WebNovels

Chapter 11 - Chapter 11 – The Banished Doctrine

Time Remaining: 1 Day

 

The sky over Astradim was anything but ordinary. Veins of starlight stitched through layers of void like torn flesh hastily sutured by a careless god. The artificial sun above pulsed with a cold, mechanical rhythm — not warmth, but surveillance. Below it, shattered monoliths lay like broken prayers. Shrines to forgotten truths, swallowed by a planet that had not belonged to the divine in centuries.

 

And beneath this silent rebellion, two brothers walked where gods dared not.

 

The Banished One

 

He stood in the shadow of a half-fallen temple, robed in charred cloth that once shimmered with celestial pride. Now, it sagged with exile. His eyes gleamed — not with madness, but memory.

 

His name was Eralyx.

 

Once known as Eralyx the Fractured Flame, he had stood against the gods during a divine cleansing cycle — a rebellion so thoroughly purged from the archives that even whispers of it were dangerous.

 

"You've come for the impossible," he said, voice ragged from time, but firm. "And yet… I believe you may succeed."

 

Ryu tilted his head. "Nice place. Very haunted."

 

Luto narrowed his eyes. "You knew we were coming?"

 

"I've been dreaming of this moment for decades."

 

He turned, walking deeper into the ruin.

 

"If you're still foolish enough to go through with this… follow me."

 

 

Day One – The Hidden Blueprint

 

Eralyx's sanctuary was no ordinary ruin. Half-sunken into the scorched terrain, it was held together by ancient sigils glowing faintly along the walls. Some pulsed in rhythmic resistance to divine detection. Others? They simply wept — bleeding memory into the floor.

 

"This temple," Eralyx explained, "was once a site of divine coronations. I corrupted it with truth."

 

He led them past relics — broken blades, cracked halos, masks of shattered executioners — and to a vast chamber where diagrams stitched from fire and thought hovered midair.

 

He gestured to a map, drawn by hand on divine parchment. "This is the Riven Dimension. A realm stitched together by fractured divine laws, where execution becomes erasure."

 

Luto's gaze was sharp. "Memory-draining crystals. Soul anchors. Chrono-glyphs designed to bend perception…"

 

"They don't just want to kill your brother," Eralyx said. "They want to erase him. To make him forget who he is — and make the multiverse forget he ever was."

 

Ryu clenched his fists. "They'll try to make Onyx forget us."

 

Luto's voice dropped to a deadly calm. "They've already failed."

 

Eraylx gave a small, solemn nod. "The Riven Dimension shifts space in the blink of an eye. What seems like a path could become a wall, or worse — a memory. And it's guarded by divine beasts that feed on emotion and time. You'll fight just to stay real."

 

"And that's before you even reach the Execution Grounds."

 

 

Day Two – Forbidden Techniques

 

By dawn, their training began.

 

Inside a chamber of twisted light, Eralyx introduced them to ancient and outlawed techniques.

 

"Soul-Tether Transference," he began, unfurling a scroll etched in blood and flame, "is a last resort technique. You forge a tether between your soul and another — allowing you to shield their mind from decay or pull them back from the brink."

 

"But it comes at a cost. If done improperly, it could flood your mind with theirs, overwrite your identity, or worse — cause one soul to devour the other."

 

Ryu whistled low. "So… bad idea unless we're desperate."

 

"Which you will be," Eralyx said bluntly.

 

They also studied Divine Matrix Destabilizers — ways to overload divine glyphwork using paradox logic and mortal intent. And Exit-Rift Tunneling — the only theoretical method of escaping the Riven after breaching the execution ground, assuming they survived long enough to need it.

 

Luto absorbed every detail like a starving tactician. His mind already spinning future outcomes. Ryu, while seemingly unfocused, occasionally touched the relics — and each time, they pulsed.

 

His presence made them remember.

 

That night, the brothers sat on the balcony's broken ledge, legs dangling above a field of frozen flame.

 

"Tomorrow…" Ryu said.

 

Luto nodded. "Tomorrow we stop hiding."

 

 

The Riven Cut

 

The following morning, the temple's final gate stood before them — a fractured portal frame bound by silver coils and melted stone.

 

Luto stepped forward, holding a blade forged from Caelren's forgotten vaults — a blade designed not to kill, but to cut concepts.

 

"You ready?"

 

Ryu grinned, pulling his bandana tight. "I've been ready for twelve years."

 

Behind them, Eralyx watched with hands folded. "Most come here searching for power. You came looking for a brother. That's the kind of madness that shakes gods."

 

He hesitated. "If I don't see you again… remind him of who he is."

 

With a slow breath, Luto sliced the air.

 

The world screamed.

Reality fractured like glass dipped in fire. The sky folded in, inverted, and shrieked as the portal opened — not like a door, but like a wound.

 

And together, they stepped into The Riven Dimension.

 

 

The Wound That Watches

 

It wasn't a world.

 

It was a scream frozen in time.

 

They landed hard on cracked obsidian. Purple skies above churned with silent thunder, divine lightning carving unknown glyphs into the void. Floating spires drifted through the air like the bones of dead titans.

 

Ryu knelt, eyes narrowing. "This place… hates us."

 

Luto scanned the surroundings. "That's because we're not supposed to be remembered here."

 

Every step felt heavier.

 

The laws of time tilted. Gravity shifted. They crossed bridges made from bone, rivers of still flame, and forests of whispering trees — trees that tried to speak their names backward.

 

"We're being watched," Ryu muttered.

 

Luto nodded. "Let them look. Maybe they'll learn something."

 

As they walked, Ryu glanced around. "Strange. Eralyx said this place would be crawling with divine beasts."

 

Luto shrugged. "Maybe we're early… or maybe they're hiding. Or just like we thought it's a trap jackass"

 

Ryu gasped, as if appalled 

 

The Veil Ahead

 

At last, ahead of them, rose a monolith — not built, but grown from divine fear itself. It pulsed with crimson and black, humming with the rhythm of cosmic judgment.

 

The outer veil of the execution ground.

 

This was it.

 

Ryu cracked his neck, face stern.

 

"We're close."

 

Luto lowered his hood, electricity dancing across his fingers.

 

"Let's bring him home."

 

And with that, the two brothers stepped forward — into the gods' most sacred and wretched arena.

More Chapters