he coast howled like it was trying to forget.
Waves slammed into jagged black stone. Salt mist hung in the air like breath held too long. Aiden stood at the cliff's edge, cloak snapping behind him, eyes locked on the ruins half-swallowed by the sea.
Vel'Serin.
The city built into the cliffside, devoured by its own ambition.
What remained now were broken towers, glass bones, and collapsed bridges winding downward into the drowned lower levels.
He could already feel it—beneath the rot, beneath the salt: a hum in the air.
Another Fragment was close.
---
> [Location Discovered: Vel'Serin, the Sunken Archive]
Threat Rating: Tier C – Structural Instability, Corrupted Entities
Sync Potential: High
Current Objective: Reach the Archive Core
Optional: Uncover "The Mirror That Remembers You"
---
Torran stood a few steps back, hood raised against the wind.
"This place gives me a headache."
"It should," Aiden replied. "Reality isn't whole here."
"What broke it?"
"People like me."
---
Inside the Ruins – Descent Begins
The upper levels of Vel'Serin were skeletal, picked clean by scavengers and time. But once they crossed the threshold of the Archive's ancient library, the silence changed.
It wasn't quiet.
It was waiting.
Books floated in shattered stasis-fields, their pages frozen mid-turn. Light flickered across mirrored walls that shouldn't reflect anything—but sometimes did.
> [Temporal Field Detected – Mild Warp]
Passive Effect: Memory Drift (Resist: INT/WIS Threshold Passed)
Warning: Echo Entities Active Below
---
Aiden placed a hand on a glyph-locked door. It hissed open—not because he knew the code, but because the Fragment recognized him.
Inside, a dome chamber loomed.
At the center: a mirror floating above a cracked dais.
It pulsed.
Aiden stepped closer.
And then—
He saw himself.
Not as he was now.
But older.
Colder.
Crowned.
And alone.
---
> [Echo Sync Initiated – Mirror of Convergence]
This reflection does not speak.
It watches.
And it waits.
---
The reflection raised a hand.
So did Aiden—by instinct.
But the reflection moved first.
It cast a spell he didn't recognize.
Frost bloomed through the glass. The mirror pulsed—
And shattered.
A burst of energy surged out.
Torran was thrown back. Aiden dropped to one knee, eyes burning, the Emberheart Core spinning inside him like a second sun.
> [Fragment Absorbed: Converged Self – Timeline Thread #0295-C]
Legacy Sync +4%
Total Sync: 20%
---
A new spell pulsed into his mind—cold, perfect, controlled.
> [New Skill: Glass Requiem (T2 – Echo Tier)]
Type: Mirror / Ice / Mental
Effect: Reflects incoming magic once per cast; backlash applies stagger
Cooldown: 45 seconds
---
Torran groaned. "Was that… you?"
Aiden rose slowly.
"No," he said. "It was a version of me who didn't stop."
---
The air shimmered around them.
Something was coming.
Not just a guardian.
Not just a beast.
But something that remembered him—and wanted him to remember it.
> [Boss Encounter Triggered: The Archive's Warden – Echo-Class Guardian]