Rain drummed softly on the stone roof of the archive tower, casting a rhythmic, almost meditative ambience throughout the room. The scent of old parchment and candle wax lingered thickly in the air, wrapping Kael and Elaria in an ancient silence. The librarian had long since gone, leaving them alone among the labyrinth of forgotten knowledge.
Kael stood hunched over a dusty oaken table, the map from the Chrono Scribe unrolled before him. Except… it wasn't a map. Not in the traditional sense.
"It's blank," Elaria said, squinting at the parchment. "Is this some sort of joke?"
Kael didn't answer. His fingers hovered over the strange runes lining the edges. They shimmered faintly, as if dancing to a rhythm unseen. The moment his fingertips brushed the edge of the parchment, the ink flared—an iridescent pulse rippling across the paper like lightning across glass.
Words appeared, not drawn but grown, like veins beneath skin.
"The map is not to places, but to moments. Each door opens not with key, but with choice."
Elaria leaned closer, her breath catching. "A temporal map. Of course! The Chrono Scribe doesn't just record events—it reveals potentialities."
Kael looked up. "You mean this thing shows us… possible futures?"
"No," she corrected, "it shows pivotal moments in all timelines. The crossroads. Places where one action can change the course of everything."
A silence settled between them as they stared at the shimmering page. A new set of runes began forming in the center, twisting into what resembled a sigil—a jagged spiral intersected by a triangle of dots.
"It wants us to make a decision," Kael said, voice low. "To pick a moment. A door."
Elaria's eyes darkened. "That's dangerous. We don't know what kind of consequences we're invoking."
Kael glanced at her. "What did the Chrono Scribe say to you? Earlier. When you touched it."
She hesitated. "It whispered… 'She still remembers.' I thought maybe it meant Lyra. Or maybe…"
"Or maybe someone else from your past?" he asked gently.
Elaria didn't respond. Instead, she placed her hand on the sigil.
The world around them bent.
Reality didn't shatter—it unknit. Threads of light pulled away from the stone walls and candlelit shelves. Time, space, matter—each peeled back to reveal a yawning spiral of white.
They were no longer in the archive.
They landed with a thud on cold marble.
A courtyard unfolded before them. Ornate columns wrapped in ivy stood like sentinels along the edge, and the air smelled of roses and something older—ozone, maybe, or lightning trapped in a bottle.
Kael stood, brushing dust from his coat. "This… isn't Galedor."
"No," Elaria said, her voice distant. "This is the Academy of Hollow Stars. The original."
Kael's brow furrowed. "Wait. That school you were a part of?"
"I wasn't part of it," she said quietly. "I was forged in it."
Footsteps echoed.
Dozens of robed figures emerged, walking through the courtyard. None of them noticed Kael or Elaria. They were phantoms, merely observers.
One figure stood apart from the rest.
A girl with silver-blonde hair braided down her back, standing on a dais with a staff clutched in her gloved hand. Her expression was fierce. Regal.
Kael inhaled sharply. "Is that… you?"
Elaria remained still.
The version of her on the dais raised her voice, carrying authority and venom. "We are the last of the Astral Scholars. If the Archons wish to erase us from time, then we'll burn their tomes before the ink dries!"
The crowd roared in approval.
Kael turned to Elaria. "You were leading a rebellion?"
"I don't remember this," she murmured. "At least, not like this. There are gaps in my mind—eras sealed away. Maybe by magic. Maybe by trauma."
The scene shifted. Like a projector slipping reels.
The same courtyard, but now in flames. The silver-haired girl lay on the ground, blood pooling beneath her. Towering above her was a creature of void—featureless, crowned with stars, cloaked in an aura that made Kael's stomach churn.
"You defied entropy," it whispered, voice like a thousand ticking clocks. "And for that, you will be unraveled."
It raised a hand—and the girl screamed.
Elaria collapsed to her knees, clutching her chest.
Kael knelt beside her. "Hey! What's wrong?!"
"I… I felt that. Like it was happening now. That pain. That hopelessness…"
"Is that thing the Warden? The one that attacked Lyra's city?"
"No," she said between gasps. "It's older. Much older. The Warden is a pawn. This is something else—something that watches from beyond timelines."
Kael stared at the creature. "And it knows who you are."
The creature turned suddenly, its gaze locking on Kael.
Impossible.
They were only supposed to be observers.
"Anomaly detected."
Kael's body locked up. He felt something slithering inside his thoughts, scanning, peeling away memories, rewiring doubts.
Elaria stood abruptly, her voice loud and commanding. "End simulation. Override path vector. Return to anchor!"
Nothing happened.
She repeated the command in a harsher tongue—an ancient dialect Kael didn't recognize. The space around them quivered, like a bubble about to burst.
Then they fell.
They landed back in the archive, gasping.
The map disintegrated into ash between them. The sigil burned itself into the table like a brand.
Kael crawled backward, pressing his back to a bookshelf. "That thing saw me. It knew me."
Elaria's hands trembled. "That shouldn't be possible. These memories—these moments—are echoes, not real. It… it breached the fold."
He looked at her. "What was that creature?"
Elaria closed her eyes. "The Weeper of Threads. A being that exists between fates. It doesn't live in time—it eats it."
Kael stared at the scorched sigil. "And now it knows I exist."
Elaria nodded grimly. "You've been marked, Kael. We both have."
Later that night, as the rain continued to fall, Kael sat alone in one of the reading alcoves, a candle flickering beside him.
He could still feel the Weeper's gaze.
Not on his flesh.
But deeper.
As if a part of him had already been unwound and tucked away in some unreachable corner of the multiverse.
When Elaria joined him, her face was pale.
"There's more," she said softly. "I think the Chrono Scribe showed us that moment not as a warning—but as a challenge."
Kael arched an eyebrow. "Challenge?"
She nodded. "To change it. To prevent that fate. Or at least… to survive it."
Kael leaned back in the chair. "Then we need to find the next crossroad. And fast."
They didn't notice the crack forming in the floor behind them. A hairline fracture stretching toward the base of the archive's foundation, pulsing faintly—like a heartbeat buried beneath the earth.
Something had followed them back.