The fractures in the sky calmed just enough to let them breathe. The avatars looming in the rifts had not descended fully, their forms blurred, waiting. The world was holding its breath.
Nox's feathers smoldered as he landed before Sid, his gaze sharp, unreadable.
"We move. Now."
Reinhardt grunted, still holding his axe as though daring the sky to collapse. "Move where? Everything is floating rubble and screaming air."
Nox ignored him. He turned to Sid, who was still trembling, his fractured arm pulsing with black and gold.
"Come," Nox said firmly. "There is something you must see. Something that cannot wait."
Sid's throat was raw from screaming, but he managed a hoarse reply. "Now? When the world is..." He gestured at the horizon, where an entire forest folded into itself, vanishing into white nothingness. "...that?"
"Yes." Nox's eyes gleamed. "Because if you don't see this, you won't live long enough to fight back."
Lucien frowned. "What are you planning, raven?"
Nox's wings flared. "Not planning. Revealing. I have carried this secret since before Sid was born. It is time."
The journey was madness. Nox led them across collapsing fields, along shards of earth still tethered by threads of unbroken time. Lucien's Timeglass Aegis strained to stabilize the paths, Reinhardt hacking apart whatever hollow beasts clawed from the cracks.
Finally, Nox brought them to the ruins of Axis — once the capital's deepest vault, now a labyrinth half-buried in shadow. The air here was heavy, pressing against lungs and bone, yet solid compared to the collapsing world outside.
"This place still stands?" Lucien whispered.
"It was built not by mortals," Nox said, striding ahead, talons clicking against stone. "But by gods and keepers, in an age when both remembered their duties."
Torches lit themselves as they walked. The walls were lined with murals, ancient and worn, yet still glowing faintly with divine light. Sid slowed, his eyes catching on one panel.
It showed a towering figure of shadow Ravh'Zereth chained by pillars of golden fire. Beneath it, a second figure: a man-shaped silhouette with eyes of starlight, one hand raised in judgment.
Aureon.
Sid's chest tightened. "This… Aureon sealed Ravh'Zereth?"
Nox turned, feathers brushing the mural. His voice was low, almost reverent. "Not the gods alone. Aureon himself. He was the one who bound the demon lord. He gave the world one chance to breathe."
Sid's fractured arm throbbed as if in recognition. His voice cracked. "Then why… why put himself inside me?"
Nox's gaze softened — the rare look of a creature who carried too many lifetimes. "Because the seal was never meant to last forever. Aureon knew his light would fade. To guard against Ravh'Zereth's return, he needed a vessel who could hold both — light and abyss. Balance."
Lucien stepped forward, disbelief etched across his face. "You're saying this was… planned? From the start? Sid's suffering, his chains, all of it?"
Nox did not flinch. "Yes."
The word struck like a blade.
Sid's breath hitched. His knees weakened until he leaned against the mural for support. "So every step… every fight… every nightmare I thought was mine alone…" His voice trembled. "It was all someone else's choice?"
Silence hung heavy.
Nox lowered his head. "Not someone else's choice. Aureon's will. My duty."
Reinhardt finally broke the silence, his voice rough. "Speak plainly, bird. What duty?"
Nox exhaled slowly, then spread his wings wide. His shadow stretched across the mural, revealing another hidden inscription — a raven carved beneath Aureon's hand.
"I am not only Sid's guardian. I am the Keeper of the Seal. Aureon chose me to guide the vessel who would bear both spark and abyss. To keep the balance until the final decision."
Lucien's eyes widened. "All this time… you weren't just helping him. You were binding him."
Sid's chest ached as he stared at Nox. Betrayal twisted in his gut. "So when you told me to fight, when you told me to hold back, when you told me I wasn't ready..."
Nox's voice was quiet, but steady. "It was not advice. It was the chains Aureon left in me. Commands I had no right to refuse."
Sid's hands shook. He wanted to scream, to curse, to break the raven into pieces. But part of him already knew. Every lesson, every cryptic warning — it had all been steering him here.
"You manipulated me," Sid whispered. His fractured arm flared, black and gold fire twisting violently. "You pretended it was choice. But it was never mine."
Nox met his fury without retreat. "Do you think I wanted this? Do you think I enjoyed chaining a child, forcing him into a destiny carved before he could walk? You think I have not hated Aureon for every feather I've shed under this burden?"
The raven's voice cracked, and for once, his pride fell. "But what is hatred, when the alternative is the abyss consuming everything?"
They reached the heart of the vault — a chamber vast as a cathedral, the ceiling vanishing into darkness. At its center stood a great slab of obsidian, wrapped in both golden chains and black fire.
Sid staggered forward, drawn by instinct. His fractured arm pulsed in resonance, threads of light and shadow stretching toward the seal. He felt Ravh'Zereth thrash within, roaring, clawing to break free. And beneath it, Aureon's calm whisper urging stillness.
Lucien's face paled. "Gods… that's what you've been guarding?"
Nox bowed his head. "The cage. The key. The burden."
Reinhardt stepped forward, jaw tight. "And Sid's supposed to decide whether to open it?"
"No," Nox said. His eyes were dark as cinders. "Sid is the cage. The seal you see here is only reflection. The true prison is in his soul."
The words stole the air from Sid's lungs. He staggered back, clutching his chest. "Me? Then what's the point of this—this slab, this vault?"
"To remind you," Nox said softly. "To show you that you were never free. That Aureon trusted no one else. That Ravh'Zereth can only be chained by one who carries both chains inside himself."
Sid's vision blurred with tears and fury. His voice was a whisper, but it cut like a blade. "Then I was never Sid. I was only a prison given a name."
Lucien stepped between them, his eyes blazing. "No. You're wrong. Sid is more than your damned seal, more than Aureon's pawn. He's..."
"Quiet," Reinhardt said, though his voice held no malice. He looked at Sid, eyes tired but steady. "Boy, you want to break free of their chains? Then make their chains yours. Forge them into something else. Otherwise… you'll never stop being a vessel."
The Seal of Dusk pulsed behind them, golden and black chains rattling in unison. The sound echoed through the vault like a heartbeat.
Sid fell to his knees, gripping his fractured arm. His soul felt split in two, Aureon's calm starfire and Ravh'Zereth's abyss gnashing against each other. Nox's words echoed, merciless and final:
You are both prisoner and key.
And for the first time, Sid wasn't sure which part of him wanted to break the seal more.