The higher he climbed, the more the world unraveled.Time stuttered. Shadows spoke. And the past clawed through memory like a bleeding wound.This was no test of strength.This was a reckoning.
The Spire of Dust stood like a blade at the edge of existence — where the sky split like glass, and the stars bled light sideways.
It wasn't just tall.It wasn't even mortal.
It pierced realms — a construct older than memory, older than gods. Forged by the Architect Without Name to lock away a Primordial Fragment, the Spire was warded by Nullborne — guardian wraiths born of paradox and preserved time.
Kael stood before it. Alone.
His sigil flared on his back — heat and rhythm like a second heartbeat.
This place… it knows me.
Every step forward made his skin tighten, as if reality itself was checking him — testing whether he belonged.
At the gate of the Spire, mist parted. A figure formed — tall, hooded, eyes hollow as the void. A Nullborne Lord.
Its voice was static and thunder.
"Name your Worth. Or be erased."
Kael didn't speak. He acted.
He summoned Shadow Echo — illusions splitting off from him in ghostly waves — then unleashed Soulbind, wrapping them in tethered hunger.
The shadow-weapon formed mid-swing — a glaive made of memory and fire.
He struck once.
The Nullborne Lord was bisected...and reality twisted.
The gate shimmered. A thousand versions of it flickered and vanished, until only one path remained.
Test 1: Surpassed.
Inside the tower, time fractured.
Every step sent Kael backward, forward, sideways — through echoes of himself.
A younger Kael, broken and bleeding.An older Kael, monstrous and merciless.A version where his eyes glowed red, laughter cold and divine.
They fought him.He fought him.
"You let them die," one screamed, a mirror version of himself covered in ash and blood. "You always let them die!"
Kael ducked a phantom blade, breathing hard. His halberd morphed into a sword mid-swing.
Is this what I become? Is this what they saw in Aeon?
He whispered, voice steady, voice steel:
"Then I'll make sure I never do again."
He drove the blade through the final echo. The room shattered like glass. Light poured in from all directions.
Test 2: Surpassed.
At the top of Floor 12, the storm of time calmed.
She stood there, waiting.
Elyra.Warden of Dust.Disciple of the forgotten god who built the tower.A woman woven from memory and steel, with eyes like collapsing stars and armor that shimmered with forgotten battles.
"You've come far," she said, drawing her ether-blade. "Too far."
Kael readied his halberd. "You know who I am."
"I remember Aeon," she said softly. "I remember… you."
Their battle was chaos made beautiful.
Ether-blades shattered the walls. Floors caved in from pure kinetic force. The very air froze, halted by their clash.
Elyra wept even as she fought.Tears streaked her cheek with stardust."I don't want to do this. But duty—"
Kael didn't strike.
Instead… he lowered his weapon.
"I'm not Aeon," he said. "I'm Kael. And I won't become the monster they fear."
Silence.
Elyra stared at him — long and trembling.
Then… she smiled.
A sad, broken thing.
She knelt.
And opened her hand.
The Fragment of Will shimmered into the air — a spiraling glyph of white and gold, pulsing with ancient weight.
Fragment Acquired: WILL.
[End of Chapter 7]
But far below the Spire, something stirred — a god's husk, forgotten and sealed… and now waking.
Next Chapter Preview – Chapter 8: What Sleeps Below
The Spire of Dust was not empty.Beneath its foundation, something ancient has stirred — a remnant of the war before time, chained in silence. And Kael's presence has shaken the lock.
Meanwhile, the Guilds close in. But not alone. A third force rises — not mortal, not divine. Something… lost.
And Kara Yil receives a message etched in bone:
"The Hollow Prince walks the path again. Prepare the Black Bloom."