The air around Kael burned,but not from heat. From memory. The figure standing before him The First Forgotten wasn't just a lost soul. He was the beginning of loss itself.
The Archive trembled in silence. Flames curled around the Forgotten's body, but they didn't consume him. They bowed. Like fire had once belonged to him and even now, centuries later,it remembered his grief.
"You feel it, don't you?" the figure said.
"Not fear. Not hate.
But the weight of something… missing."
Kael tightened his grip on Soulquill. The blade vibrated faintly, like it too was listening.
"Who are you?" Kael asked.
"Really?"
The figure stepped closer. From his cracked mask, only one eye glowed not red, not gold,but the soft grey of forgotten pages.
"Before the Archive, before the threads,
before even the ink had purpose…
I was the first soul denied remembrance."
He pointed to his chest.
"They took my story…and rewrote the world without me."
A gust of memory-wind blew through the Archive. Kael saw glimpses. A boy standing alone as his village burned.
Screaming names no one else remembered. Hands reaching out only to pass through people like he was made of ash.
"I died in silence," the figure said.
"And the world called that 'peace.'"
Kael's breath caught.
"You're not a villain…"
The Forgotten tilted his head.
"Not yet."
He raised his hand. The sky above the Archive tore and a blazing scroll appeared. Its pages twisted violently,
each one soaked in red.
"This is the Pricebook," he said.
"Each soul who was never remembered,each thread cut before its ink dried."
"One hundred names.
One hundred forgotten truths."
The scroll exploded into embers and scattered across the sky.
"Find them," he whispered.
"Rewrite them.
Prove that remembrance… still matters."
Kael stepped forward. His flame-threaded arm glowed.
"And if I don't?"
The Forgotten didn't move.
"Then the Archive collapses.
The stories you saved will vanish.
And so will you."
Silence fell again. Only Soulquill hummed. Its glow syncing with Kael's heartbeat. Auri's voice echoed gently inside him.
"Whatever path you choose… we walk with you."
Kael looked at the burning sky the scattered pieces of souls lost in time. He clenched his fist.
"Then I walk into the fire. One echo at a time."
The embers of the Pricebook scattered across the Archive sky like dying stars. Each one pulsed softly, calling… crying… waiting. Kael stood beneath them his blade Soulquill trembling in his grip.
"Where do I begin?" he whispered.
The Forgotten turned without a word,
fading into the mist like a shadow never meant to stay. But his voice lingered.
"Begin with the soul that hurts the most."
Suddenly a single ember fell from the sky. It didn't burn. It wept.
Kael reached out. The moment it touched his palm,his threads flared crimson and gold. And the world shattered.
He wasn't in the Archive anymore. He stood in a ruined city,skies choked with ash, buildings whispering with voices of the dead. The ember in his hand glowed brighter.
"Where… is this?"
A voice replied. Young. Broken. Close.
"You're inside the echo."
Kael turned. A child stood there barefoot, hair matted with soot,eyes far too old for his face.
He didn't cry.
He didn't blink.
He just asked:
"Do you remember me?"
Kael took a step forward.
"What's your name?"
The boy looked down.
"They never gave me one."
> "I was born in a war.
Died in one. And no one ever spoke of me again."
The ember in Kael's hand flickered violently. The air pulsed a memory collapsing in real-time.
Flashes surged around them: Children hiding beneath rubble. A mother screaming without sound. Soldiers laughing while cities bled. Kael gritted his teeth.
"This… this was erased."
The boy looked up, tears finally forming.
"Because we didn't matter. They said our story was too small."
Kael fell to his knees. He placed Soulquill in front of the boy.
"Then let me write it."
The blade glowed, pages unfolding from its edge. But the boy stepped back.
"Why now?"
"Why would anyone care now?"
Kael's voice shook.
"Because if we don't…
then silence wins."
The city cracked around them. Buildings screamed. The boy's body began to dissolve into ink.
"You're too late…"
Kael screamed.
"NO!"
He lunged forward grabbing the boy's hand just as the last of him faded.
And whispered:
"I remember you now. You lived. You mattered."
The ink froze. Time stopped. And from that frozen black A single line was written on the page:
"Echo 1: The Child Who Was Never Counted."
The world stopped moving. Kael knelt there,hand still holding the child's fading fingers,Soulquill glowing beside him its pages folded open like wings of truth. In the silent void that followed,
a whisper rippled across the realm:
"One remembered... ninety-nine remain."
The echo dissolved gently not in pain, but in peace. No screams. No fire. Just a warmth that Kael hadn't felt since Auri smiled. He stood up slowly,his hand still trembling. And then he felt it. A pull in his chest. One of his threads flared bright red and weaved itself into the first page of the Soulquill. The words written there burned:
Echo 001: The Child Who Was Never Counted.
Kael whispered the name softly. Even if the world never knew it,even if the Archive never accepted it he knew.
And sometimes…one soul remembering was enough to bring a soul back from oblivion.
Suddenly, the broken world around him snapped shut. Kael stumbled back, landing on the Archive's floor again. The Pricebook's embers still floated in the sky. But now one of them was missing. And where it had been…a glowing doorway had appeared.
The girl his guide stood near it. Her eyes weren't surprised. They were… proud.
"You did it," she said softly.
Kael looked down at Soulquill.Its edge now slightly stained not with blood,
but with a glowing ink that pulsed like a heartbeat.
"I thought it would hurt more," he whispered.
She shook her head.
"Truth doesn't always hurt."
"Sometimes, it just… finally breathes."
From deep within the Archive,
a bell rang.
Soft.
Lonely.
Ancient.
The girl turned toward the sound.
"The others know now."
"The Archive has felt your rewrite."
Kael frowned.
"The others?"
She looked at him, serious.
"You thought you were the only one with threads?"
"Kael… there are others. Some are rewriting too and some are…unraveling."
Kael stepped toward the glowing door.
"Do I follow the next ember now?"
She nodded.
"Yes. But be warned."
"Not every soul wants to be remembered."
Kael took one last look at the Archive sky. The embers had stopped moving. They watched him now.
Judging.
Hoping.
Burning.
He gripped Soulquill tightly.
"One down.
Ninety-nine to go."
"I'll write them all. Even if it kills me."