The vault's silence was heavy. Even the shadows seemed to hold their breath. Graxion stood amid the wreckage, the Archon's mask now cracked in half at his feet. He hadn't just defeated a celestial warrior—he'd destroyed a symbol of divine authority.
Kaen sat on a fallen pillar, panting. "So… that just happened."
Graxion didn't respond. His eyes were locked on the darkness swirling beneath the stone floor—like ink beneath glass. The moment the Archon fell, the shadows in the chamber had deepened. Not just darker… but ancient. Watching.
"I felt something when the blade struck," Graxion muttered, approaching the swirling floor. "Like the shadows weren't just reacting. They were… awakening."
Kaen raised an eyebrow. "Awakening what?"
Graxion crouched and placed his palm against the ground. Cold. Alive.
And then—
THOOM.
A tremor rippled outward, and the floor split. Stone shattered like thin ice, revealing a hidden spiral staircase that descended into blackness. Faint symbols glowed along the edge—none that either of them recognized.
Graxion turned to Kaen. "You coming?"
"Do I have a choice?" Kaen said, already standing. "You just killed a celestial cop. I'm not about to let you walk into god-hell alone."
They descended. Each step down felt like sinking through time. The deeper they went, the more oppressive the air became. Until they stepped into a chamber that hadn't seen light in eons.
It was a hall of statues.
Twelve massive figures lined the walls—each carved from a different material: obsidian, crystal, bone, gold, even starlight frozen in stone. The air pulsed with lingering power. At the far end stood an empty pedestal.
Graxion approached one of the statues, a winged beast with six arms and a blindfold. "These aren't the gods the Archons worship."
Kaen nodded. "These are older."
A whisper tickled the edge of Graxion's mind. A voice not his own.
"They erased us."
He spun around, but no one was there. Kaen hadn't reacted.
"We were the first. The forgotten. The balance."
The shadows on the walls flickered, and for a moment, the statues seemed to breathe.
"They feared our power. So they called us evil. Demons. Shadows."
Graxion stepped back, his breathing shallow. "You're the original pantheon… the ones before the light took over."
The whisper replied:
"You are our echo, Graxion. The last remnant. The heir to what they tried to destroy."
Suddenly, a beam of violet-black light shone from the empty pedestal. In its center hovered a stone tablet—engraved with symbols that only Graxion could somehow understand.
Kaen looked nervous. "Is that… your name?"
Graxion nodded slowly. "My true name."
The moment he touched the tablet, everything changed.
Memories not his own flooded in—worlds before this one, where beings of shadow and light ruled together. Balance maintained by both creation and entropy. But the light grew arrogant. They declared themselves the only truth, casting their siblings into the void.
And in that void, the shadow waited. Watched. Endured.
Graxion collapsed to his knees, gasping. Kaen caught him.
"What did you see?" Kaen asked.
Graxion looked up, his eyes no longer just glowing—they burned with the power of the Forgotten.
"I'm not just wielding shadow," he said. "I am the shadow."
The chamber trembled, the statues humming in agreement.
One by one, they began to bow.