Kael walked through the next corridor.
No doors. No light. Just a hallway carved from whispers. Each step felt heavier,not on his feet but on his soul.
"You carry more now…" the girl said beside him.
"You're changing."
Kael didn't reply. His hands were still shaking. His heart still remembering Noen's voice. That broken goodbye. But even inside the ache, there was something growing.
A strength. A voice.
They reached a stone wall. No door. No symbol. Just a blank surface.
"Now what?" Kael asked.
The girl didn't answer. Instead, the wall itself... began to bleed. Not blood. Ink. It dripped down like tears. And slowly,it formed a line:
"She never screamed, but she never stopped dying."
Kael touched the ink. The wall pulled him in.
He blinked. Now inside a room. A small one. Too clean. White walls. Neatly folded clothes. And in the center a girl. Sitting on the bed. Staring at nothing. Alive. But barely. Kael stepped closer.
"Can you hear me?"
The girl didn't respond. She just blinked. Slow. Robotic. And then quietly, she said:
"I don't know how to leave."
Kael's heart thumped. This wasn't fear. This was emotional silence. A girl trapped not by monsters but by stillness.
She looked up at him finally. Her eyes dull,but her voice honest.
"They took everything. Not just my family. Not just my name."
She pointed at her chest.
"They took the noise from my soul."
Kael stepped forward.
"Then I'll make you a new one."
Suddenly, the room flickered. The walls cracked. And the silence SCREAMED.
Not with sound but with memory. The girl fell to her knees. Her skin cracking like glass.
"You can't save someone who doesn't believe she's alive..."
Kael grabbed her hand.
"You don't have to believe it.
Just let me carry it… for now."
The floor shattered. The white walls exploded into a storm of paper. Each page had the same line written in blood:
"I'm fine."
"I'm fine."
"I'm fine."
Over and over. Kael screamed.
"YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE!"
The storm paused. The girl looked at him. For the first time her eyes showed something:Tears.
She whispered:
"Then help me remember how to scream."
Kael hugged her. And the silence broke. The moment Kael hugged the girl,the paper storm paused. Her shoulders trembled. But her arms… remained still.
"No one's ever touched me without expecting something," she whispered.
"You're… not here to save me, are you?"
Kael shook his head.
"I'm here to remember you."
"And that means accepting all of you not just the parts that survived."
The room shifted again. This time, it didn't break. It transformed.
The papers floating mid-air twisted, glowed and formed into pages of a book. But this one was different. No ink. Just impressions of pain.
Scratches where blades once kissed skin. Dents where fists had landed. Blanks… where words were never spoken.
Kael stepped toward the book. It pulsed. The girl reached out instinctively.
"Don't open it," she said.
"It hurts…"
Kael looked into her eyes.
"If I'm going to carry your truth,
I have to read your silence too."
He opened the first page. And the room screamed again.
FLASH Memory One:
A small child, hiding under a bed,
hands over ears. Outside the room:
"Why did we even have her?!"
"I didn't ask to be her father!"
The girl didn't cry. She just bit her lip hard enough to bleed.
FLASH Memory Two:
She stands in school. New dress. Fake smile.
"Slum girl thinks she's a princess."
"Maybe she sold herself for it."
She laughs along because that's safer than breaking.
FLASH Memory Three: Her birthday. No gifts. No candles. Just a mirror.
She stares at her reflection and whispers:
"Why do I look like someone no one wants to love?"
Kael couldn't breathe. His fists clenched. The book snapped shut. The girl had fallen to her knees again,
trembling. Kael sat beside her.
"You didn't deserve a single page of that pain."
"But now… it's mine too."
The girl slowly looked up.
"What happens now?"
Kael stood. The book floated between them. One by one, the blank pages began to fill. Not with pain but with truth.
Her real laugh. Her favorite song. The time she smiled at a street puppy. The one friend who once called her "sunshine."
Kael extended his hand.
"Now your story gets rewritten."
"Not with lies… but with your real self."
The girl smiled. It was small. But it was real.
"My name is Auri."
"Will you remember me… Kael?"
He nodded.
"Forever."
The room dissolved into threads of golden ink. Another page hovered in the Archive.
"Auri – Echo Preserved."
The moment Auri's name joined the Archive,Kael felt it:
A third thread weaving into his chest not burning this time,but warm… like a promise. He staggered a little,but stood tall. His voice trembled:
"That makes three."
The girl nodded beside him.
"Three stories preserved.Three wounds healed. Three pieces of you, now… never the same."
Kael looked at his hands. They glowed faintly not white, not red but gold. Forged through pain, lit by truth.
Suddenly, a gust of dark wind howled through the Archive. Not wind, but presence. Heavy. Ancient.
"What is that?" Kael asked.
The girl's expression changed.
She looked not scared,but sad.
"The Archivist is stirring."
Kael blinked.
"Who is the Archivist?"
The floor beneath him cracked.
A voice twisted, echoing whispered:
"Three threads… three echoes… three lies you turned into light."
A dark figure formed in the shadows. Tall. Cloaked in black parchment. Eyes glowing like forgotten candles.
"You unsealed me…"
Kael stood firm.
"Who are you?"
The voice replied, cold and final:
"I am the one who remembers pain... but never writes the ending."
"I am the Laughing Archivist."
The girl stepped between them.
"You're not supposed to appear until the Tenth Echo."
The Archivist chuckled.
"He changed the rules. Three preserved souls…and not one forgotten."
He turned to Kael.
"You think preserving them saves them?"
"It doesn't."
"It saves you. So you don't shatter into pieces like they did."
Kael gritted his teeth.
"You think I'm doing this for me?!"
"No," the Archivist replied.
"But you will."
The figure snapped its parchment fingers. Suddenly all three souls Rilan, Noen, Auri appeared. Flickering like ghosts. Not in pain but not fully free either.
The Archivist whispered:
"Do you hear them?"
And Kael did. Each echo, inside him now speaking:
"Don't forget me."
"Don't lose me."
"Don't fail us."
Kael dropped to one knee. The weight was growing.
"They're inside me… but I don't know if I'm strong enough to carry them."
The girl knelt beside him.
"You don't have to carry them."
"Just walk with them."
Kael looked up. Tears in his eyes. Fire in his soul.
"Then I walk forward."
"With all of them."
The ground pulsed. The Archivist faded, leaving one last whisper:
"We'll meet again…when you forget the first name."
Kael stood. Stronger. His threads glowed. Not three lines now but one golden flame.