The Forgotten Vault was not on any map.Not even the Academy's dimensional charts dared mark its path.
You didn't find it by walking.You found it by remembering the right questions.
Rei held the sigil key tightly as the hidden door beneath the Library unfolded like unfolding paper in water.
Lightless. Soundless.
Aira walked beside him, her gloves glowing faintly, the Shadekin's presence calm for once.
"You're sure about this?" she asked.
"No," Rei replied, "but I need to know."
They stepped in.
Inside, the Vault felt wrong.
There were walls, but they bent and pulsed as if breathing.Shelves of memory crystals lined the path, each one flickering with trapped screams and whispers.
They passed names inscribed on shards:
Devourer of Dawn
The Silent Eye
Laughing Crow
All familiar. All names of things that once ruled the primordial dark.
Then they found it.
A mirror, standing alone in a chamber of black marble, humming with old power.
At its base, a single inscription:
"The One Who Smiled."
Rei reached out. The mirror accepted him.
The world fell away.
He was standing in an ocean of fog, beneath a sky of bleeding light.
Shapes moved in the fog — vast, shifting, almost human.
Then he saw it.
Not a Shadow.Not a monster.
But a child — or something like one.Featureless, with too many eyes, laughter echoing from nowhere.
It tried to speak, but every word came out as a giggle, each giggle shaping the fog into shards of memory.
Aira stood beside Rei within the vision, stunned.
A field of shattered worlds, burning silently.The "child" walked, giggling, scattering ashes with each step.
Other Shadows towered above it, grand and monstrous.
They whispered:
"It is too young.""It is too soft.""It will learn."
But the child only giggled, trying to play with the embers.
The child stood before something vast:A woman made of light, holding out her hand.
"Would you like to learn to smile?"
The child tilted its head. Confused.
"A smile is what you wear when you want to hide your fear."
The child giggled, but it wasn't joyful.
It was hollow.
A war. The child, now older, stood laughing in the dark, blood dripping from unseen teeth.
It smiled.
It smiled even as other Shadows fell around it.
Because it had learned:
A smile was easier than tears.
Rei fell backward, gasping, the vision shattering around them.
Aira caught him, her eyes wide, the Shadekin within her whispering quietly, as if in respect.
Rei clutched his head.
"It wasn't always like this," he whispered. "It didn't want to be what it became."
"It learned to smile because it was afraid."
Aira swallowed, steadying him.
"And now it's inside you."
"Yeah," Rei replied, tears threatening.
"And maybe it's… lonely."
They stood in silence.
Around them, the Vault pulsed softly, the crystals whispering, acknowledging what had been seen.
Aira squeezed his hand.
"You're not alone in this," she said.
"Neither is it."