The sky above Arkveil was bruised violet, streaked with the black veins of a storm that never rained. Thunderheads gathered like conspirators above the old citadel, casting long shadows over the jagged architecture below. In the highest tower, amidst shattered glass and forgotten scripture, Wale stood before a mirror that no longer reflected his image.
This was no ordinary glass. The Mirror of Marenel was forged from silvered soulglass—an artifact meant to reveal truths no mortal dared to seek. It had shattered a thousand minds before his, but Wale was no mortal anymore. Not since he severed his humanity with his own hand. Now, the mirror showed only flickers—of past selves, future bloodshed, and the endless stretch of shadow that followed in his wake.
He stared at the reflection, watching not himself but the world as it trembled under his orchestration. A fleet of merchant ships in the west now flew his sigil in secret. Armies once sworn to kingdoms had begun shifting loyalties under the table. The faithful were starting to whisper his name as if it were divine.
Power was no longer taken. It was suggested. And the people gave it willingly.
With a flick of his wrist, Wale dismissed the vision. The mirror clouded over like an eye closing in contempt. He turned to the chamber, his long coat sweeping across the rune-carved floor. Behind him, standing half-shrouded in the flickering torchlight, were the last four remnants of the Mirrorborn—beings who had once served the ancient gods but now served Wale.
"You've sown the seeds?" he asked, voice low, cool, and free of emotion.
"They sprout in silence," replied Daelin, the red-eyed warlock of the southern isles. "By the time the world knows your hand, it will already be yours."
Wale nodded. "Good. Let the world focus on Grey's banner. Let them hope."
He crossed the chamber to a table where maps lay open—every kingdom, every mountain pass, every ancient ruin where the pieces of divinity were hidden. The Final Coil, the Sunforged Throne, the Heartstone of Ivalen—all marked. Grey was gathering them, desperately, believing they would help him stop the end.
What Grey didn't know was that each relic drew him deeper into the mirror's trap. Every time he touched one, Wale saw further. Knew more. Controlled more.
Wale traced a finger over Grey's path. "Let him come," he whispered. "Let him believe."
Far to the west, in the burnt remains of Drelmere's forested edge, Grey knelt beside a stream darkened by soot. His hands, scraped and bruised, dipped into the water in silence. The fight against the Dreadbound had taken more out of him than he'd admitted to Chris or the others. Physically, he had survived. Spiritually, he was unraveling.
Chris approached behind him, her boots kicking up ash. "You're not sleeping again."
Grey didn't look at her. He watched the ripples in the water, as if the stream might carry away the thoughts he couldn't.
"He's always ahead," Grey murmured. "Every plan we make, he's anticipated. Every ally we find, he's already touched. It's like he's—"
"—already won?" Chris finished bitterly.
Grey finally turned, his eyes sunken with exhaustion and fury. "Don't say that."
Chris sighed and sat beside him, their shoulders brushing. For a moment, neither spoke. The wind carried only the distant call of mourning doves and the rustle of scorched leaves.
"I found something," Chris said finally, reaching into her satchel. She pulled out a small stone, no larger than a child's palm. It pulsed with a dull, red light.
Grey raised an eyebrow. "Is that...?"
"The Fractured Eye. One of the lesser relics tied to the Mirrorborn." She handed it to him. "It's not powerful, not directly. But it sees things. Truths. Wale's truths."
Grey's fingers curled around it. As soon as he touched the stone, he gasped. Images exploded in his mind—crowds bowing not to kings but to shadows, old gods bleeding from broken thrones, and Wale standing atop a mountain of mirrors, each reflecting Grey's face back at him, twisted in agony.
He dropped the Eye.
"It's not just war," Grey said, trembling. "He's rewriting reality. The world itself bends around him now."
Chris nodded grimly. "Then we can't just fight him. We need to undo him."
In the far north, deep beneath the ruin of Karrhen Keep, Wale descended a stairwell cut into obsidian. The Mirrorborn had warned him of this place—where the Tether still lay hidden. It was the source of the world's bindings, the anchor that kept time, will, and reality structured.
If he severed it, not even the gods could stop what came next.
The chamber at the bottom was silent as death. In its center was the Tether—a suspended knot of light, pulsing in rhythm with the heartbeat of the world.
Wale approached, eyes gleaming with the same madness that once drove kings to genocide. His voice broke the stillness like a hammer to glass.
"Time has had its rule," he whispered. "Now, it will be mine."
He extended his hand.
But just before his fingers touched the Tether, a pulse surged outward. A projection formed—a ghostly visage of an old man with silver robes and golden eyes. The last Guardian.
"You tamper with the bones of creation," the Guardian said. "Do you understand what you are?"
Wale smiled faintly. "I am what comes after."
Without hesitation, he reached through the projection and clasped the Tether.
Back in the southern wilds, Grey awoke with a scream. The fire had died down to coals, but his body felt like it had been torn apart and stitched back together wrong. Chris rushed to his side, alarmed.
"What did you see?"
Grey's voice was hoarse. "He touched something. Something old. I felt it snap. Like the world skipped a breath."
Chris helped him up, eyes wary. "Then we don't have time."
Grey nodded. "We go north. We go to Karrhen."
Wale, now seated atop the broken throne in Arkveil, felt the power shifting around him. The laws of cause and effect, of time and chance, bent slightly with each breath he took. The Mirrorborn knelt at his feet. Daelin trembled slightly as he looked up.
"What are we now?" he asked.
Wale leaned forward, his voice almost gentle. "We are what fills the void when gods abandon their thrones."
In the following days, whispers spread. Lightning split the skies in places untouched by storms. Children spoke in languages they'd never learned. The stars blinked out in certain regions for hours, then returned—moved slightly. The world was no longer right. And the name "Wale" began to be spoken not as a man, but as a force.
Grey stood before the Council of the Remaining in Eldenhall, relics laid out before him. His voice was thunderous, commanding.
"He is not a king. He is not even a monster anymore. He is an idea, planted in every doubt we ever had. But we can still fight. We must."
The Council listened, uncertain.
Chris stepped forward. "We've seen the anchor. The Tether is broken. But reality hasn't fallen apart. Not yet. We have a chance. One last stand."
Reluctantly, the old generals nodded.
Preparations began. An army not just of soldiers, but of memory, of history, of will itself. It was no longer just a battle between two brothers.
It was war for what reality meant.
And far away, in the highest tower of Arkveil, Wale opened his arms to the storm. Lightning kissed his fingertips.
"Come then, Grey," he whispered. "Bring your stories. Let's see which one the world remembers."