Sometimes, the most dangerous prison is the one wrapped in memory."
Selene staggered back, heart hammering against her ribs as the Rift pulsed with silver mist and burning crimson light. The boy standing before her looked like Aarav—but his presence was wrong. His black eyes gleamed like bottomless wells, void of the wonder she once adored.
"Aarav?" she whispered, voice shaking.
The boy tilted his head. "That name feels... distant."He took a step closer. "I remember stargazing. I remember your voice. I remember... pain. Then silence. Now? I am the Rift's will."
Selene's throat tightened. The Rift hadn't just been a passage. It had changed him. Or worse—rewritten him, like an overwritten page in a fading notebook.
🕯 Memories Unravel
"Do you remember the watch?" she asked, holding up the silver timepiece.
A flicker of something passed over his face—recognition? Confusion? Grief?
He looked away. "I remember ticking. Like a heartbeat. Then it stopped."
Her chest ached. "You gave this to me, Aarav. The night we saw the Crown of Selene."
He flinched. "Stop. Don't say that name."
Selene took a step closer, her voice gentler. "You are him. The boy who wrote stories in the stars. Who kissed me like the moon might fall from the sky."
His fingers twitched.
But then his expression hardened. "The boy you knew is gone. He couldn't stop Zahir. He couldn't save you. I became something else... something stronger."
🔥 Fire Beneath the Surface
Cracks shimmered across the Rift's floor beneath them, like broken glass filled with stardust. The space trembled as if reality itself was listening.
"I've seen what's coming, Selene," he said. "You think you can save me. But there's a reason Zahir hasn't stopped you yet."
He raised his hand, and the air rippled.
"Because he wants you to reach me. So he can watch you break."
In a burst of light, a circle of celestial flames erupted around them—Aarav's old power, now warped.
Selene shielded her eyes from the blinding heat. "If you really were Aarav, you'd never use the stars to hurt me."
His black eyes narrowed. "Maybe I'm not him anymore."
⚔ The Rift Battle Begins
Suddenly, he lunged.
Selene dodged just in time, her instincts from her training with Kael kicking in. She spun, drawing from the starlight in her veins, channeling a crescent-shaped wave of lunar magic that met his blazing strike in midair.
A shockwave blasted outward.
Reality around them fractured, revealing endless mirrored versions of themselves—thousands of Aaravs and Selenes in infinite poses: dancing, fighting, kissing, bleeding.
It was the Rift's deepest trick—memories weaponized.
Selene hesitated, thrown off balance by the flood of emotion. In one mirror, she saw herself cradling Aarav's dying body. In another, she watched him vanish in stardust while she screamed.
He attacked again, slicing through three illusions, his voice cracking, "You don't know what it's like to remember everything and feel nothing!"
🌓 A Shattered Truth
Selene dropped to her knees, clutching her head as another wave of mirrored memories hit her.
Then—suddenly—a melody.
Soft. Familiar.
The tune Aarav used to hum when he wrote in his notebook.
Her eyes flew open.
The pocket watch was glowing again, brighter than ever.
She raised it. "You left me a message."
His body froze mid-strike.
"If you're seeing this," the watch spoke in Aarav's real voice, "I'm trapped inside the Rift. It's rewriting me. But if you're still out there, Selene... find my heart."
"Find the boy who still looks at the moon and sees you."
The Final Shard
Aarav gasped. His sword clattered to the ground.
The black in his eyes began to crack, like glass breaking.
"Selene…" he choked. "It hurts…"
She ran to him—but just as she touched his hand—
Everything froze.
The Rift screamed with a high-pitched whine as Zahir's voice thundered through the dimension.
"Touching, really. But the story doesn't belong to either of you anymore."
"The final shard is mine now."
Selene looked up as the stars above shattered like glass—revealing Zahir's monstrous silhouette descending from the heavens.
Wrapped in shadow.
Wearing a crown made of broken time.
To be continued…