New Intramuros — Emergency Containment Sector
The lights flickered overhead as the alarms finally ceased. Silence hung, heavy and sharp. The Mirrorborn stood just beyond the shattered threshold, still wearing Sam's face—only this time, it smiled.
Not in mockery.
But in sorrow.
Sam stared at the figure, breath shallow, Mind Split still clawing at his sanity. The voice inside his head—his own, fractured, echoing—whispered truths that hadn't happened yet.
"You're not me," he said, tone low and trembling.
"I'm what you become," the Mirrorborn answered, stepping forward. The way it moved—deliberate, burdened—was more familiar than Sam wanted to admit. "Or rather, what you left behind."
Rael lifted his blade in warning, but the creature didn't flinch.
"Sam," Valencia said, still pale from her own encounter, her voice brittle, "don't engage. That's not just a Rift echo. It's a full mirror anomaly. It thinks it's you."
The Mirrorborn tilted its head. "She's right. I am you, Sam. The you that made one different choice. One moment you stayed. One moment you left. That's all it takes to fracture a life."
"Stop," Sam said, his tone sharper now. His body was still recovering—his Resonance spasming, energy unpredictable. "Why are you here?"
The Mirrorborn turned its gaze to Valencia. "Because she dies. Again and again. And you keep trying to save her in every timeline."
Valencia froze.
"No matter how strong you become… you always fail," it continued.
Sam surged forward, punching the wall just beside the figure. "Say her name again, and I'll tear the Rift out of your spine."
The Mirrorborn didn't flinch. "Do it. Then look in the mirror and realize how many of us you've killed trying to stop the same ending."
Flashback – Five Years Ago, Lower Oras District
A girl stood in the rain. Barefoot. Holding a flute carved from bone. Her eyes, green like stormlight, shimmered with a sadness that didn't belong to a child.
Valencia was ten.
And she had just buried her brother.
She remembered the faces of the scavenger-militants, the smell of scorched earth, and the way her Vein activated for the first time—slicing wind into a cyclone of screams.
She had no one left. Only her name and her anger.
And a single commandment etched into her grief: Survive long enough to destroy the system that made you a weapon.
Present — Containment Hall
Valencia stepped forward. Her expression was unreadable now—no longer fear, but a cold, measured calm.
"I want to see it," she said. "Show me what you saw."
The Mirrorborn hesitated. "It won't save you."
"I'm not asking to be saved."
With a single motion, the creature raised its hand—and the walls bled light.
The Resonance reacted instantly, forming a mind-bridge between Valencia and the anomaly.
Rael shouted, "Valencia, wait—!"
Too late.
Inside the Memory Rift
She stood on a battlefield—not of weapons, but of decisions.
A thousand versions of Sam stood around her. Some weeping. Some kneeling. Some dead.
And in the center, one Sam held her broken body.
"I should've chosen you," that version whispered.
Valencia gritted her teeth, walking through the echo-field. The noise, the guilt, the weight—it wasn't foreign. It was home. All the pain she'd buried, every death she'd witnessed—this was just a sharper echo.
She reached the core of the vision, where a decision burned: Stay, or run.
And without hesitation, she spoke: "I stay."
Back in Reality
Valencia gasped as she collapsed backward into Rael's arms. Her body was trembling, but her eyes were burning with clarity.
"You saw it," Sam said, helping her stand.
"I saw enough," she replied, steady now. "And I'm still choosing this fight."
Sam turned back to the Mirrorborn. "What now?"
"You made a dent," the anomaly said, its voice fading. "But the Rift remembers. And others are coming. One of them wears your mother's face."
The chamber's lights shattered in an instant. Darkness poured in like smoke.
The Mirrorborn was gone.
Elsewhere — The Deep Court Citadel
The Director of Rift Strategy knelt before the central monolith—twenty meters of obsidian etched with timelines.
"The Mind Split has occurred," she said. "Initiate Protocol Lazarus."
Above her, the monolith pulsed once.
Then the names appeared:
Andres Bonifacio
Gabriela Silang
Emilio Jacinto
Sam Rivera
And one final name, flickering at the end:
Josefa Rivera
She smiled.
"They won't survive her."
New Intramuros — Recovery Chamber
Valencia sat beside Sam, bandaged and bruised. Neither of them spoke for a long time.
Finally, she asked, "Do you really think it's you we're fighting?"
Sam looked up at the night sky breaking through the clouds.
"No," he said. "It's the stories they want us to believe. The ones that keep rewriting who we are."
Rael entered then, grave. "We've got movement. Another Rift signature. Eastern border. But this one's… ancient."
Sam stood slowly.
"Then it's time we write our own history."
As they moved to respond, a strange gust of wind passed through the city.
And in its center, a woman stood—draped in war-torn crimson, wielding a kampilan made of molten time.
She turned, revealing the face of Sam's mother.
Only older.
And smiling.