Chapter 79 – Hollowbirth
The wail echoed long after the Hunter vanished.
A tremor surged beneath their feet, and the twisted terrain of the Hollow Vein shifted like a living thing rousing from a deep slumber. The broken architecture groaned as if waking from centuries of silence—walls unfolded, upside-down towers twisted skyward, and impossible geometries began aligning like a puzzle rearranging itself.
Kael-X gritted his teeth as he stood, Maya helping to steady him. The last fragments of the Hunter still flickered in the air, its runes dissolving like ash. But something else had been released… something older.
"Did… killing that thing trigger the Hollow?" Elijah asked, his voice tense.
"No," Veyron whispered as he hovered slowly downward, eyes narrowing. "It unlocked it."
Suddenly, the air fractured.
Not shattered—fractured, like light through a prism of broken time. From the center of the canyon, a circular void spiraled open. Black mist poured upward, then spiraled inward like it was being inhaled. And from that darkness, a shape emerged—massive, slow-moving, yet absolutely terrifying in its presence.
A creature—no, an echo-being—birthed from timelines that were never meant to cross.
It had no face, only shifting expressions made of collapsing futures—Kael's own face appeared, then Maya's, then Elijah's, then versions of them that never existed, screaming in silence. Its limbs were made of decisions undone and rewritten. And its heartbeat… was the sound of reality folding.
Maya recoiled instinctively. "What is that?!"
Kael-X's eyes widened slightly. "That… is the Hollowbirth."
"The consequence," Nyx added from his shadow. "The Hollow's memory incarnate. Everything erased… but never forgotten."
Elijah raised his kinetic barrier, but the creature didn't strike.
Instead, it spoke.
Not aloud, but directly into their bones.
> "PARADOX HAS AWAKENED. RECLAMATION BEGINS."
And then it moved.
Not fast—but with purpose. Each step bent space, turning the air to liquid shadow. The Hollow Vein responded, pulling further inward, closing around it like a throne welcoming its king.
Kael-X stepped forward, but Maya grabbed his arm. "No. We just fought a Keeper. You're not ready for this one."
"I'm not trying to fight it," Kael replied calmly. "I'm going to talk to it."
Everyone stared.
"You what?" Elijah blinked. "That thing isn't alive in any normal way!"
Kael's expression darkened. "Neither am I anymore."
He stepped into the creature's path. The Hollowbirth paused.
Kael raised his voice—not in challenge, but in declaration.
"You remember every choice I've ever made… so you know why I'm still standing. I didn't come here to erase anything. I came to finish what the fractured timelines couldn't."
The Hollowbirth tilted its head, and an eye—made entirely of fractured realities—opened across its chest. Inside, Kael saw himself… as a child. Alone. Bleeding. Watching a world that never accepted him burn.
The Hollowbirth spoke again.
> "YOU ARE NOT THE CENTER. YOU ARE THE RIPPLE."
Kael didn't flinch. "Then let me crash."
And in that moment, the Hollowbirth didn't attack. It bowed its head—just slightly—before folding back into the shadows. The canyon shuddered, the geometry settling into calm. The veil of threat lifted. Temporarily.
Maya stepped beside him. "You connected with it."
"No," Kael whispered. "It just recognized what I've become."
Elijah lowered his shield, breathing out. "So… what now?"
Kael turned toward the deeper end of the Hollow. "Now we go where no timeline ever dared to finish."
The Hollow Vein opened again before them.
But this time, it invited them in.
Silence lingered long after the Hollowbirth retreated into the depths.
Even the wind seemed hesitant to return, as if the air itself feared what had just occurred. The Hollow Vein pulsed beneath their feet, no longer in chaos—but not at peace either. It was holding its breath, watching.
Kael-X stared at the path ahead. The twisted canyon had reshaped again—opening into a narrow bridge that led to a structure unlike anything they'd seen so far. Not broken ruins, but something whole. A temple? A vault? No… something older. Something that had always been there but now chose to reveal itself.
"We need to rest," Maya said softly, her hand still faintly glowing from the sigil she had sustained. "Even Kael can't push much further without breaking."
"No," Kael said. "We're not safe here. The Hollow isn't done shifting."
Elijah frowned. "You think it'll turn on us?"
"I think…" Veyron interjected, landing lightly beside them, "...it's watching who moves forward."
They moved cautiously across the bridge.
It was suspended above nothing—true void, not darkness. Below them was absence. Not death, not even non-existence. A place where even potential had collapsed.
Elijah walked stiffly. "You think that thing will come back?"
"No," Kael murmured. "It served its purpose."
Maya's brow furrowed. "Which was?"
"To see if I flinch."
Veyron smirked. "You didn't. Barely."
They reached the end of the bridge, where the monolithic structure stood like a beating heart carved into stone. Runes pulsed softly across its surface. At its center was a door—a perfect circle with no handle, no seam.
But as Kael approached, the surface rippled. A whisper echoed from behind it.
> "Speak the name of the truth you hide."
Kael paused.
Elijah looked to him. "Well?"
Kael's jaw tensed. "I know what it wants. This door doesn't open with power—it opens with honesty."
He stepped forward and spoke, voice low.
"…I didn't want to survive the first war."
Silence.
Then a sound—a slow thrum, like an ancient bell ringing across dimensions.
The door dissolved into mist.
They stepped through.
Beyond it was not a room—but a memory.
The sky burned crimson. Bodies of monsters and soldiers alike littered the battlefield. Kael stood at the center, alone, blood on his hands—his own and others. In this vision, he was younger, wild, unrefined… broken.
Maya gasped. "This is…"
Kael nodded. "My last stand. The day I should've died."
The memory Kael looked up—and saw them.
Not with shock, not with fear.
But with recognition.
Because time had folded.
Kael-X stepped forward, meeting his younger self eye-to-eye.
"You remember this," the younger Kael said, voice cracked with pain. "Why come back?"
"To remind you," Kael-X answered, "that you didn't die here… because you weren't supposed to."
The battlefield faded.
The Hollow Vein accepted their passage.
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