They walked through the new garden—no longer The Garden That Wasn't. Now it bloomed in shapes that had never been named. Trees that whispered emotions instead of rustling leaves. Water that shimmered with futures, not reflections. The child walked ahead, barefoot across soft soil stitched from rewritten memory.
Orion watched the little one with quiet awe. "What is it exactly? A fragment of the Veil? A paradox given breath?"
Lyra shook her head. "No. It's not a piece of what was. It's a seed of what might be. It isn't bound by our cycle."
Kael kept his hand on his blade as he walked, cautious. "Then how do we trust it?"
The child turned, still smiling. "You don't. But I'll walk beside you anyway."
Its voice was light, ageless. Unburdened. Not innocence, but freedom from assumption.
From behind them, Caldrein emerged from a shimmering fracture in the air, his form more stable than it had been in eons. The Tower's curse no longer weighed him down. "That child is possibility incarnate," he said. "The Veil kept it from being born. You—by choosing the seed—made it real."
Orion crouched beside the child. "Why us?"
"Because you didn't choose to end the story," the child said. "You chose to write more."
They reached the heart of the garden, where the soil pulsed like a heartbeat. A single bloom rose from it—black petals edged in starlight.
The child touched it, and the bloom opened.
From within emerged not a weapon, not a throne, but a doorway.
A gate unlike any they had seen before.
Not to another world.
Not to another realm.
But to Beyond.
A space outside the multiverse. Unwritten. Blank. Waiting.
Kael's voice dropped. "This is where the Nameless wanted to go. Not to rule. To escape."
Caldrein nodded. "The Nameless feared it. The Void Beyond has no memory. No story. It is true nothingness—until someone writes in it."
Orion looked at the others. "We could leave everything behind. Start new."
Lyra met his gaze. "But then we'd abandon what still needs healing."
The child tilted its head. "You don't have to abandon it. You can bring the fire of what could be… back into what is."
Suddenly, a tremor echoed across the multiverse. Distant but vast.
Caldrein grimaced. "The Veil's roots are awakening. That door bought you time, not peace. The Nameless was only the first gatekeeper. There are others—older than endings, buried in non-being. And now… they've stirred."
Kael grinned faintly. "Good. Let them come."
The child stepped to Orion and reached up, placing a tiny glowing hand on his chest. "You're not the Last Astral Sovereign."
Orion blinked. "I'm not?"
"You're the First."
A pause.
Then the doorway pulsed, waiting.
They turned from it.
And together, with the child between them, they walked back into the worlds that were breaking—no longer just to stop endings, but to write beginnings.