Chapter 19: Echoes of the First Fracture
The sky cracked open like a wound.
Above the ruined canopy of Emberreach, threads of silver light spiraled across the heavens—twisting, splitting, and reforming into something monstrous. The Lunar Rift had widened. And with it, came the whispers.
Shen stood at the edge of the Bloomroot maze, blood dried across his arm, his Voidbrand pulsing like a second heartbeat. Behind him, the corrupted domain he'd just torn through was crumbling—its roots twisting and burning away under some unseen celestial pressure.
Nyxria lay unconscious near a collapsed statue, pale glyphs still flickering across her fingertips.
He knelt beside her, brushing a strand of white hair from her cheek.
She was burning cold. Not from injury, but from something deeper—an internal overload. Her system was reacting to the forbidden glyph she'd touched at the maze's core.
"Hold on," Shen muttered, standing as the wind thickened around him. "We're not done yet."
System Notification:
[World Status Update: LUNAR FRACTURE DETECTED]
→ Regional Effect: Temporal Distortion (Minor)
→ Divine-Class Entity Detected in Emberreach
→ Hostile Factions Inbound
A low growl rumbled through the air—not from any beast, but from the land itself. The roots of the Bloomroot tree were now rising, floating upward like veins ripped from the earth, bending toward the broken sky.
And then he heard it again.
The voice.
"So... you survived the first bloom, God-Slayer."
It was not the system. Nor a memory.
It was Veyrith.
The presence sealed inside his Voidbrand—speaking in tones that didn't echo, but resonated.
"The Thorned Saint was nothing more than a symptom. But you've awakened a disease in the world's script."
"They will come now. Not the fools you fought in Emberreach… but those who remember the First Fracture."
Shen clenched his fist. "Tell me what that means."
"No. Remember it yourself."
And suddenly, it wasn't Emberreach he saw anymore.
It was a garden of stars. A spiral of celestial ruins. A throne made of shattered moons. And a younger version of himself, kneeling with a blade made of ink and silence.
Then—black.
"Shen!"
Nyxria's voice snapped him back.
She was awake, panting, her arms trembling as glyphs unraveled across her skin like broken constellations.
"I saw it," she whispered. "The original cycle. Before the gods rewrote it. Before... any of us existed."
Shen helped her up. "We need to move. The system alert just marked me."
"No," she replied, locking eyes with him. "It marked us both."
Meanwhile, in the Obsidian Spires — Far West
A divine-class beacon flared, signaling a celestial breach.
Onyx-armored sentinels moved in formation.
A masked figure in pale robes looked up at the fractured sky and smiled.
"So, the God-Slayer lives... and he's fractured the Bloomroot's seal."
He turned, voice low. "Tell the Orders. Prepare the Anointed. And awaken the Monarch of Ash."
Back in Emberreach
Shen and Nyxria fled through collapsing streets, navigating abandoned sectors still echoing with distorted time loops. System-glitched shadows flickered through alleyways, stuck between seconds.
Every now and then, Shen felt the Voidbrand pulse—not just with power, but with grief. Fragments of forgotten wars, of names no longer spoken.
He remembered something Veyrith had said before:
"You weren't born a God-Slayer. You became one… when you chose to unmake the stars."
What the hell had he done in that past life?
"Where are we going?" Nyxria asked.
"Out of the city," he said. "Somewhere the world system can't trace us so easily. I know a place."
But even as they escaped, the rift in the sky widened.
And far above, something stirred. A shape with wings of broken glass and a crown of silence. Watching. Waiting.
The next cycle had begun.
System Update – [New Quest Unlocked]:
Cycle of the Forsaken
— Trace the origin of the First Fracture
— Unseal the second memory within the Voidbrand
— Defend the Dreamless Citadel before the Eclipse arrives
Reward: Voidbrand Upgrade – "Chrono-Eater's Pulse"
Warning: Divine-Class Opposition guaranteed
Chapter End Teaser:
In the next chapter…
Shen enters the Dreamless Citadel, a sanctuary built for beings who remember the forgotten timelines.
But inside, the truth about his first life as the God-Slayer will start to unravel.
And not everyone inside the citadel wants him to survive long enough to remember it.