The forest of Calemyr was alive with sound.
Leaves rustled underfoot, the wind weaving through branches like a thousand murmurs — voices of the unseen. The golden dawn had long since faded, replaced by the pale shimmer of an overcast sky. Mist clung to the trees like ghosts reluctant to leave.
Kael walked at the front, his eyes distant.
Each step felt heavier than the last. The shard of the Heart of Eos pulsed faintly beneath his skin, syncing perfectly with his heartbeat — too perfectly.
> You are the fracture.
Those words hadn't stopped echoing since the ruins. He could still hear Eos's voice, soft and melodic, like a lullaby laced with sorrow. But now there was another voice — the whisper that had followed after, faint yet familiar, slipping between thoughts like smoke.
He didn't tell Lira about it. Not yet.
She already had enough reasons to think he was losing it.
"Hey."
Her voice broke through his haze. "You've been quiet for hours. Thinking about the goddess again?"
He managed a faint smirk. "You say that like she's an ex I can't get over."
"Isn't she?" she shot back, brushing a leaf from her shoulder. "You did get a piece of her heart stuck in your chest."
Kael chuckled despite himself. "That's… disturbingly accurate."
The humor helped — for a moment. But as they walked deeper into the forest, the mist thickened, and with it came the subtle hum of mana in the air. The System's faint overlay flickered at the edges of his vision.
> [Warning: Spatial distortion detected.]
[Dungeon Proximity: Grade — Unknown.]
Kael stopped. "We're near a gate."
Lira unsheathed her sword instantly. "Unregistered?"
"Looks like it. The System can't read its grade."
"That's never good news."
"No," he said, scanning the faint glow between the trees. "But it might be important news."
They moved carefully toward the distortion. The forest's sounds dulled as if swallowed by the air itself. The moment they stepped through the last ring of mist, the world flickered — color drained away, sound fractured, and suddenly—
—they were standing before a black monolith, its surface carved with runes that bled faint, blue light.
A dungeon gate. But unlike any Kael had seen before.
It didn't open.
It breathed.
Every few seconds, the stone expanded and contracted subtly, as if inhaling the world around it. The energy emanating from it was wrong — chaotic, unaligned, like something alive yet dying.
Lira exhaled slowly. "That… doesn't look stable."
Kael approached. The closer he got, the louder the pulse in his chest became — until it almost hurt. The shard of Eos inside him reacted violently, glowing beneath his shirt.
> [System Alert: Resonance Detected.]
[Origin Energy: Confirmed.]
Kael gritted his teeth. "Origin energy… the same as the relic."
"So this dungeon is connected to the goddess?" Lira asked.
"Or something older."
Before he could say more, the monolith shuddered.
The ground cracked open. Light burst forth, twisting the world into chaos.
---
Kael found himself falling — not through space, but through time.
The forest, the mist, the sky — everything vanished into a swirl of blinding gold.
When he landed, it wasn't on earth but on smooth, reflective glass.
A sky of light spread above him.
Floating structures, glowing bridges, and crystal towers stretched into infinity. The air itself shimmered like liquid sunlight.
He recognized it instantly.
"The Celestial Realm…" he whispered. "But that's impossible."
Lira stumbled beside him, looking pale and disoriented. "W-what just happened? Where—"
Before she could finish, a voice cut through the air — soft, clear, and echoing from everywhere at once.
> "You shouldn't be here."
They turned.
A figure descended from the air — not walking, but gliding, her robes flowing like starlight. Her hair was silver, her eyes glowing blue like the heart of the moon. She wasn't Eos. Her presence was colder, sharper — divine, yet without warmth.
"Who are you?" Kael asked, his voice steady despite the tremor in his hands.
The woman's gaze fixed on him. "I am Seraphine. Warden of the Celestial Gate. And you…" She tilted her head slightly. "You bear what should not exist."
Kael felt the shard pulse in defiance. "The Heart of Eos."
Seraphine's expression darkened. "A fragment that was never meant to awaken again."
Lira stepped forward. "Hold on— we didn't come here by choice. The gate pulled us in!"
"Then it recognized the anomaly," Seraphine said coldly. "The fracture."
Kael's pulse quickened. "You know about that."
"I know everything that threatens the balance of this world," she replied. "And you, mortal, are its greatest disruption."
He clenched his jaw. "If you think I'm the problem, you should look at the System that's been toying with people's lives."
"The System exists because you failed," she said sharply, her voice reverberating like thunder. "It was born from your mistake — from the first Kael Ardyn, who defied fate itself."
The air went still. Even the light seemed to hold its breath.
Kael's heart pounded. "What did you just say?"
Seraphine's gaze softened, but only slightly. "You don't remember, do you? Your soul was the first to reject death. The first to tear the veil between life and rebirth. The System was created to contain you."
Lira's breath hitched. "Contain him…? You mean—"
"Yes," Seraphine said. "He was the beginning. The first reincarnate. The flaw in creation."
Kael's mind reeled. The memories that had been haunting his dreams — fragments of fire, battle, loss — they weren't just echoes. They were his own.
He took a step forward, fists trembling. "If that's true, then why bring me back?"
Seraphine's expression turned sorrowful. "Because even gods make mistakes."
For a moment, silence. Then — light gathered in her palm, forming a spear of radiant energy.
"But I won't let the same mistake repeat."
The weapon hurled toward him with blinding speed.
Kael reacted instinctively. The shard on his chest flared, summoning a barrier of golden energy — it shattered instantly on impact, throwing him backward. Lira lunged forward, intercepting the next strike with her blade, sparks of mana flying.
"Run, idiot!" she yelled. "I'll hold her off!"
"Not a chance!" Kael shouted back.
The ground beneath them cracked, and a surge of energy erupted, tossing them both apart. The air grew thick with divine power — heavy enough to crush lungs, to bend light.
Kael coughed blood. The System flickered wildly.
> [Warning: Host integrity compromised.]
[Rebooting Soul Core…]
[Accessing Origin Recall.]
A blinding wave tore through him.
And suddenly — he remembered.
Flashes.
A world of pure light.
Himself, standing before Eos — not as a mortal, but as something more.
> "You can't stop the cycle," she had told him.
"Then I'll break it," he'd said.
He'd done it. He had defied death. Torn his soul from the loop of existence. And the backlash had rewritten creation itself — birthing the System that governed all life after him.
He wasn't just reborn.
He was the reason rebirth existed.
When the vision ended, Kael's body radiated with light. His aura flared, golden fire crackling around him. The shard's glow merged into his veins.
Seraphine's eyes widened. "You're awakening…"
Kael rose slowly to his feet. His voice was calm — too calm.
"Then maybe it's time someone finally decided who controls this world — the gods, or those who live in it."
Lira staggered up beside him, clutching her sword. "You sure you can fight a god?"
He smirked faintly. "Let's find out."
---
The air trembled. Seraphine raised her hand, summoning countless blades of light that hung suspended in the air.
Kael extended his arm — golden sigils spiraled from his palm, the mark of Origin burning brightly.
For a heartbeat, all three stood frozen in the glow of divinity and defiance.
Then — the world exploded in light.
---
When the brilliance faded, Kael was on one knee, panting. The battlefield was gone. The sky fractured, the ground a reflection of broken glass. Lira was nowhere to be seen.
Only Seraphine remained, wounded but standing. Her expression had shifted — no longer wrathful, but weary.
"This is not the end," she whispered. "The fracture has begun."
Before Kael could respond, the light around her collapsed inward, and she vanished.
The world fell silent again.
Kael staggered to his feet, breathing hard. His reflection stared back at him from the glass-like floor — but for a moment, it wasn't his face. It was someone else's. Someone older. Someone who smiled faintly and whispered—
> "Welcome back, Origin."
Kael froze. The voice wasn't his own.
Then, the world shattered completely.
---