"The cruelest erasure is not of pain… but of love."
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📖 [Scene: The Ashborn Encampment – Aedric's Tent, Night]
The Book of the Unwritten pulsed like a living thing, its spine cracking open without being touched.
Aedric sat cross-legged before it, flame flickering around his hands — not out of power, but fear.
> "It called to me," he whispered.
"Like it remembered me… before I remembered myself."
Lyara approached slowly.
> "You don't have to open it yet."
He shook his head.
> "If there's even a single story inside that needs remembering, I must."
The book opened — not to a page, but to a memory.
It wasn't written.
It was lived.
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🌀 Memory Projection – Location Unknown
Aedric stood in a dim, stone-walled room.
Candlelight flickered against old wooden furniture. A lullaby hummed from somewhere nearby — hauntingly familiar.
He followed the sound.
Through the door, he saw her.
Selene.
Not the cold-eyed betrayer she had become, but younger. Softer. Singing.
And in her arms…
A child.
A boy.
Maybe four. Black hair. Silver eyes. A mark of flame faintly glowing on his tiny chest.
> "He has your fire," Selene whispered — not to anyone present, but to the memory of Aedric.
> "And your silence."
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💔 The Forgotten Flame
The child laughed — chasing an ember in the air.
> "What's his name?" Aedric asked the memory, knowing it wouldn't respond.
But it did.
The walls whispered:
> "Riven."
Aedric fell to his knees.
He clutched his chest — the pain wasn't just emotional. The Flame Core flickered violently.
This child wasn't just someone he forgot.
He had been erased.
---
🌑 The Divine Pact
The memory shimmered — shifting now to a council of gods.
Aedric, bloodied and chained, knelt before the Pantheon.
> "You have chosen mortality," one god hissed.
"Then you shall suffer its price."
Selene, desperate, screamed:
> "He didn't ask for this!"
The Masked God stepped forward.
> "Then we take… what he doesn't yet know he loves."
A sigil formed in the air — divine, absolute.
Riven's existence was bound in ink, buried beneath reality itself.
---
⚠️ Back to the Present
Aedric gasped as he returned.
Lyara caught him.
> "What did you see?"
> "My son."
Silence.
> "He was erased before I even knew he existed."
> "Because I chose to be human."
Lyara gripped his hand tightly.
> "Then we'll burn through every page of that book until we find him."
---
🛡️ New Quest Unlocked
> ✅ Quest: Remember the Lost Flame
Find the three fragments of Riven's soul hidden across the Divine Realms. Reforge his presence in the world before the Pantheon locks the Book forever.
> ✅ New Flame Signature: Father's Ember
Strength increases 2x in presence of children, or when protecting innocence. Immune to emotional manipulation tied to memory.
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👁 Final Scene – Caelen Reacts
Caelen stood in a mirrored sanctuary, watching the same memory unfold within his own ink.
> "So… the boy lived."
He closed the mirror.
> "And now he'll burn for both of you."
He turned to a cloaked figure.
> "Send the Pale Wardens. If Aedric tries to reclaim the fragments, make sure he loses something else."
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