Darkness cradles Kael like a cocoon.
His body floats in the pale-blue light, suspended between sleep and awakening, pain and revelation. Around him, ghostly doors drift through the void—some open to starlight, others scream silently behind locked seals.
The chained figure stares down, a being not of flesh, but of memory, echo, and ruin.
"The others were broken before they reached this place," it says, voice trailing like smoke. "You are the first to hear me without going mad."
Kael blinks slowly. "What… are you?"
It drifts closer. "I am the soul of a forgotten era. The last keeper of the Door Between Worlds. My chains are bound to time. But you—you are still free."
Kael's breath catches. "You called me the Final Key."
The being nods. "You are born of silence, marked by memory, and shaped by loss. The Key was never a weapon. It is a choice."
Images flood Kael's vision—
A woman cloaked in moonlight, whispering a name he almost remembers.
A city collapsing into itself, its people transformed into shadows.
A small boy standing before a locked door, begging it to bring someone back.
Kael sees himself in every scene.
This isn't a prophecy.It's a memory.
His memory.
Suddenly, pain lances through his chest. The light tears apart around him. The chained figure reaches for him, but reality splinters.
Kael screams as he's pulled back—through stone, through time, through something deeper than magic.
Aethermark Academy — underground chamber.
Kael jolts awake, coughing stone dust. The floor beneath him is cracked where he fell, but somehow whole. As if it healed over. As if the chamber was alive.
Naia's voice cuts through the ringing. "Kael! Thank the stars!"
She rushes to him, helping him up, but freezes when she sees his eyes.
They're glowing. Silver-white.
Kael stands. Unsteady, but… different. His voice is quiet, but layered—like two people speaking at once.
"I remember now," he says.
Naia's hand goes to her wand. "Remember what?"
Kael lifts his hand. The runes that once bled are now sealed with gold, no longer raw magic but refined—commanding.
"I remember the Door. I remember what was locked away. And why I was born."
Elsewhere, high in the western watchtower, Master Oryn stares into a scrying mirror.
He sees Kael.
He sees the glow.
And he knows.
"It's begun," he whispers.
Behind him, another figure emerges from the shadows—cloaked in black and silver, with the insignia of a forgotten order.
"Shall we inform the Council?" the figure asks.
Oryn shakes his head. "No. The Council would try to kill him. And if they fail…"
He doesn't finish the sentence. Instead, he turns toward the night, where lightning flickers over the mountains like cracks in the sky.
"…the world ends."