It begins in a forgotten monastery, high above the Ashen Peaks.
Monks wake screaming.
Not from dreams—but from memories that were never theirs.
Visions of other lives.
Of sins.
Of screams in sterile rooms.
And then… a knock on the monastery gate.
Not a knock, really.
A scrape.
Bone on iron.
The monks gather.
One opens the gate.
There stands a tall figure—hooded, hunched.
Wrapped in fabric not woven, but imposed—as if stitched from erased thoughts.
A single eye gleams in the shadow of its cowl.
"Have you received the fragments?"
The monk nods, trembling.
The figure steps forward.
"Then the Shepherd comes for the lambs who remember too much."
Meanwhile, Kael and Naia ride south.
News travels faster than them.
People speaking names they forgot.Dreamers waking to old wounds.Lovers reunited with truths they once buried.
But not everyone rejoices.
Whole towns tear themselves apart from memories too heavy.
Some burn their homes just to make the past disappear again.
And in each of these ruins…
The Shepherd is seen.
Kael stops at the edge of a lake.
Naia hands him a cracked mirror. "You should see this."
The mirror reflects Kael's face—But behind it, flickering like a ghost—
A second silhouette.
Cloaked.
Watching him.
Kael grips the mirror. "He's following us."
Naia doesn't deny it.
"He's not just following."
"He's harvesting the broken."
They reach the memory refuge—an ancient library called Vault of Virmar.
Here, scholars and seers record every dream, every vision returned by the Blueprint.
One of them, an old woman named Mariel, greets them.
"You've opened the dam, boy," she rasps. "The waters are rising too fast."
Kael kneels. "Then help me guide it. Make it safe."
But Mariel shakes her head.
"That's not what's coming."
"The Shepherd doesn't kill memories."
"He twists them."
That night, a fire breaks out in the Vault.
Books burn.
Screams echo.
Kael runs through smoke—
And finds Naia, face pale, whispering:
"He's here."
The smoke parts.
And the Shepherd walks in.
No haste.
No rage.
Just certainty.
Kael steps forward, firelight dancing in his eyes.
"You're too late."
"I've already set the truth free."
The Shepherd pauses.
Then lifts a hooked staff.
"Truth is not light. It is weight."
"And I am the one who buries it."
He strikes the floor.
Reality fractures.
Kael's knees buckle.
Suddenly, he sees—
A thousand versions of himself, screaming inside mirrored cells.
Each one remembering something different.
Each one broken by it.
Naia shouts, pulls him back.
"Kael! Don't let him overwrite you!"
Kael grips her hand.
Fights the spiraling visions.
And whispers one word:
"Evan."
The memories synchronize.
All the selves converge.
And the Door within him opens just enough.
He stands tall.
"I am not your prey."
"I am your echo made flesh."
The Shepherd hisses.
"You were never meant to remember."
Kael grins, bleeding from the nose.
"I didn't. He did."
"And now I carry it all."
He slams his palm to the ground.
A wave of memory explodes from him—
Raw. Blinding. Real.
The Shepherd reels back, cloak catching fire.
And vanishes into the smoke.
The Vault lies in ruins.
But its heart survives.
Kael falls to his knees, exhausted.
Naia holds him, whispering, "You survived him."
He shakes his head.
"No."
"I warned him."
Chapter 30 End