Chapter: The Thrones Beneath Stars
The hall of the ancients opened before them like a celestial wound—vast and timeless. Jax walked beside his brother in silence, every step reverberating through the obsidian floor as if the chamber itself was listening.
Above them, the ceiling was not a ceiling at all, but an open sky suspended in nothingness. Stars wheeled silently across it, forming constellations Jax had never seen. He felt as though each spark burned with a consciousness, watching, judging.
"Where are we?" Jax asked.
His brother didn't look back. "The Atrium of Judgment. The space between worlds where the blood of Supremes is weighed."
"You make it sound inviting."
A dry chuckle. "It isn't."
They reached a dais flanked by seven thrones—each carved from a different primal element. Fire, ice, stone, wind, shadow, light, and one that flickered between all forms—a throne of flux. That one thrummed when Jax neared.
He paused. "Let me guess. That's mine."
His brother finally turned, expression unreadable. "Not yet. It recognizes your potential. But the throne does not accept the unproven."
Jax felt it—an unseen force resisting him as he tried to step closer. Like a current pulling him back, testing his resolve.
"What do I have to do?"
"You must reclaim the third fragment."
Jax stiffened. "There are more?"
"There are six," his brother replied, "scattered across the veils of reality. Each sealed in trials only we—the bloodborn of the Supreme—can face. You have two. The third awaits in the Citadel of Falling Time."
Jax narrowed his eyes. "Sounds ominous."
"It is." The brother stepped aside, raising a hand toward one of the throne's carved guardians. A ripple passed through the air, and a glowing portal burst to life—unstable, writhing like a wounded serpent.
Jax peered into it and caught glimpses of a fractured realm. Clocks melting into rivers. Skies raining fragments of tomorrow. Cities collapsing in reverse. Time bent and rewritten.
"You want me to go in there?"
"Time in the Citadel doesn't move forward. It moves… sideways. You will face versions of yourself that never existed. Choices you never made. Futures that could undo you."
Jax swallowed the rising fear. "And the catch?"
His brother's voice was steady. "You must return with the fragment… without losing who you are."
The portal pulsed.
Jax turned toward it. "And if I fail?"
"You won't come back."
No dramatic warnings. No reassurances. Just the truth.
Jax took a breath, feeling the thrum of the two fragments still buried in his chest. He remembered the Supreme's words—You still have much to learn.
Maybe this was how.
He stepped through.
The Citadel of Falling Time was madness.
It greeted him with silence, broken only by the ticking of invisible clocks.
The sky was a swirling mosaic of shattered mirrors. Every surface reflected a different moment—some of his own life, others of people he'd never met. A child version of himself ran past, laughing, chased by a mother he never knew. A war-torn version stood atop a pile of bodies, bloodied sword in hand, eyes hollow.
The world shifted.
A door appeared where none existed.
Jax stepped through and found himself in a hallway where time bent sideways. He blinked—and suddenly he was old. His skin wrinkled, his back bent. He took another step, and youth returned.
"Not real," he whispered, pressing forward.
Then came the voices.
They rose from the walls, from the air, from within his bones.
"You could have stayed. You could have saved them."
"You abandoned her."
"You were never meant to rise."
Each accusation struck like a hammer to the soul.
He saw versions of himself—one who had chosen a peaceful life, another who had embraced rage and become a tyrant. One had died young. One had become a god.
Each one tried to stop him.
"Turn back," the peaceful one pleaded.
"Kill him," the tyrant sneered.
But Jax kept moving, heart pounding, the fire of the fragments guiding him. He clenched his fists and roared, shattering the illusions in his path.
At the Citadel's core, he found it—the third fragment.
It hovered above a platform of cracked glass, suspended in a shaft of light that flickered between night and day.
He reached for it—
And a hand caught his wrist.
His own hand.
Another Jax stood there, clad in armor made from regrets and memories, eyes burning with the weight of impossible knowledge.
"I am who you would become," the double said, "if you take this power without understanding."
They fought.
Steel clashed. Energy cracked. Each strike was like tearing a page from a cosmic story.
Jax faltered.
The other pinned him.
"You're still afraid. Still ruled by doubt."
"I am afraid," Jax growled. "But that's why I won't lose myself."
And then, with everything he had, he let go—not of the fight, but of the fear.
The fragment surged into his chest. The double vanished in a burst of light.
And time, for the first time in the Citadel, moved forward.
Jax stumbled out of the portal into the Atrium of Judgment, smoke rising from his shoulders. His brother was waiting, arms crossed.
"You took longer than I expected."
"I almost didn't come back."
The throne of flux shimmered.
This time, it did not resist.
As Jax approached, the throne accepted him with a flare of starlight and void.
He sat.
Power pulsed around him. The stars above shifted in response.
His brother nodded once. "Now, you are ready."
"For what?"
The chamber darkened.
A door appeared—massive, sealed with seven locks.
His brother looked to it. "To learn the truth of what we were created for."
The final seal clicked once.
The next journey had begun.