Alex fell like a puppet whose strings had been severed. One moment, he was standing there with the Eclipse Blade shining in his palm. Just a moment later, he fell to the ground of the forest, the silver emblem on his chest glowing dimly, as if struggling to remain alight.
His body did not even twitch. Not even a moan. Nothing.
The Eclipse Blade fell to his side with a muted thud, its erstwhile glowing edge reduced to a faint throb of fading starlight. Whatever energy it had possessed a moment before was exhausted—lost, shattered, depleted.
Varrion sank onto one knee alongside the boy, touching two fingers to Alex's neck. His jaw muscles were tense.
"Still alive. barely," he grunted.
Behind him, Livia stood in silent shock. Her boots were stuck to the ground, and her hands shook at her hips. Her eyes flicked between the Eclipse Blade and Alex's motionless body, as though debating with herself which one she was more afraid of.
A wind blew overhead, disturbing the high branches. But on the ground, the air lay thick—unnaturally silent. As though something invisible had leaned in close to hear.
Varrion's eyes fixed on the mark on Alex's chest—The Hollow's Bargain. It flashed once more, slower this time, a brief shimmer of silver threads under the skin. The light resembled a heartbeat, stuttering, faltering. And then… silence.
He puffed out through his nose. "That mark. It's not finished with him yet."
Livia approached cautiously. Her knees touched dirt as she crouched down next to Alex, sweeping locks of sweat-soaked hair away from his forehead.
"W-what happened to you…" she whispered, voice breaking.
No response. But one of Alex's fingers flickered.
Varrion grabbed it.
He scrawled a short line in the ground with the heel of his boot, and then another, creating a serrated warding symbol—a primitive stabilizing rune. It glowed very softly in the soil, its edges glowing like hot coals before it dissipated under a fall of dead leaves.
"Whatever's got him under, it's not natural," he stated. "We have to act quickly. If that symbol blazes up again, we may not be able to recover him."
Livia gazed up, wide-eyed. "You think he's—?"
"Trapped," Varrion completed. "Somewhere within the Paradox. Somewhere deep."
There was a long silence between them.
And then—a spark from the mark. A gentle, silvery throb like moonlight beyond water. And for one transfixed moment, the light wasn't only from the mark. It ran through Alex's veins, glowing beneath his skin like thin strands of destiny being sewn by something more than of this world.
Varrion stepped back.
"Time's short," he told the trees. "If he doesn't return on his own…"
He trailed off.
Livia simply stared down, her fingers still tangling with Alex's.
"Come back," she whispered. "Please."
The forest replied in silence.
Alex's breath did not come back.
Instead, the world just. went away.
No agony. No crossing over. One blink, and the forest was no more.
He opened his eyes to somewhere that could not be.
A limitless sky stretched out over him—broken like flecked glass, every fissure radiating gentle twilight. The earth was no earth at all, but churning obsidian cloud, heavy as mire to tread, yet constantly shifting beneath his footsteps like animate smoke.
No wind. No sun. There was only stillness, deeper than silence.
Then he gazed upward—and caught his breath.
Five thrones loomed over him in a broad circle, impossibly huge, sculpted from shadow and bone, starlight and obsidian. They stood under a hanging black eclipse—a perfect ring of nothingness suspended above all, pulsing weakly like a dying heart.
Each throne contained a figure wrapped in silence. Faceless, still, far away. And yet. watching.
Behind each statue, a mirror hovered, suspended in mid-air, rippling like water. The mirrors glimmered with fuzzy, changing images—scenarios and recollections, perhaps—but nothing Alex could concentrate on. Whenever he attempted to gaze directly, his vision blurred and his heart rate accelerated.
He stepped forward once.
The second throne moved.
The woman sitting there, draped in warm silver light, leaned slightly forward. Her demeanor was not threatening—not even commanding—but unavoidable. As if she'd stood for him far longer than he could grasp.
Light flowed from her into the mark upon his chest. Not gruesomely—softly. Like the sigh of the tide going back home.
Then—
A voice.
Clear. Calm. Female. And out of him.
"You are late… but alive. That's enough."
Alex stumbled backward. "Who—what is this? Where am I?"
"You've touched the Paradox," the voice replied. "You are now inside its root."
His heart raced. "What does that mean? Who are you people?"
"That will come," she replied. "For now—you must stand. I will guide you. The others cannot speak. You are not strong enough yet."
Alex gazed at the other thrones.
The four figures did not move at all. Their mirrors quivered with spasms of memory, but no voices sounded. Only the second figure talked—and only in his mind.
Shadows curled weakly around the feet of the other thrones, creeping toward their mirrors like inquisitive tendrils.
"Each of us contains part of your path," the voice went on. "One voice at a time."
Alex's fists clenched. "The others… who are they?"
"…You will know them when it matters. When you are ready."
Her voice returned. More distinct now.
Not words, but presence—such as silver rain falling within his bones.
> "Your soul stands at the edge of the Paradox. If you go further… you won't return."
Alex blinked. His sight rippled, colors folding in on themselves. He grabbed at his chest reflexively—and felt it.
The Mark.
It throbbed softly under his shirt, under skin and spirit. Not heat. Not agony. Something ancient. A voice muffled in quiet.
A silvery light flashed across the space between him and the second throne. A strand—invisibly fine as breath—tied his chest to the woman perched high above. Her face was covered, shrouded in glimmering veil-glow, but her eyes…
He couldn't see them, and yet he knew that they watched.
"You're within me," he grunted. "Or—my Mark. You're of it."
"Not exactly," she said, the thread vibrating. "But close enough."
"You have the Hollow's Bargain. One of five. The sole one that chose you prior to you choosing it."
Alex gulped, heart racing.
"What is this place?" he questioned, voice trembling. "What is the Paradox?"
The mirrors at the back of the thrones convulsed harder, light warping inwards. The air hummed like a taut string.
"The Paradox is not a place," she said. "It is a wound in the pattern."
His throat went dry. "Am I dying?"
There was a silence. Then:
"No. You're being rewritten."
The words hit him more sharply than any blade. His knees nearly went out from under him.
He glanced about once more—at the void-sky, at the eclipse still suspended above, at the immobile titans upon their thrones.
"Why me?" he asked. "Why… this?"
She did not reply immediately.
Then—
"Your gates were broken open. That is always the first gate."
He shook his head. "Who are you? What are you?"
Another silence. Then, quietly:
"I am your Second Voice. Nothing more… yet."
The silver thread quivered.
Around him, the Paradox started to shift—mist creeping higher, thrones receding. The mirrors behind the other beings flashed frantically now, and for a fleeting instant, he thought he heard whispers. Not words. Emotions. Sorrow. Rage. Determination. All in the same heartbeat.
His Hollow's Bargain Mark tingled—not pain, but an urgent pressure, as if whatever was inside it wanted to have a voice too.
The woman's voice grew stronger now, with an undercurrent of urgency.
"Go back now. The Path has been laid. Next time… you will ascend."
"Ascend?"
"The Eclipse Paradox is a stairway," she replied. "It goes forward—and backward—at the same time."
The ground beneath him melted into starlight.
The five thrones dissolved like smelted ink. The second figure raised her hand—not in goodbye, but in warning.
"You bear the Bargain. Don't break."
Then the thread broke.
And all came to white.
His body was lightless, suspended between worlds, held aloft by something older than time itself. His Hollow's Bargain Mark was the first to react, filling with silver-black energy that pulsed outward, spreading like ink through his veins. His pulse skipped, slowed, then dragged out the seconds between breaths.
He was transforming.
His skin flashed—translucent, otherworldly—like the dying light of a star that was extinguishing. His bones melted into the ether. The air vibrated, full of the power of the Paradox, but it wasn't menacing. It was… familiar. The air around him rippled, the horizon distorting as if reality itself was being ripped asunder and re-sewn in his presence.
Then, hovering above his head, a symbol materialized.
A perfect, empty hollow ring floated within the form of an eclipse, churning with light and darkness. It vibrated in tandem with his Mark, harmonizing with his breath. For one instant, Alex knew—knew the equilibrium between light and darkness, between Past and Future—but the insight slipped from his grasp like smoke, vanishing before he could grasp it.
This was not your end," the Second Voice resonated within him, far away and redolent with old echoes. "Just the first door.
The heat flowed over him once more, the gentle hug of his chest being wrapped around. A memory not his own was a whispered promise in the recesses of his mind, something missing but urgent—such as a truth that had always been present, just waiting for him to see. It vanished as quickly as it came, leaving only a feeling of emptiness and heaviness in its stead.
Then the Mark burned once more. The Hollow's Bargain icon and the Eclipse mark combined. Two symbols entwined in his chest, briefly aglow with a light so fierce it seemed as if the very air around him was afire with it.
Alex could feel a heavy pressure in his center, as if he was being torn asunder and remade, sewn back together again, made whole.
But the vision was destroyed before he could understand it. The Paradox, as though it had registered his existence, started to withdraw. Slowly, quietly—the black heaven fell apart into starlight. The obsidian earth that had held him disintegrated, dispersed by an unseen tide, returning to emptiness. The grandeur of the realm withdrew, folding itself back in like a tidal wave retreating into the depths.
And then it was gone.
His body jerked.
Alex's breathing seized in his throat as the world around him re-focused. His limbs shook, his vision spun as though he had been jolted awake from a dream he couldn't recall. His body came crashing down, weight coming back to him all at once. The Mark blazed hot on his chest before it faded back to its soft glow.
There was a whisper in his mind, a sound that hung just out of reach.
"Next time… come with a question."
And then—nothing.
Alex's eyes opened, his breathing harsh, and the world outside too real. He blinked at the bright light of the campfire, his senses reeling. His chest ached where the Hollow's Bargain Mark throbbed weakly, its silver-black light flashing at the periphery of his vision. The residual effects of the Paradox still lingered around him—jumbled memories, fading impressions of a place that didn't exist, tugging at the fringes of his mind.
The fire's warmth felt far away, too distant. His body weighed him down, his limbs as heavy as lead. A sudden pain burst in his chest, a ghostly ache that arrived and departed as suddenly as it came. His heart pounded against his ribs, and for an instant, he thought the ground beneath him would give way again, sucking him back into that endless twilight.
Livia gasped, her pale face backing away from him, her eyes wide with shock. Varrion, however, was already kneeling beside him, his serene calm a jarring contrast to the chaos of the moment. He rapidly checked Alex's vitals, smoothing over his forehead before giving a curt nod. "Still alive… barely."
Alex attempted to rise up, but his body did not comply. The room revolved around him, and for a moment, he couldn't recall where he was or how he had ended up there. His head pounded with a numbing pain, each throb reminding him of the odd, unearthly place he had left behind. Where was that place? The Second Voice… the thrones… the Paradox…
He tried to open his mouth to speak, but his voice sounded strange, like he was talking through a dream. "What… happened to me?"
Varrion did not respond at once. He rose to his feet, facing the others as they struck the camp with rapid, trained efficiency. "He's alive. Prepare to move out."
Livia shared a quick, anxious look with him before she turned back to her work, bundling up equipment and lashing down their gear. Her fingers shook barely at all, but she didn't speak.
Alex was detached, as if watching from outside, removed from the world around him. His mind reeled in mad circles, the reverberations of the Paradox too near and yet too distant to comprehend. He raised a hand, tracing the Mark on his chest. It still pulsed with a faint, steady rhythm. Whatever had occurred to him—whatever he had witnessed—it was far from finished.
Varrion's voice cut through his fog. "We move for Valia Solara."
Alex didn't answer. He couldn't. All he could do was look at the glowing symbol on his chest and wonder if it was the last remnant of something far greater.
High up above Caelum, Elias alone stood on the cliffs, his form illuminated by the fading light of evening. The wind cried through the rocks, pulling at his cloak, but he stood firm, his eyes upon the group below.
They were already departing, vanishing into the trees. The space between them seemed enormous, and yet Elias felt each step.
His face was impassive, eyes darkened as if the world's burden weighed upon his shoulders. He did not speak for a long moment, standing there and watching.
At last, his lips opened, the words little more than a whisper, but heavy with significance:
"Goodbye, Alex. Hope we meet again… soon."
No further word, he turned, disappearing into the darkness of the cliffs, leaving behind only the winds and the silence.