The cavern pulsed with a rhythm not unlike a heartbeat.
Steven stood at the edge of the abyss within Xal'Toruun's catacombs, the Codex hovering before him, its runes unraveling into sharp glyphs that painted the air with starlight. Cold sweat slicked his palms as whispers stirred from the shadows, distant yet familiar—echoes of a voice he once knew… his own?
"This place remembers you." The Codex's voice had changed again. Warped, distorted… more human.
He stepped forward. The stone beneath him groaned. This wasn't a cave. It was a sealed rift—one that led to the Void Between Worlds.
He should have turned back.
But then he saw her.
A figure, shrouded in shimmering veils of crimson and gold, hovered just above the ground across the chasm. Her eyes burned like twin novas, locked on him.
"You're late, Starcaster."
Steven tensed. "Who are you?"
She descended slowly, robes trailing like liquid flame. "My name is Zephyra. I am the Keeper of Forgotten Stars."
She raised her hand, and the walls of the cavern trembled. Out from the rift surged arcane tendrils—streams of corrupted magic that twisted midair.
"You came seeking truth… but truth requires sacrifice."
Steven's grip on reality slipped as time distorted. He was no longer just in the cavern—he was everywhere, pulled through memories not his own. A battlefield of broken moons. A throne of screaming stars. A child, alone, whispering a name the universe had already forgotten: Lethal.
His knees buckled. The Codex snapped shut and slammed into his chest, anchoring him.
"ENOUGH!" Steven roared, golden light erupting from his palms. The force shattered the illusions and hurled Zephyra back.
But she only smiled.
"You've begun to awaken it. The True Codex. When you see it… the Absence will see you too."
She vanished in a flare of light.
And for the first time, Steven felt it:
A second presence inside him—dormant, ancient… watching.
The silence after Zephyra's departure was deafening.
Steven clutched the Codex tighter, its warmth now replaced with a cold hum that seeped into his bones. Around him, the cavern began to collapse, ancient glyphs flickering out one by one like dying stars. Whatever had happened—it had marked him.
He had to move.
With a flick of his fingers, Steven cast a Phasewalk rune. Light coiled around him, shifting his form slightly out of phase with reality. The world bent at the edges, muffled and slow. He sprinted through the crumbling corridors, navigating the skeletal ruins of Xal'Toruun like a ghost.
But halfway to the surface, something cracked through the spell—a scream.
Not human.
It echoed like a cry across dimensions.
Steven slid to a halt. The air trembled. The walls of the corridor split apart—and from the darkness slithered a creature forged of voidstone and living shadow. Dozens of glassy eyes blinked open across its body.
A Voidspawn. A scout of the Absence.
"Already?" Steven muttered, raising both hands. Sigils ignited midair as he prepared a counterstrike.
But the creature didn't lunge.
It spoke.
"He watches. The seal is weakening. The memory… must remain forgotten."
Steven's blood ran cold. This one wasn't just a scout.
It was a Warden.
The Codex flared to life again, flipping to a blank page that bled ink like it was alive. Runes burned into its surface:
> Command Phrase: Aetherial Lock.
Access: Forbidden Memory Protocol: Lethal Prime.
Steven didn't hesitate. The runes etched into his skin blazed gold as he shouted, "Aetherial Lock—Override Lethal Prime!"
The cavern shattered like glass.
Suddenly, he was standing inside a vision—a pure-white plane of suspended time. Across from him stood a man cloaked in tattered robes, a mirror of Steven but older, eyes haunted and tired.
The man spoke first.
"If you're seeing this… then we failed."
Steven's heart stopped. "Who are you?"
The man stepped forward, touching Steven's shoulder with a glowing hand.
"I am you. Or what's left of you in a timeline that no longer exists. I was the first Starcaster… and the last hope before the Absence consumed it all."
Lightning flashed in the white void.
"Listen carefully, Steven: the Codex is not a book. It's a prison. And what it holds—what it really holds—is you."
Steven couldn't breathe.
The white void trembled with every word spoken by the version of himself standing across from him—older, wiser, shattered by truths he hadn't yet discovered.
"The Codex holds… me?" Steven repeated, his voice barely above a whisper.
The older Starcaster—Lethal Prime—nodded solemnly. "Not just you. Every failed iteration of you. Every life where you died, where the Absence won. The Codex was created by the Architects to trap those echoes… and to give one version—a final version—a chance to get it right."
Steven's knees buckled, and he collapsed onto one hand. "All this time… I thought it was just a guide, a key to some ancient power."
"It was," Lethal Prime said. "But you're not using it. It's using you. Feeding you fragments of power from past selves. Giving you access to magic outlawed by time itself."
Steven's voice turned bitter. "Then why help me now? Why show yourself?"
Lethal Prime's expression hardened. "Because you're close to waking it. The True Codex. The core that contains The Memory. The one the Absence is truly afraid of."
Suddenly, the void began to crack—black fissures crawling through the air like vines.
Lethal Prime looked up, fear etched in his face. "We don't have time. When you return… everything will change. They'll know you've seen me."
He walked forward and gripped Steven by the face, eyes glowing with searing golden light.
"Remember this: You are not a weapon. You are the verdict."
Then Steven was torn backward, violently.
The white void shattered—
And he gasped, blinking into the real world as rubble collapsed behind him. The cavern had fully caved in. The Voidspawn Warden was gone… or dead… or worse.
The Codex now hovered in front of him again, glowing ominously. One new symbol carved into its spine.
A single letter:
Ω
Steven stood in silence. The memory lingered—his own future self warning him. A prison. A verdict. A thousand lives lived and lost.
He clenched his fists.
"No more running. If the Absence wants me—then let it come."
And for the first time, Steven Lethal didn't feel like a pawn in a cosmic game.
He felt like a storm ready to break.
---
Ending Epilogue — Eyes of the Storm
Far beyond the ruins of Xal'Toruun, in a space between stars where reality thinned and the void fed, something stirred.
Within the heart of the Black Nexus, a presence awakened. Countless eyes blinked open in the dark, each one watching the mortal who had dared to unlock Lethal Prime's memory.
A deep, guttural voice rumbled through the void.
"The Codex fractures. The Verdict walks."
Around the presence, titanic shapes moved—lieutenants of the Absence. Shadow-walkers. Voidborn entities long sealed behind reality's veil. One stepped forward, its body robed in shifting glass.
"Shall I go, my Absence?" it asked.
The darkness smiled.
"No. Not yet. Let him believe he is free."
And as stars died in the distance, the storm began to gather.
---
To be continued