By the time Thuta stumbled back to his room, the sun was already pushing pale light through the clouds. The streets of Yangon were waking — vendors setting up carts, buses grinding to life — but to him, everything felt dim, distant. Like he was walking through the world wrapped in fog.
He locked the door behind him, dropped his satchel, and leaned against the wall.
The sigil was still glowing.
He walked to the mirror, rolled up his sleeve, and stared at it.
It pulsed gently. Like a second heart.
"Still there," he murmured.
He hadn't imagined last night. The voice. The smoke. The man. The eyes.
He splashed cold water on his face and collapsed onto the bed. He needed rest. He needed answers. He needed his old life back. But mostly, he needed silence.
Instead, the scroll began to hum.
He sat up. The scroll lay half-unfurled on his desk, glowing faintly, its symbols rearranging themselves again. This time, they didn't form words.
They formed a diagram.
A circle within a square. Four rings. One spiral.
It looked like a door. Or a lock. Or a vault. The center bore a single mark — his sigil.
Beneath it, new glyphs burned into the parchment.
"Keys are never made without locks. Or locks without reason."
Thuta stared.
Was that what he was now?
A key?
He touched the sigil on his palm, and it flared in response — not in pain, but in acknowledgment. As if agreeing.
Then the world blurred.
---
Flashes. Heat. Stone walls. A circle of fire.
A hand — not his — holding a rod of burning metal. Etching runes onto a vault door. Chanting words in a language he didn't know, but understood in his bones.
Then darkness.
And silence.
Thuta gasped and fell to the floor, breath shallow, hands trembling.
"A memory," he whispered. "Not mine. Theirs."
He clutched his head. "This isn't just power. It's history. And I'm not supposed to have it."
He sat there for a long time. On the floor. Staring at nothing.
The realization hit him like a weight:
The sigil was forged for a purpose.
It was a key to something meant to stay locked. And now it had chosen him — a debt-ridden, half-lazy dropout who couldn't boil tea without burning it.
"This is insane," he whispered. "I'm not special. I'm just... here."
He stood slowly and looked around his room.
Books. Crumpled receipts. A rice cooker.
He frowned.
"I wonder if I can make the rice boil without burning it this time."
He concentrated, hand hovering over the cooker.
"Boil."
Nothing.
He focused harder. The sigil pulsed. Heat flowed into the air.
The cooker exploded.
Thuta screamed, fell back into a pile of laundry, and stared at the blackened appliance.
Smoke curled from it like incense.
He groaned. "Great. I'm a cursed kettle with PTSD."
His eyebrows were singed.
---
He spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on his bed, pacing, trying to ignore the pulse of the sigil. The scroll remained quiet. The visions, gone.
Evening came.
Then night.
The silence stretched long. Too long.
Until —
A creak.
The sound of wood bending.
Thuta froze.
It had come from the window.
He grabbed the nearest thing — a sandal — and crept toward the sound.
The window was open.
But he didn't remember opening it.
A shape moved behind him.
He turned —
Too late.
A man stood in the shadows of his room. Cloaked. Hooded. Face half-covered in a scarf. He didn't move like a man. He moved like smoke.
Thuta held up the sandal.
The man raised a hand — not threatening — just calm.
"You opened what should remain sealed," the stranger said. His voice was soft. Controlled. Not angry. Not friendly.
Thuta didn't respond.
"You are marked. You carry the Crimson Key. And the Fold will come for you."
"The what now?"
But the man was already moving. To the window.
"Wait!" Thuta shouted. "Who are you?"
The stranger paused halfway out the frame.
Then, without turning, said:
"Watch for the man without a name. When you see him again, it's already too late."
And he was gone.
Thuta stood frozen, sandal still raised like a useless weapon.
He let it fall.
He sat down.
And whispered, "What have I gotten myself into?"
The sigil didn't answer.
But it glowed, bright and red — like a door just beginning to open.
---