LOCATION: HOLLOWGLASS — MIRRORHOLD, FRACTAL SANCTUM
The fog in Mirrorhold always moved like it knew secrets.
In the heart of Mirrorhold—Seraphine's sanctum rose from the mist like a cathedral made of broken promises. Each mirror was angled wrong on purpose. Each reflection lied—except the one that mattered.
Three figures knelt in silence.
Echo Veil.
They had returned from Ashvale.
No words spoken. Just the flick of a wrist, and a mirrored shard floated forward, hovering above an obsidian basin carved into the floor.
Seraphine stood barefoot in the mist, veil over her eyes, gown stitched from moonlight and regret. Her voice didn't rise—it unfolded.
"Did it take root?"
The lead assassin nodded.
"And what did it see?"
The shard began to ripple.
Not with light.
With memory.
Images bloomed across its surface—refractions of a future not yet born.
Halix.
Kneeling. Alone in her private sanctum. Her white robes torn. Her prayer glyphs broken. She held a piece of cloth—burnt, ash-stained.
She whispered a name like a wound, low and mumured.
"Aelira…"
The vision cracked.
Seraphine watched, unmoving.
"She's breaking," she said quietly.
Not with joy.
Just fact.
The shard shattered.
Seraphine turned to her assassins.
"Begin phase two."
The Echo Veil rose, vanishing into reflections, gone between the mirrors like they were never there.
Seraphine stood alone, now facing a cracked mirror that didn't reflect her face—but another's.
Halix's.
Still strong. Still radiant. Still Proud
But the crack ran through her eyes.
Seraphine lifted one finger, traced the line of the fracture.
"Soon."
"And she won't even see it coming."
---
LOCATION: FLAME VALE — BRIMHOLD, THE UNBROKEN HALL
The air inside the Unbroken Hall was thick with smoke and ambition. Lava flowed beneath the glass floor, casting molten light over two warlords who should never sit at the same table.
Ezekar Nythe leaned against obsidian, cloak draped like shadow incarnate.
Warlord Dren stood over the war map, arms bare, muscles coiled, steam rising from his skin. His blade rested on the table like a threat that hadn't been spoken yet.
"We don't kill her," Dren said.
"No," Ezekar replied. "We let her bury herself."
Between them, a scroll unfurled—Halix's recent orders, signed in divine ink. Mass arrests. Glyph-burnings. A public execution that failed when the glyph flared wrong and burned a priest alive.
"Ashvale's faith is cracking," Ezekar murmured. "We just have to push."
Dren grinned, all teeth and violence.
"You want the First Throne to intervene. Risky."
"Calculated," Ezekar replied.
"Dangerous."
"So are we."
They stood in silence for a moment, watching the cracks spread across the Faith's banners.
Then Ezekar spoke again, voice cold and steady.
"If Halix falls, the Order fractures."
"And Lucan?"
Ezekar's eyes gleamed under the brim of his hood.
"Let them fear him first. Then they'll beg for someone who understands him."
Dren chuckled and offered his hand across the lava-lit table.
"To holy war."
Ezekar didn't shake it.
He just turned and walked away—his voice trailing like smoke.
"Not yet."
"First, we make her believe the throne still holds. Then we pull the floor."
---
LOCATION: ASHVALE — VAULTED HALL OF CLEANSING
Sanctified air curled through the chamber—clean, cold, unforgiving. Glyphlight shimmered across the obsidian floor, patterns etched in ritual lines, all converging on the figure in the center.
Aelira Varn stood before it.
Not a child.
Not anymore.
What knelt before her was vessel—a failed Rite candidate marked by a corrupted system echo. Its skin bore fractured sigils. Not random. Not wild.
Engineered.
Glyphs spun slowly across the vessel's chest, trying to stabilize—trying to become something.
Then—
"Aelira."
The voice wasn't human.
It was a static-glitched copy of a voice that shouldn't be remembered.
Lucan's voice. Just… wrong.
Distorted through recursive loops.
She blinked.
Impossible.
The signature wasn't identical—but the pattern? Familiar. Painfully so.
Not original. Not divine.
Copied. And sloppily.
Before she could scan further, Halix entered.
The temperature dropped.
Her robes trailed divinity like knives. The chains at her belt shimmered with restrained glyphfire.
She didn't look at the vessel. She looked at Aelira.
"It speaks?"
"Not with soul," Aelira answered. "With system."
Halix stepped closer.
"Then it's worse than I thought."
She gazed at the glyph signature now—a frown curling beneath her mask of grace.
"A parasite. Born from Lucan's defiance. An echo mimicking his pattern. Destroy it."
Aelira hesitated.
"It didn't generate him. It's… replicating him."
Halix's voice iced over.
"You question the sanctity of the Rite?"
Aelira's answer came colder.
"…No."
But her eyes lingered on the echo.
"Then Destroy it"
And her hand—trembled.
Then—
"Yes, Mother."
That last word cracked the silence like thunder.
Halix turned.
Satisfied.
And gone.
---
LOCATION: ASHVALE — INNER CHAMBER, LATER
Aelira stood over the console display, the glyph's final scan flickering across the interface.
She whispered, almost bitter:
"It's not from you, Lucan."
Pause.
"But someone is trying to remake you."
She didn't smile.
She didn't cry.
She just closed the file and locked it behind a prayer.
But her hands refused to stop shaking.
---
LOCATION: HOLLOW CREED — INNER SANCTUM
The chamber hummed with silence.
Not the peaceful kind—the heavy kind. The kind that fills the lungs just before a storm cracks the sky.
Lucan stood at the center, sweat still drying on his skin. His blade was sheathed at his back, his breathing shallow but steady. Beside him, Jareth—silent, alert, hand on his hilt.
They had returned.
And the Hollow Creed greeted them with drawn steel.
Across the dark chamber, Verrick stood tall—his eyes no longer pretending calm. No smiles. No masks.
Only command.
"Kill him."
Just like that.
He didn't shout it. He didn't grandstand.
He just spoke it into the room like a law passed in blood.
Several shadows stepped forward—loyalists in full Creed regalia. Masked. Trained. Ready.
And yet—
Most of the chamber didn't move.
Dozens of Creed members stood still. Eyes flicked. Fingers tensed. But not a single sword lifted.
Not against Lucan.
Not yet.
Verrick's voice dropped lower. Angrier.
"You heard me."
Lucan stepped forward, slowly, ignoring the pain in his side.
Unsheathing his blade with a rasp like a dare.
"Guess not everyone here thinks dying for your pride is a good use of breath."
Jareth unslung his dagger and sword. Calm. Focused.
A warrior again.
The air shifted.
Verrick's eyes snapped to one figure in the room—someone he hadn't expected to hesitate.
Rivenna.
Still. Watching. Like she always did.
But not like before.
This time, she moved.
Fast.
A silver blur—no theatrics, no noise—just suddenly at Verrick's side, her blade drawn and pressed against the hollow of his neck.
"Drop it, Verrick"
The Creed froze.
Even the air seemed to pause.
Verrick didn't flinch. But the rage behind his eyes flared like black fire.
Lucan stared at her, surprise dancing behind his exhaustion.
"Didn't peg you for the side-switching type."
Rivenna didn't blink. Didn't smile. Just said:
"Don't thank me. Just survive long enough to make this worth it."
Verrick's hand hovered near his weapon.
But didn't move.
Not yet.
Lucan's breath came slow as he looked around the room.
Not at enemies.
At silence.
Still. Heavy. Watching.
Something had changed.
Something big.
And somehow,
He wasn't alone in it anymore.