The mirror was never meant to reflect truth.
That was its danger.
It was forged not by belief, but by compensation—a reaction from the System's Architects to the impossible precedent Sykaion had introduced. When the First Ledger bent without breaking, when the Four Articles began to infect systems across cities, when even Ledger Null had stepped back rather than strike, the Architects had no choice but to adapt.
Thus, the Dissonant Mirror was designed.
Not to kill him.
But to echo him.
To present a version of Sykaion the world would rather believe in. One more convenient. One more heroic. One more controllable.
A better lie.
He felt it before he saw it.
It started in dreams. Flashes of places he hadn't been. Decisions he hadn't made. A version of himself surrounded by worshippers, giving orders, wearing robes not stitched from struggle but from power.
Then it bled into waking.
Zeraphine caught it first. Reports from the west edges of Veltrin: people seeing Sykaion in two places at once. Merchants hearing contradictory proclamations. A child swearing she saw him demand tithes at a shrine.
He hadn't left the Archive in two days.
When he heard, he didn't panic.
He went still.
Because he knew.
He walked to the central floor of the Archive, where the Second Ledger still pulsed faintly, waiting. Arlyss followed, tension burning in every motion.
"What are they doing?"
"They're creating something easier to follow," he said. "Something that looks like me. Sounds like me. But doesn't ask anyone to think."
"So a copy."
"No," Zeraphine said, appearing behind them. Her voice was sharper than usual. "It won't be that clean. It'll be just flawed enough to make people question which of you is real."
Sykaion met her eyes.
"And the longer both exist, the more power shifts to the one who fits the narrative people want."
Outside, citizens had already begun to split.
Some whispered the original Articles.
Others quoted a newer, fifth line—a clause about obedience over risk.
It was never written by him.
It was never real.
But the Mirror had seeded it anyway.
He stood on the Archive steps.
He wanted to speak.
But anything he said now could just be mirrored.
Twisted.
Arlyss laid a hand on his shoulder. "We need a different kind of defense."
He looked at her.
She was right.
Truth wouldn't win by being louder.
It had to be harder. Heavier. Rooted.
So they built the Speaker's Chamber.
A place where people could speak their own memories of the Articles.
No scripts. No authority. No intermediaries.
Just belief.
They opened it at dusk.
And people came.
Not because they trusted Sykaion.
But because they wanted to remember what trusting had once felt like.
One by one, they stood.
A mother spoke about the moment her daughter stopped fearing debt collectors.
A former enforcer read the Second Article aloud while trembling, confessing how many he'd silenced before it existed.
A child recited the Fourth Article without understanding, but with perfect cadence.
Every word etched itself into the Archive walls, not because the System allowed it, but because people kept choosing it.
Sykaion stood beside the chamber door.
Silent.
Listening.
And then it happened.
The Mirror walked into the city.
It looked like him.
But its eyes glowed faintly blue.
Its smile never reached them.
It moved like prophecy.
The people didn't cheer.
They hesitated.
Because for all its symmetry, it was missing something.
And Sykaion felt it too.
The Mirror didn't carry cost. It didn't bleed belief. It exuded authority, but lacked memory.
Zeraphine stepped close.
"They didn't just make a copy. They made a rival myth."
The Mirror raised a hand. The System flared above it—casting a beam of false law, shimmering with architect-forged approval.
The crowd gasped.
But they didn't kneel.
Not yet.
Sykaion took one step forward.
And said the only thing that could not be mirrored.
"Tell me what you remember bleeding for."
The Mirror tilted its head.
No answer.
Only silence.
And for now—that was enough to hold the crowd.
But Sykaion knew the real fight hadn't begun.
It wouldn't be decided in combat.
It would be decided in conversation.
And the Mirror was only just learning how to speak.