Kael stood alone on the edge of a reality that didn't obey rules.
The Between wasn't a place, not really. It was a tear in the world—a wound where time slipped sideways and light forgot its color. The air shimmered without wind, and the ground beneath his boots pulsed like it remembered things it shouldn't.
And somewhere in this fractured place, Kael was supposed to learn control.
He'd barely slept. The shards inside him wouldn't let him. Every time his body tried to rest, visions pulled him under. Sometimes they were memories. Sometimes futures. Sometimes both. He saw crowns crumbling, armies screaming his name, stars bleeding into oceans.
And sometimes… he saw himself.
But not as he was.
Not human.
Something else.
Something becoming.
Selene stood a few paces away, her cloak fluttering in the not-quite-wind. She hadn't spoken much since they arrived. Now, she raised a hand and pointed toward a spiraling platform of broken stone floating in the air ahead.
"Step onto it."
Kael frowned. "What is it?"
"A trial," she said simply. "If the shards truly chose you, they won't tear you apart. Not yet."
He glanced down at his hands. They looked like his hands. But he knew better now. There were moments where he'd feel the edge of something… wrong. Like his fingers had bent in a way they shouldn't have, like his shadow moved half a second behind his step.
He stepped forward. The stone rippled under his boot. Not crumbling, not shifting—rippling, like it was waiting.
Then it lifted him.
---
Unshackled Within
The platform rose through the Between, carrying Kael into the heart of the fracture. Above him, the sky broke into mirrored shards, reflecting infinite versions of himself. Some broken. Some bleeding. One crowned.
The shards in his chest pulsed in unison.
He felt it immediately. The strain. The heat. The pull in his bones.
And then a voice—not Selene's. Not his own.
"You are wielding without knowing. Binding without balance."
Kael turned. There was no one. Just the air pulsing with words.
"You are not the first to hold a fragment of the Crown."
"Who are you?" Kael said aloud.
"The echo of a failure. The memory of a warning."
Kael clenched his fists. "Then show me."
The moment he said it, the world cracked.
Energy surged through him like fire through nerves. His vision went white. His knees buckled. The shards in his chest flared, and for a moment, he thought he would come apart.
Then the pain passed.
And standing before him was… himself.
Except not.
This Kael had no eyes. His arms glowed with glyphs. The shards floated around him, orbiting like moons. And when he spoke, his voice trembled the stone beneath their feet.
"You want control?" the echo asked. "Then survive."
---
The Fracture Unleashed
The first blow came without warning. The echo moved faster than thought, his strike landing across Kael's shoulder and sending him spinning across the platform.
Kael grunted, rolling to his feet. The pain was real—but not physical. Something in the shard responded, and Kael felt it push outward. The echo struck again.
This time, Kael dodged.
It wasn't instinct. It was the shard. It pulled him aside just before the impact. It knew.
Kael moved with it. Listened. Let the power surge through him—but not consume him.
For every strike he blocked, three more came. But the longer he moved, the clearer it became.
He wasn't just reacting.
He was syncing.
With the shards. With the fracture. With… himself.
Until he stopped dodging.
And struck back.
His hand lashed out—not with a punch, but with a ripple of space that cracked across the echo's chest like a bolt of lightning carved from time.
The echo stumbled. And laughed.
"You're beginning to see."
Kael's body burned. His skin glowed faintly now—glyphs forming around his forearms and along the side of his neck. He could feel the Crown shaping him, but he was shaping it too.
"I'm not here to see," Kael growled. "I'm here to master it."
---
Shaping the Unknown
The rest of the trial was a blur of motion and memory. The echo fought like a storm, like every mistake Kael could make was its own weapon. But Kael kept rising. Kept pushing.
He learned how to phase through impacts—not vanish, but displace himself a fraction of a second to avoid harm.
He learned how to call up a fracture wave—a burst of unstable reality that shattered stone and time alike in a short arc around him.
And more than anything, he learned that the shards weren't just power. They were potential.
But they had a hunger.
And they didn't want to be tamed.
---
The Descent
When the platform descended, Kael collapsed to one knee at Selene's feet, sweat dripping from his brow, light still flickering across his skin.
Selene didn't speak at first. She studied him for a long moment.
"You're not the same," she said quietly.
"No," Kael replied. "I'm not."
She crouched beside him, offering water. "You survived the first phase."
Kael looked up. "How many are there?"
Selene's gaze shifted to the horizon. "Enough to break a god."
Kael leaned back, breathing heavily. His muscles ached, but his mind felt sharper. The shards were quieter now. Not asleep—but listening.
He understood the truth now.
He couldn't just carry the Crown's fragments.
He had to command them.
Because if he didn't—
They would command him.