The sun rose differently now.
Not from divine command, not by scripted cycles of the Architects, but simply because the world chose to breathe again. The wind followed no sacred path. The rain no longer answered to ancient pacts.
Everything was free.Everything… except the Dream.
Deep beneath the golden fields, below even the layers of reality Erik had rewritten, something stirred.
A flicker.
A sigh.
A memory.
It wasn't tied to time or place. It didn't belong to any god, devil, or soul. It wasn't meant to exist—but it did.
Because even when the world forgot him… the Dream remembered.
Somewhere in a quiet village surrounded by meadows and starlight, a boy named Ilan woke from a strange sleep. His breath hitched as he sat up in bed, sweat clinging to his brow despite the chill of dawn.
His mother rushed in, eyes wide. "Another one?" she asked gently.
He nodded, staring blankly at the wooden ceiling.
"It was the same man," he whispered. "The man with silver eyes."
His mother tucked a blanket around his shoulders. "What was he doing this time?"
"Standing in a garden. Watching the stars."
She smiled gently. "That doesn't sound so bad."
"It is when the stars are whispering his name."
Outside the window, the wind brushed past the trees in a strange rhythm.
Ilan looked out, then back at his mother. "Mom… is it normal to dream of someone who doesn't exist?"
She paused. Her smile faltered.
"I don't know," she admitted. "But sometimes… the world remembers people in strange ways."
That same night, Ilan dreamed again.
But this time, he wasn't just watching.
He was inside it.
He stood in the middle of a ruined battlefield. The sky was cracked. The air hung heavy with silence. And in the center stood a man with short brown hair, tired eyes, and no sword—only his hands outstretched to the stars.
Erik.
But this Erik looked… peaceful.
The dream shifted.The battlefield melted into a throne room.Then a forest.Then a golden field.
Every version of the world Erik had touched played out like pages of a forgotten book. And Ilan read every word without understanding why he could.
Until a voice echoed through the dream:
"You were never supposed to see this."
Ilan turned.
Erik stood there now—facing him directly. Not as a dream. Not as a god.
As a man.
"Who… who are you?" Ilan asked.
"I was someone who broke the chains of the world," Erik replied. "So others could live freely."
Ilan frowned. "Then why am I dreaming of you?"
Erik smiled sadly.
"Because even peace carries echoes. And not all echoes fade."
He extended a hand, not glowing with power, not blazing with glyphs.
Just… a hand.
"You've touched something buried deep in the world. A seed that shouldn't have sprouted yet."
Ilan took a cautious step forward. "Is that… bad?"
"No," Erik said. "It's inevitable."
As Ilan reached out to take Erik's hand—
Everything shattered.
The dream collapsed.
He woke with a scream.
His window had blown open in the night. Wind rushed in, pages from his sketchbook scattered across the floor. Each page—drawn without memory—held images he didn't recall making.
A sword made of starlight.A throne of shifting words.A door splitting open with a burning glyph.
And at the bottom of the last page…
A name.
ERIK.
Handwritten in his own shaky script.
His mother barged in again, clutching her pendant. "Ilan?! What happened?"
He looked at her, eyes wide with terror and wonder.
"I think… he's trying to come back."
Elsewhere…
In the void between stories, where the Vault once stood and the Throne once ruled, a crack formed.
It wasn't loud.
It wasn't wide.
But it was there.
Through it, a thread of golden light slipped out, winding its way through dreams, across timelines, toward a world that was never meant to remember.
And behind that crack…
A presence stirred.
Not out of rage.
Not for war.
But with curiosity.
And longing.
"Was it enough?"
The voice was quiet.
But the stars seemed to answer.
Not yet.
Back in the village, Ilan sat beneath the willow tree with his sketchbook.
He couldn't explain why, but he began writing a story. Not something he had learned or read. It came from somewhere else. A feeling. A dream. A whisper in his chest that wouldn't let go.
The tale of a man born with the soul of something greater. A godkiller. A guide. A Lockbreaker.
A man who gave up everything for a world that would never know him.
He titled it simply:
"The One Who Wasn't Chosen."
And as he wrote the final sentence—
The air shimmered.
For just a moment, the wind spoke in a voice that only Ilan heard:
"Thank you."
And the petals of the willow tree turned silver.
Somewhere far away, across stars that now spun with free will…
A man stood in a quiet field, barefoot, watching the sky.
His name?
He didn't remember.
But when the wind whispered "Ilan," he smiled.
Because though the world no longer needed him—
Someone still dreamed.
And sometimes, a dream…
Is all it takes to begin again.