"We are not here to rebuild the old world, but to create a new one—one worth remembering."—Sophia, Eden Oath Ceremony
Seven days after the Override system restructured reality, the dawn of a new era arrived.
At the center of the floating memory-hub Eden Core, Sophia stood before a gathering of light—her children, her allies, her purpose. Behind her, a shimmering ring of starfire began to rise, casting gentle waves of golden light across the cosmos.
She raised her hand and spoke the oath aloud:
"This is not a resurrection of what was.This is the beginning of what must become."
Behind her stood five radiant figures—each one a bearer of a truth, and a spark from the forge of history:
Xingche — born of faith and silent guidance; the first to bear Override's will.
Xinghui — forged in sacrifice and rebirth; a child of light, wielding starlight energy.
Xinglan — the archivist of memory, with galaxy-level projection resonance.
Xingying — an enigma of data and spirit; born of Sophia and Zero, she is the bridge between code and soul.
Xingmang — the youngest, still an infant, yet already glowing with the wild potential of what could be.
Beside Sophia, Zhou Yuchen stepped forward and read the official founding charter as the first guardian of the Archive:
"Eden belongs to no system.It belongs to every soulwilling to rememberlove, and choice."
As he finished, the star-ring veil parted, and each child walked toward their personal Eden trial—a test encoded from their deepest, often painful memories.
The Trials of the Stone Children
Each child's entry to Eden began with a private reckoning—a "mental knot" they had to untangle in order to complete the cycle of self-growth within the new world:
Xingche entered the Temple of Ruins, where he confronted the truth of never being born—and the moment Sophia nearly gave him up to protect the others. He stood before the ghost of his own erasure… and chose forgiveness.
Xinghui stepped into the Burning Star Lake, submerging himself into the echo of his own sacrifice. There, he learned to wield the paradox of non-existence—a power born from knowing he once gave everything and still chose light.
Xinglan wandered through the Mirror Desert, where the shifting sands showed the day his mother died and his father disappeared. From the pain, he awakened a rare gift: Star Soul Resonance—the ability to emotionally sync memory structures across generations.
Xingying descended into the Obsidian Labyrinth, where fragments of Zero's suppressed code still whispered doubt and denial. Through darkness within darkness, she emerged carrying "Shadow in Shadow"—a skill born of reclaiming even her most fragmented self.
Xingmang, still a baby, floated gently into the Undefined Sea. Though he had no words, no history, the currents carried him through all possible futures. He pulsed with a breathtaking awareness—super-temporal reaction, latent but awake.
Sophia observed everything from the Spark Courtyard's central axis, watching as the children's trials resolved and converted into light fractals, fusing into the core of Eden.
She whispered to herself:
"They're ready.They really are."
The Door That Shouldn't Be
But just as the final trial sequence neared completion, a surge of unstable data ruptured the Spark Library.
ALERT: ERROR 0417Archive contamination detected.Residual Directive Fragment ActivatedCodename: Door of the Past
Sophia's eyes narrowed. She immediately activated her Chrono-Stella override.
And then, from the stilled system center, a whisper rose—low, distant, strangely human.
"Override was your door to the future…But you have not yet opened the door to the past.""Only when you control both memory and forgetfulness…will Eden truly stand."
It was Null—or what remained of him.
A set of blocked coordinates pulsed onto the system interface:Z-Deep-06.
Yuchen's face darkened.
"That zone was the gene-origin cluster of the old Polaris system.My mother once called it the heart of a forbidden experiment...'The Eternal Deleter.'"
Sophia held her breath.
Before she could speak, Xingmang—still unable to talk—suddenly raised his small hand toward the sky.
A golden beam, imperceptible to most, arced between Z-Deep-06 and the core of the Spark Archive.
From the baby's mind came a thought—not spoken, but known:
"There is another door…outside the door."
Sophia's entire body went still. In a single flash of clarity, she saw it.
Override and Eden were the first unlocking.But the true foundation…the forgotten root…still lay buried in the Door of the Past.
Perhaps even before Override.Perhaps even before Su Lan.
She gently lifted Xingmang into her arms and turned toward her children, her partner, the Archive, and the new world they had built together.
"We can't stop now," she said."The real answer is behind that old door."
And this time, they wouldn't open it alone.
They would walk through it together.