Age 13
Temple of Broken Time
Chamber of Reversals
The chamber was alive with clocks.
Not the kind that ticked seconds—these were stranger. Some looped backward. Others stuttered, or spun without hands. One floated, suspended in air, bleeding golden sand into nothingness.
This was where the Ascendant Candidates trained.
Kael stood at the center, surrounded by flickering runes etched into obsidian tiles. He'd grown taller, leaner—bones sharpened by training and silence. His eyes, once a pale gray, had grown darker, as if absorbing shadow.
"This," said Instructor Veyra, gesturing to the largest relic—a vertical ring of metal humming with violet light—"is the Eye. It sees a few seconds into your past. Your task is simple: defeat what you were."
Kael tilted his head. "Defeat... myself?"
Veyra smiled beneath her silver mask. "Exactly. If you cannot overcome your own echo, you will never master the Tower."
She snapped her fingers.
The Eye flared.
Kael's echo stepped from it—a perfect replica, down to the scars and cold gaze. But the echo moved first, anticipating him. It slashed at Kael's chest with blinding precision.
Blood splattered.
Kael reeled back, gritted his teeth. He'd been told the Eye didn't show illusions—it created temporal folds, bending reality backward like paper.
The echo came again.
This time, Kael dodged—barely.
His own movements were predictable. That was the trick. If he was too rigid, his echo knew what he'd do. If he was too erratic, it would still counter his every move, having already done it once.
He had to become someone unwritten.
He closed his eyes. Inhaled. Listened not to logic, but to instinct—that quiet hum underneath memory.
Then he struck.
A feint to the right. Duck. Pivot. Turn left.
A move he'd never trained, never repeated.
The echo hesitated.
Kael drove his blade upward—straight through his double's throat.
The echo shimmered, then shattered into violet dust.
The Eye went still.
Veyra stared, then bowed slightly. "You are the first to win on your third breath. The Broken Gods watch you."
Kael stood, chest rising, mind spinning.
He had seen what might come. Fought against the future.
And won.
But that night, as he slept in the ash-chambers, he dreamed of Lira again.
She smiled. Reached out. Touched his hand—
—and vanished.
Kael awoke with a start, heart pounding.
"Why do I still dream?" he whispered to the dark.
"What part of me refused the blade?"
He stared at his hand, flexing the fingers that once gripped hers.