, body shaking.
He was lying on the forest floor. The rift was gone.
Kael and Liana were hovering over him, relief and fear etched into their faces.
"You were gone for three minutes," Kael said hoarsely. "But your body... it went cold."
"I saw something," Aelric murmured. "No—I remembered something."
Liana helped him sit up. "What did you see?"
"A city I've never been to. A war I never fought. A version of me that bowed before something divine. Or monstrous. I don't know which."
Kael exchanged a worried glance with Liana. "You said your mother's voice spoke through the rift."
"She did. But it wasn't her. It was a piece of her. A memory. And there was a girl."
Liana's eyes widened. "Describe her."
"Floating. Black hair. Ancient eyes."
"That sounds like... no. It can't be. The Oracle of Dusk was destroyed during the Fall of Velmora."
Aelric looked away. "Unless she was never in Velmora to begin with."
Silence stretched between them.
Then, from within Aelric's pack, a soft pulse of light.
He reached in—and pulled out the compass. The one Elira had given him.
But now, it glowed.
Not in gold.
But in midnight blue.
Liana gasped. "That's not just a compass anymore. It's an anchor."
"An anchor to what?" Kael asked.
"To the other side," Aelric whispered.
The wind howled through the trees.
Above them, the sky had begun to darken—not with clouds, but with fractures. Hairline slits barely visible, like cracks in glass across the heavens.
Kael pointed. "Is that...?"
"Another rift," Aelric said grimly. "Or a warning."
They stood in silence.
For a brief moment, the compass hummed again.
This time, the voice inside it was not Aelric's mother.
It was Elira.
"They're coming. And you are not ready."