The fog in the valley was different. Elsewhere, it was a dynamic, shifting thing, coiling and retreating like the breath of the world. Here, it was static, thick, and absolute. It muffled all sound, creating a profound, unnerving silence that felt ancient and deliberate. The world seemed to have been paused, and Lio had the distinct, prickling sensation that they were on a stage, under the gaze of a vast, unseen audience.
He took a few steps ahead of his family, and the fog closed in behind him with an unnatural swiftness. One moment, he could hear the scuff of his mother's boots on the rock; the next, there was nothing. He was sealed in a white, featureless room of mist, completely isolated. He called out, but the fog seemed to snatch the sound from his lips, leaving only a dead, flat silence.
Then, the fog began to move. Not like wind, but like thought. The mist before him swirled and coalesced, not into a solid shape, but into a tapestry of countless, shifting, disembodied eyes. They were eyes of every shape and color, blinking slowly, all fixed on him with a calm, omniscient intelligence.
A voice spoke, not to his ears, but directly inside his skull. It was a voice without gender or tone, as vast and dispassionate as the sky.
I AM THE WITNESS.
THE FOG THAT SEES. I HAVE WATCHED YOU WALK THIS PATH BEFORE, LITTLE ECHO. I KNOW THE QUESTIONS THAT BURN BEHIND YOUR EYES.
Lio was frozen, not with the frantic terror a Hollow inspired, but with a deep, cosmic awe that was far more terrifying. This was not a monster. This was a power. This was a god.
YOU ARE TIRED OF THE CIRCLE, the voice continued, the eyes in the fog blinking in a slow, asynchronous rhythm.
YOU WISH FOR THE TRUTH. I HOLD ALL TRUTHS. I SEE THE GEARS OF YOUR PRISON. I KNOW THE NATURE OF THE GIRL. I KNOW THE PATH TO THE PLACE WITHOUT VERSIONS. ASK. I WILL GIVE YOU ONE TRUE ANSWER.
The offer was a sudden, brilliant light in the darkness of Lio's mind. A true answer. A key. A way out. After all the lies, the shifting maps, the maddening repetitions, the truth was being offered to him. The hope was so intense it was physically painful. He opened his mouth, the first of a hundred questions ready to spill out—How do we break the loop?
BUT TRUTH HAS A PRICE, the voice interrupted, its calmness more intimidating than any threat. A TRUTH FOR A NAME.
Lio's nascent hope faltered. "A name?" he whispered, the sound swallowed by the mist.
A NAME IS A STORY. A HISTORY. A REALITY. I COLLECT THEM. TO RECEIVE YOUR TRUTH, YOU MUST GIVE ME A NAME. YOURS. OR THEIRS. I WILL TAKE IT, AND IT WILL BE MINE. THE STORY WILL BE OVER.
The bargain settled into Lio's mind, cold and venomous. He understood instantly. To learn how to save his family, he would have to sacrifice one of them. He saw their names laid out before him like tarot cards, each one a terrible possibility.
Ira. Could he give the name of his broken father? Condemn the man who had started them on this path to… what? A final emptiness? Forgiveness through erasure?
Sera. Could he sacrifice his mother? The one person who held any real strength, whose silent knowledge had saved them more than once? The thought was a physical violation.
Mina. The key. The mystery. The girl who was always the same. Could he give her name to this entity, perhaps solving one mystery only to create a black hole at the center of another?
Lio. Could he offer himself? Give up his own name, his own story, for an answer he might not even be lucid enough to use afterward?
He stood trembling before the wall of eyes, the weight of the choice pressing down on him. What if the truth he received was simply, 'There is no escape'? What if he traded his mother's name, only to be told their damnation was absolute? The price was a certainty; the value of the prize was unknown. It was a god's bargain, and mortals always lost those.
He saw the scarred face of the man in the water, the version of him that was utterly alone. That man would have made the trade. He would have sacrificed anyone, anything, for a different outcome. But looking at the unblinking eyes of the Watcher, Lio knew he could not become that man. A truth that cost him his family—his love for them, his responsibility to them—was not a truth worth having.
"No," Lio said, his voice shaking but firm. "No deal."
He closed his eyes, bracing for a punishment, for a divine wrath. But there was nothing. When he opened them again, the wall of eyes was gone. The voice in his head was silent. The thick fog around him was thinning, receding to its normal state.
He could see his family again. They were only a few feet away, staring at him.
"Lio?" his mother asked, her brow furrowed with concern. "Are you alright? You just… stopped."
To them, only a second had passed.
Lio looked at their faces, their precious, familiar, unknowing faces. He nodded, unable to speak. He had just refused forbidden knowledge from a god to protect them, and it was a secret he would have to carry completely, utterly alone.