❂ Chapter 27: The True Steps to the First Realm
The corridor narrowed until their shoulders brushed both sides. Every step forward sounded like it echoed from behind — not loud, but delayed, like something was walking just a few paces slower, just out of sight.
Jio exhaled through his nose. "Feels like we're walking into a throat."
Havella didn't laugh. Vexi, behind them, pressed her palm against the wall. It pulsed once under her touch — a dull, spongy recoil. She pulled her hand away sharply.
"That's not stone," she said. "It's… layered thought."
"That supposed to mean something to us?" Havella asked, frowning.
"It means we're not walking through a hallway. We're walking through her recollection of one."
"You mean the First Fairie?" Jio asked.
Vexi nodded. "Her memory shapes the path now. We passed Alminice's reach hours ago. This is the part where logic ends."
"And reality?" Jio added.
"That depends how tightly you hold onto it."
The end of the corridor opened into an impossibly vast space — a stairway spiraling in all directions, some upright, some sideways, a few vanishing into the ceiling like roots growing in reverse. The stairs weren't lit, but they were visible, lined with carvings like braided hair or weeping vines.
Each step held text. Not writing. Meaning — etched into space, into form.
Jio stepped onto the first, and the word beneath his foot whispered in his head:
"Boundless."
He stopped. "Did you hear that?"
"No," Havella replied, crouching near another step. Her hand hovered, hesitant. "Mine says... 'Permission.'"
Vexi stared upward. There was no top. Only the sound of steps, already being walked. "Each step is a trial. Not physical. Not magical. Just… truth."
"Truth?" Havella muttered.
"Yes. If you don't accept what the step holds, you'll be stuck in its meaning. Forever."
Jio looked at the second step. His mind tried to read it but it didn't show him words — it showed him a feeling. A memory. His mother's smile, his father's empty chair, a storm he survived alone.
The step read: "Left Behind."
He took it anyway.
His heart tightened, but it didn't break. Not yet.
Havella followed. Her step said: "Worthy Theft." She blinked at it, then pressed forward with a short breath, as if spitting on a wound.
Vexi was slower. Her first read: "Not Yours." The way she clenched her jaw showed it struck deeper than she wanted to admit.
Dozens of steps. Each one different. None of them repeated.
As they climbed — or walked sideways, or inverted — time stopped acting as it should. Havella began speaking of something that hadn't happened yet. Jio answered with something she would say an hour later. Their paths crossed and re-crossed in ways that should've tangled them forever, yet never did.
Still, the stairs spoke.
"Intent."
"Burdened Joy."
"Memory Denied."
"Self Made Lie."
"Returnless Door."
Jio paused at that one. His foot hovered for a long time.
"You don't have to," Vexi said.
"I do," he replied. Then stepped.
He exhaled shakily as it accepted him.
At the hundredth step — or the thousandth, it was impossible to count in this realm — they stopped before a door. It wasn't carved or ornate. Just wooden. Worn. Ordinary.
Havella stepped closer and touched the handle. Her hand trembled.
"It doesn't look like much," she said.
"That's because it isn't," Vexi replied. "Not for us. This is the last step before seeing the First Fairie. Not meeting. Not touching. Just… seeing."
"And after that?" Jio asked.
"Most never get further. They either turn back… or the seeing changes them."
Jio clenched his fist. Bright Call flickered faintly in his palm. "I didn't come here just to look."
"You didn't come here to survive either," Vexi said quietly.
Then Havella opened the door — and light, not from the realm, but from within themselves, poured outward.
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End of Chapter 27
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