The sun was already high, its double, orange glow flooding the wasteland. Every step was a challenge. The ground beneath our feet grew increasingly irregular—the earth was dry and cracked like an old man's skin in some places, while in others it was covered in a strange, shimmering dust that rose with every gust of wind, whispering inaudible words. This was the dust of Erasure. I saw particles of matter float in the air, blurring the outlines of distant hills, making trees seem to dissolve on the horizon. The world around us was slowly, but inexorably, falling apart.
The Collector walked beside me, his heavy, clay footsteps the only constant sound in this decaying landscape. Sometimes, when the dust of Erasure settled on his surface, I saw his clay tremble slightly, as if fighting against the consuming void. But he never stopped. He was steadfast. He was my constant anchor in this sea of chaos. My mind, though clear thanks to the Book of Signs, was still a battlefield. The Prime Echo, hidden within the Collector, still pulsed in my consciousness, casting a shadow over every recovered memory. I felt that this source of life and death, creation and annihilation, was the key to everything. But its contradictory nature was like a splinter lodged in my newly gained understanding. The voice with the scars, the one that warned against the Soul Foundry, returned in my thoughts. "More lies. More oblivion." Was it a warning, or an attempt to deter me?
The Book of Signs. I felt its presence, its vast knowledge. I began to discern patterns within it that went beyond simple facts. It was a map, as I had indicated earlier. But not just a map of space. A map of time. A map of thoughts. As I "read" it, I felt a new, clean crystal materialize from my hand from time to time, filled with a fragment of recovered truth. I placed these crystals on the Collector's hand, and he, after a moment's hesitation, put them away inside himself. He was my Archivist. My storehouse of memory that could not be forgotten.
We walked across desolate plains, passing abandoned settlements whose clay homes had merged with the earth, almost invisible, as if they themselves had forgotten their existence. There were no traces of people anywhere, only destruction. Sometimes we came across distorted fragments of ancient structures, stones covered in erosion and indistinct runes that the Book of Signs recognized as the language of the ancient Wanderers. They spoke of places of Power, of points where reality was most malleable. They showed the way.
Halfway, in the shadow of a small hill, we came across something strange. An ancient stone circle. These were no ordinary boulders. Each was carved into a spiral shape, and their surface was covered with a thin layer of shimmering Erasure dust. Nevertheless, I felt echoes of ancient energy within them. The Collector stopped abruptly. His obsidian eye scanned the stones, and his clay body trembled slightly. Then I saw it. In one of the stones, near the ground, there was a small, almost invisible, recessed symbol. The same kind I had seen on the casket. And also... on my hand. The Collector slowly, with difficulty, raised one of his clay hands. He pointed to the symbol. "That's... one of the Signs," I whispered. "I remember it. It opens... passages. Passages between Eons." It wasn't a full memory, but a flash, as if the Book of Signs was trying to activate something in my head. These stones were not just a relic. They were a tool.
I approached the stone. Carefully, I touched the symbol on the stone with my hand, the one with the pulsating glow. We both felt it—the Collector and I—a wave of energy. The stone trembled, and the Erasure dust from its surface hissed into the air, forming a vortex. Blue light flowed from my hand, absorbing into the stone. Then I heard it. A whisper. Not from the stone, but from deep within the earth. Millions of voices, barely audible, mingling into one powerful chorus. These were words. Ancient prayers. Forgotten tales. Warnings. These were Echos. Absorbed into the earth. The Book of Signs in my head began to pulse even more intensely, trying to translate these whispers. I understood some of them: "The path is an illusion. Truth hidden in the void. He waits. In the Soul Foundry..." But then the whispers dissolved into chaos. "...Do not trust the clay... Memory is a gift... Oblivion is... the only path..." The voices mixed. The Architect's voice. The Whisperers' voice. The Wanderers' voices. All battling for dominance.
The Collector fell to his knees. His clay shell began to crack. Small, glowing crystals, the ones he had absorbed, began to emerge from his body, shimmering in the light of the suns. It was too much. Too many Echos. "Collector!" I cried, touching his shoulder. He was cold. I clenched my hand, trying to break the connection with the stone. The energy subsided. The whispers fell silent. The stone stopped glowing. The Collector's crystals stopped emerging. The Golem slowly rose. His eye scanned me, and I saw unimaginable weariness in it. "It's... dangerous," I whispered. "Too much Truth at once. My memory... is still fragile. I must build it slowly." The Collector nodded, accepting this with silent understanding. Now I knew. The Soul Foundry would not just be a place of knowledge. It would be a test. A place where Truth and Lie would clash in a deadly embrace, and I would have to learn how to manipulate them to survive. The path was long, and each step revealed new, terrifying layers of oblivion.