The word "Mother" hung in the air like a bell tolling in the stillness of the underground vault.
Elen stared, frozen.Althar took a step toward Ael, whose hand still lingered near the black cube, trembling.
"Ael?" Althar's voice was calm but firm, steady like a hand reaching through a storm. "What did you see?"
Ael didn't respond. His eyes—usually sharp and mischievous—had glazed over, staring past the chamber walls into a place that wasn't here.
Suddenly, he gasped and stumbled backward, eyes wide in terror. His knees hit the stone, palms slamming down to stop his fall. The cube stopped spinning.
"It's not just a memory," he muttered. "It's alive. It remembers me."
Althar crouched beside him, a hand on his shoulder. "What did it show you?"
Ael took a few deep breaths. His voice was distant. "A palace… cold and high above the clouds. Servants with faces hidden behind masks. A woman dressed in black starlight. I called her 'Mother.' But she never looked at me like one."
Althar and Elen exchanged a glance. Elen stepped forward. "You remember where it was?"
Ael shook his head. "No names. Just… impressions. Emotion. Cold, bitter loneliness. And the sound of chains being forged beneath her throne."
Althar's grip on Ael's shoulder tightened. "She raised you."
"No," Ael said quickly. "She created me. That much I felt. I wasn't born—I was made. But something went wrong. I felt it. I wasn't what she wanted."
"And she discarded you?" Elen whispered.
Ael nodded, looking down at his hands. "She locked me away. Sealed my memories. Maybe even sent me into this world to rot… like a failed experiment."
Althar stood. "She underestimated you. You're free now."
But Ael wasn't listening. He looked up at the relic. "That thing… it has more. I felt other voices, other names calling. It's like a hive of forgotten selves."
"We need to be careful," Elen warned. "One wrong connection, and it might overwhelm you. It's not just a library—it's a convergence of abandoned truths."
Althar nodded. "Then we don't rush it. We seal it. Protect it. And use it when the time is right."
Above, the Keep had grown tense.
Though no one knew why, birds had stopped singing that morning. The wind had changed direction, carrying with it a scent of iron and ash.
Rell, one of the scouts, burst into the war chamber. "Commander Althar! Riders from the south—three of them. They wear the mark of the Executioner."
Althar's face hardened. "Just three?"
"Yes, but… they aren't normal. They don't cast shadows."
Althar turned to Elen and Ael. "Hide the relic. Now. Bury the vault. Make it vanish."
"And you?" Elen asked.
"I'll greet our guests."
Outside the gates, the riders had already arrived.
Three figures cloaked in twilight-gray robes sat atop horses with eyes of red glass. They made no sound. The leader, taller than the others, held a staff crowned with a spinning ring of bone and flame.
Althar stepped forward, wearing the mantle of Warden.
"I am Commander Althar of the Free Keep. State your purpose."
The lead rider dismounted, his movements smooth and inhuman. His voice was hollow, as though spoken through empty chambers.
"We seek what was disturbed. A relic. Ancient. Forbidden. It calls to us."
"There's no such relic here," Althar lied smoothly. "Only stone, sweat, and broken soldiers."
The rider tilted his head. "Lies are not tolerated. The Empress has sent judgment."
Flames burst from the staff, curling into the shape of a serpent before vanishing into the ground.
From the scorched soil, something rose.
Not a beast. Not a man.
A shadow—humanoid, but faceless, forged from magic and ash.
The Executioner had sent her envoys.
Althar's hand moved to his blade. "Archers," he whispered.
The Keep's walls bristled with bowstrings.
The shadow took a step forward.
But before anyone could act—
A pulse echoed from below.
The Relic had stirred again.
Even buried, it reached upward like roots seeking light.
The sky darkened unnaturally, as if night had arrived hours too soon.
The lead envoy snapped his head toward the Keep.
"It has awakened."
Deep in the vault, the cube pulsed—just once—then turned black.
But in that pulse, dozens of other names had flared in hidden places across the world. Ancient spells stirred. The forgotten began to remember.
And far away, in her obsidian palace, the Empress opened her eyes.
A name had returned.
One she had buried with her own hands.
And it whispered a prophecy she had long denied:
"The nameless shall rise."