Chapter 49
The air around them cracked, not like thunder—but like time itself snapping.
Twelve Timewalkers, robed in the color of entropy and stitched with runes no mortal should read, stood above the ruins, floating like judgment unchained.
Their eyes pulsed with shifting clocks.
"Subject Nezutsu. Timeline deviation detected. You are the Error Thread. The Rewrite must be recalibrated."
"You want to erase me?" Nezutsu asked, his hand clenched over the burning mark in his chest.
"No. Not erase," the tallest of the Timewalkers replied. "Unwrite."
Kaelith drew her second blade, trembling.
Eshryn raised a glowing ward.
"Don't attack," she hissed. "These aren't gods. They're worse. They're editors. They maintain the narrative of reality."
One Timewalker pointed at Eshryn.
"You hold a forbidden filament: the Thread of the Motherfire. Its usage breaks three fundamental cycles. Return it, or face paradox."
Nezutsu stepped in front of her.
"She doesn't have it anymore. I do. I made it part of me."
The Timewalkers fell silent.
Then, eerily in unison:
"Impossible."
Subplot Reveal: Eshryn's Bargain
"They weren't supposed to come yet," Eshryn muttered. "Not unless the Thread was fully ignited."
Kaelith looked at her sharply.
"What do you mean?"
Eshryn hesitated. Then sighed.
"I made a deal with one of them once. Long ago. I borrowed time to hide Nezutsu's existence. I was supposed to return it before he burned the Thread."
Nezutsu's eyes widened. "You knew this would happen?"
"I hoped it wouldn't. I believed in your restraint."
"But I chose to burn," he whispered.
"You chose to live. And now... we run."
Escape Plan: The Temple of First Quill
Eshryn pulled from her satchel a half-broken compass — not pointing north, but spinning in spirals.
"There's one place left they can't follow: the Temple of First Quill. It's where the Ink of Origin was stored — the power that wrote this world."
Kaelith frowned. "Isn't that a myth?"
"So was the Mirrorborn. So was he," she nodded toward Nezutsu.
"And if we find the Ink?" Nezutsu asked.
"Then you can write your own fate," she said. "Before they rewrite you out of existence."
The Timewalkers raised their hands, and golden glyphs began to burn in the air.
Time was collapsing.
The Flight Through Frozen Moments
Eshryn clapped her hands and shouted a phrase in Mirrorborn script.
Reality bent.
Suddenly, Nezutsu, Kaelith, and Eshryn found themselves falling sideways through frozen fragments of time.
One shard showed Velgrim still alive, smiling gently.
Another showed Nezutsu as a child, locked in a glowing cage.
Another — far more terrifying — showed a future where the world burned and Nezutsu stood alone on a mountain of ash, with everyone he loved turned to stone.
"These are possible timelines," Eshryn explained. "But each jump costs something."
"Like what?" Kaelith asked.
"Memories."
"Whose?" Nezutsu whispered.
Eshryn didn't answer.
The Temple of First Quill
They landed in silence — in a space with no sky, no floor. Just parchment, scrolls, and quills hanging midair, glowing with blue fire.
At the center floated a pedestal made of bone and ink.
On it rested a giant feather — black as void, its tip dipped in an infinite well.
"That's the Ink of Origin," Eshryn whispered. "It can rewrite anything. Even laws. Even gods."
Kaelith moved closer. "Why is it unguarded?"
"It's not," Eshryn replied, her eyes narrowing. "It's asleep."
Nezutsu stepped forward. As he reached toward the ink, the air tensed, like a breath held by the world.
"Nezutsu," a voice spoke — not from the room, but from within his blood.
"Who—?" he gasped.
"I am the Scribe That Was. The one who first dipped the quill. And I remember you."
"Remember me?"
"Before the first rewrite… you were the first flame I ever wrote."
The Pen or the Chain
The voice offered him a choice:
"Take the Ink and rewrite the laws — but you'll be bound to the ink forever. You will no longer be just a man. You will become a Scribe of Origin."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then the Timewalkers will find you. And they will unwrite you. Fully."
"What about Kaelith and Eshryn?"
"They will forget you ever lived."
Nezutsu stood before the quill — his hand trembling.
Behind him, time fractures reopened.
The Timewalkers had found the Temple.
Kaelith reached for her sword.
Eshryn whispered, "Don't become them, Nezutsu."
He stared at the ink… and whispered,
"Then I'll write a third path."
He grabbed the Ink of Origin — and the entire Temple shattered into script.
[TO BE CONTINUED…]