The morning should have been peaceful.
The sky was clear.Birds chattered.Children played around the well.Smoke curled lazily from kitchens.
But beneath that thin surface of normality,Ren felt it—
A shift.A ripple.A breath held by a world waiting.
Lyra walked beside him, close enough that their shoulders brushed now and then.Borin strode a step behind, his expression unreadable.Draven trailed nervously, jumping at every shadow as if the echo itself might leap out and strangle him.
Villagers watched them.
Not with fear.With uncertainty.
With the quiet knowledge that something had changed forever.
Ren forced himself to keep walking.
Every step felt like testing a new version of himself he didn't fully understand.
Lyra touched his arm.
"You're quiet."
He hesitated.
"So is the echo."
She stiffened.
"That's… good, isn't it?"
"I don't know yet."
That was the truth.
It wasn't whispering.It wasn't pushing.It wasn't asking.
But it wasn't gone.
It was waiting.
The elder approached again, leaning on her cane.
"You've stirred an old place awake, boy."
Ren bowed his head slightly.
"I didn't mean to."
She smiled tightly.
"Intent rarely matters. Only consequence."
Lyra narrowed her eyes.
"What consequence?"
Before the elder could answer, a sound cut across the village—
Hoofbeats.
Fast.Urgent.Unmistakably trained.
Borin tensed immediately.
"That's not a villager."
Children scattered.Doors opened.Heads turned.
A horse burst into view from the northern path, ridden by a man wearing layered leather armor and a half-cloak bearing a sigil no one in the group recognized:
A single vertical line crossed by nine smaller horizontal ones.A stylized ladder.Or a rising pillar.
Ren's stomach tightened.
He had seen that symbol in books.
A traveling cultivator faction.
The rider stopped in the center of the village, breathing hard, eyes scanning the area.
Then they landed on Ren.
And stayed.
Lyra's hand darted toward her bow.
Borin stepped forward, axe in hand.
Draven hid behind a barrel and began praying to any god who might be listening.
The rider dismounted with a fluid, trained motion.
"You there," he said, pointing at Ren."Are you the one?"
Ren's breath faltered.
"The one what?"
The rider looked him up and down—young, thin, tired, but with something shining behind his eyes.
"The one the forest screamed for."
Gasps rippled through the villagers.
Lyra's grip on Ren tightened.
Borin's muscles coiled.
Ren swallowed.
"I don't understand."
"You don't need to," the rider said."You only need to come with me."
Draven squeaked into the barrel:
"REN, DON'T GO WITH STRANGERS!"
Ren didn't move.
Neither did Lyra.
The rider continued:
"There was a disturbance in the spiritual field last night.Faint, but old.Very old.My order detected it."
Ren felt the world shrink slightly around him.
The rider stepped closer.
"You were at its center."
The villagers murmured.
Borin stepped between them.
"He's not going anywhere with you unless we know who you are."
The rider's jaw tightened.
"I am an Outer Scout of the Ascending Ladder Sect."
Lyra blinked.
A real sect.One of the nine recognized in their continent.
Not elite.Not weak.
A rising power.
The rider continued:
"And my sectmaster has ordered me to investigate any child who resonates with ancient echoes."
Ren's blood ran cold.
Lyra stepped in front of him.
"He's not a test subject."
"Everyone is a test subject," the rider replied calmly, "if the power inside them is volatile enough."
Borin's eyes darkened.
"You aren't touching him."
The rider raised both hands, open and unthreatening.
"I didn't come to harm him.I came to observe."
Ren spoke at last.
"What do you want from me?"
The rider's gaze softened just enough to be unsettling.
"Everything you touched last night changed."
He stepped closer.
"And you changed with it."
Ren felt the echo hum faintly in answer.
Not loudly.Not dangerously.
Just enough to remind him:
You are not alone in your body anymore.
The rider lowered his voice.
"Tell me, boy…did the forest speak to you?"
Ren said nothing.
Lyra's hand tightened on his sleeve until her knuckles whitened.
Borin shifted, ready to break the rider's legs if necessary.
Draven whispered from the barrel:
"Say no. Say no. SAY NO."
Ren inhaled.
And answered truthfully.
"…yes."
The rider exhaled, relieved and terrified all at once.
"Then I was right."
He placed one hand over his chest.
And bowed deeply.
"Child of echo…the world has begun searching for you."
Ren's heart cracked.
Lyra's eyes widened.
Borin cursed softly.
Draven passed out again.
The rider straightened.
"And soon," he said quietly,"many more will come."
Ren swallowed hard.
"Why?"
The rider looked him in the eyes.
"Because you've awakened something older than every sect.Older than every kingdom.Older than every war."
His final words dropped like stones:
"And the world wants to knowwhether you will preserve that power…or destroy it."
Ren felt the echo pulse once.
Soft.
Heavy.
Listening.