There was no sky.
Only a dome of cracked obsidian overhead, pulsing like a dying heart.
The boy stepped through the Veilgate, and for a moment, he thought he hadn't moved at all. The ash still clung to his boots. The cold still bit at his bones. But the weight of this place was different—heavier, older. This wasn't a realm that had died.
This was one that had never truly lived.
❖ You have entered: [Gravemind's Cradle]
❖ Realm Alignment: Unknown / Post-Collapse
❖ Multiversal Coordinates: Broken
❖ System Warning: This realm rejects linear causality.
❖ Adaptive Logic Mode: ENABLED
❖ Quest Continuation: Echo II – The Chained Star
→ Objective: Locate and Claim Memory Fragment II
→ Threat: Dreamless Crown Presence Confirmed
The air shimmered.
Not with heat, but memory—like every breath carried the thoughts of things that once almost existed. Shapes moved just at the edge of vision: tall, faceless, bound in golden wrappings and rusted armor, whispering to one another in dialects that folded time like paper.
The boy kept walking, hand on the hilt of the blade the System had summoned after the Ashen Veil trials: Nullfang—a weapon without weight or shadow.
His System pinged.
❖ Notification: [Enemy Faction Detected]
❖ Hostile Class: Dreamless Crown
❖ Active Agent: [Thronebearer Class – Variant]
❖ Designation: YOU
He froze.
❖ Warning: Parallel Self Encounter Imminent
❖ Combat Lock Activated – Class IV Reflection Protocol Engaged
Across the obsidian plain, a figure stepped forward.
Same height.
Same face.
Same eyes.
But different.
This version of him wore a mantle of white fire and pale steel. His system symbols shimmered behind him like constellations rewritten in blood. And when he spoke, his voice echoed—not just through the air, but through possibility itself.
"So… you made it through the Veil," the other him said.
"Let me guess," the boy replied. "You're the part of me that didn't break the throne?"
"No. I'm the part that took it—and kept it."
He drew his blade: a twin to Nullfang, but inverted—obsidian curved with white veins. A crown of shattered light floated above his head, constantly breaking and reforming.
❖ Name Registered: Thronebearer Variant [Ash Prime – Preserver Line]
❖ System Affiliation: Dreamless Crown
❖ Threat Rating: Cataclysmic (Do Not Underestimate)
❖ Relationship: Self-Origin Divergence – Timeline Collapse Point: [First Coronation Rejection]
"The throne doesn't need a breaker," the variant said. "It needs a keeper. Someone to hold the multiverse together."
"And you think wearing a dead god's crown makes you fit for that?"
"Better than tossing it into the void."
They clashed.
The first strike shattered the ground between them.
Nullfang met its inverse, sparks screaming from the clash of conflicting destinies. Neither of them moved like mortals. They warped around each other, folding time and space in bursts of raw system energy.
The variant twisted mid-air, palms glowing with codefire.
❖ Skill Activated: [Divine Echo – Temporal Rewrite]
→ Effect: Rewinds combat state by 3 seconds. Applies memory fatigue to target.
The boy staggered as time buckled around him, repeating a fatal moment he had narrowly avoided. This time, the blade caught his side.
Blood hit the black ground.
But it didn't stop him.
❖ Trait Activation: [Ash-Born Resilience]
❖ Passive Skill Evolved: [Pain Loop Override] – You will learn from agony.
He spun and brought Nullfang across the variant's chest, tearing through the illusion of divinity.
"You're not a god," he spat. "You're just a scared version of me who said yes when he should've walked away."
The variant recoiled, eyes burning.
"You don't understand. Without the throne, the Realms collapse. I saw it happen. I held the pieces together with my own blood!"
"Then maybe they were meant to fall."
He didn't wait for an answer.
The final blow wasn't strength—it was will.
He drove Nullfang into the heart of his other self and whispered, "I'm not here to save the multiverse. I'm here to end its chains."
Light exploded.
The obsidian ground cracked.
And when the vision cleared, only he remained—bloody, exhausted, but standing.
❖ Combat Complete: Thronebearer Variant Defeated
❖ Memory Anchor Absorbed
❖ You have claimed: [Echo II – The Chained Star]
❖ Memory Fragment Synced
❖ System Authority Ascension Imminent…
The System went quiet for a moment.
Then…
❖ Authority Level: Thronebreaker — Rank III
❖ New Subsystem Unlocked: [Reality Sculptor]
→ You may now shape limited narrative laws within unstable Realms.
→ Warning: Use consumes memory and accelerates fragmentation.
❖ Title Gained: "Kinslayer of the Crowned"
→ +10% effectiveness against alternate selves and Dreamless Crown agents.
He stood alone beneath the false sky.
The second fragment burned inside his chest, right beneath the first.
There was only one left.
And the path to it would lead deeper than any world—beyond broken timelines, collapsed ideologies, and the corpse of the multiverse itself.
It would lead to the Thronesea.
The place where all Bearers were born.
And where most of them were buried.
❖ Final Echo Target: "The Thronesea Abyss"
❖ Access Requires: System Dive – Multiversal Core Sync
❖ Danger Level: Absolute / Worldkiller Threshold
❖ Coordinates Locked. Begin synchronization…
The ground rumbled.
The sky wept black flame.
And something stirred in the dark—something ancient, bound in chains of song and bone, watching him with interest.
"You really plan to break it, don't you?" came a voice not his own—echoing from the Cradle itself.
He didn't answer.
He just turned, letting the flames wrap around his body as the Veilgate opened once more.
Next stop: the deepest pit of memory and power.
And the last throne.