The Shattering
Lioren didn't feel herself vanish.
She felt herself break.
Her vision split into three white flashes....
brightness,silence,coldness...each ripping her awareness apart and scattering the pieces like frightened birds.
When her eyes opened,she lay on a floor that was not a floor.
It was made of memory.
Slabs of old moments,layered like mismatched tiles :
Her childhood bed
The dusty field behind her home
The night she first fled the Watchers
The moment she saw Aurelianth for the first time
The second she had whispered Solance's name for the very first time
All overlapping.
All flickering.
She pushed herself up slowly.
Her voice trembled.
"…Where am I?"
A voice answered her.
A voice that sounded like her own.....
But younger.
Softer.
Fragile.
"You're somewhere you never wanted to return."
Lioren whipped around.
A girl stood behind her.
Small.
Trembling.
Eyes wide with fear.
It was....Her.
At age eight.
The age when the Watchers first came for her village.
Lioren took a step back.
"No… no...you're not real....you're not..."
But the child-Lioren shook her head.
"I am the part of you that stayed afraid."
Lioren swallowed.
"That part is gone."
The child stepped closer.
"No.
You hid me.
You covered me with courage because Aurelianth and Solance needed you.
But you didn't heal me."
Lioren flinched.
The child-Lioren's voice cracked.
"And now the Arbiter wants me."
Thunder tore across the broken sky as if fate agreed.
Lioren closed her eyes.
"You don't belong here.
You're a fragment."
"You're the anchor,"
the child whispered.
"Anchors sink."
Lioren choked on her breath.
Aurelianth and Solance : The Race Against the Fracture
Aurelianth stood shakily on the cliff's edge,
arms still blackened with law-burns.
Solance knelt beside him,glowing faintly,
hands trembling over Aurelianth's scorched skin.
"…I can't heal this."
"It's fine."
"You're in pain....."
"It's fine."
Solance's glow flickered in anguish.
"…She's gone."
Aurelianth turned sharply,eyes fierce.
"She's NOT gone.
She's taken."
Solance whispered:
"…And we can't feel her."
That was the worst part.
The tri-bond....now braided,stronger than ever should have allowed them to feel even the faintest trace of Lioren.
But her presence was severed,cut off completely.
As if she had been dropped into a world where their light could not reach.
Aurelianth forced himself to stand.
"We're going after her."
Solance grabbed his arm.
"Aurelianth....you can barely walk...."
He shook him off.
"She needs us.
I'm not letting the Arbiter break her."
Solance stood too,legs shaking.
"…Then we go.
Together."
Aurelianth nodded.
"You and me."
Solance whispered:
"…And her."
They both pressed their palms to the ground.
The bond pulsed....trying to find Lioren.
A golden thread shot out...snapped.
Tried again....snapped.
Aurelianth growled.
Solance cried out:
"…Something is blocking her signal."
Aurelianth's eyes narrowed.
"Then we break the block."
He slammed his fist into the earth.
The ground cracked.
A seam of light appeared.
Thin.
Faint.
Barely holding together.
But it was enough.
Aurelianth grabbed Solance's hand.
"Hold tight."
Solance whispered:
"…Always."
They jumped in.
Realm of the Anchor
Lioren walked through her own memories as if navigating a home she had abandoned.
Her childhood room stretched in one direction the night sky from the day she joined the villagers in hiding stretched in another.
Scenes looped.
Moments she thought she had forgotten played like broken puppets:
Her mother crying quietly.
Her father whispering, "Stay hidden."
The sound of Watchers scraping the walls.
The first time she ran.
The first time she was truly alone.
And the first time she felt chosen by the bond.
Lioren touched a floating memory of her younger self...And the younger Lioren flinched
as if the touch burned her.
"What is this place…?" Lioren whispered.
The child answered:
"The Arbiter made it.
It's all the moments when you doubted yourself."
Lioren froze.
"What?
Why?"
The child-Lioren smiled sadly.
"Because you're the anchor.
Anchors hold others together.
But anchors break first."
Lioren's knees weakened.
"I'm not breaking," she whispered.
A new voice drifted from behind her.
A woman's voice.
Older.
Cruel.
"Then why do you sound like you're begging?"
Lioren turned....
And gasped.
Another version of herself stood there.
Older.
Dark-eyed.
Cold.
This version looked like who she might have become if fear had swallowed her whole.
Aurelianth would have called her....
The shadow-self.
The shadow-Lioren stepped forward.
"You're weak."
Lioren stepped back.
"No."
The shadow smirked.
"You cried when the bond broke."
"I...."
"You've always been afraid."
Lioren shook her head.
"Fear doesn't make me weak."
"You are the softest part of the tri-bond.
The part that can't fight.
The part that can't kill.
The part that can be taken."
Lioren's breath trembled.
"That's not true."
The shadow laughed softly.
"Then why did the Arbiter choose you?"
Lioren's mouth opened...but no answer came out.
The shadow-Lioren leaned in close.
"Because you are the easiest piece to break."
Lioren stumbled backward,falling onto shattered memory-floor.
The child-Lioren trembled behind her,hiding.
The shadow stepped closer.
"And when you break....
Aurelianth breaks.
Solance breaks.
The bond snaps.
Everything collapses."
Lioren whispered:
"No....No, they won't.....they're stronger than...."
The shadow hissed:
"Then why can't you feel them?"
Lioren froze.
She couldn't.
Not Aurelianth.
Not Solance.
The bond was silent.
Empty.
Dead.
The shadow-Lioren knelt beside her, voice soft:
"You are the anchor, Lioren.
You hold the weight.
You sink first."
Lioren's hands shook violently.
She felt herself cracking.
"Stop…please…stop…"
The shadow reached out and touched her chest.
Lioren screamed...her light flickering...as her identity split again.
Aurelianth : Rage Against the Maze
Aurelianth landed hard in a world of gold shards.
Solance crashed beside him,rolling into a crouch.
They stood on a platform floating in an endless maze of golden light and broken paths.
Solance's glow flickered in panic.
"…Aurelianth.....this is HER realm....this is her FEAR....this place is built from HER....!"
Aurelianth clenched his fists.
"Then we break it."
Solance grabbed his shoulder.
"You can't fight someone's inner world....!!"
Aurelianth snarled:
"I'll tear down every memory if I have to."
Solance's eyes widened.
"…Aurelianth…"
But Aurelianth's voice softened, trembling.
"She's in pain.
I can feel it...even through nothing.
I can FEEL it."
Solance took his hand.
"…Then let's find her."
Together, they ran through the maze.
Lioren's Breaking Point
The shadow-self pushed Lioren to the ground.
The child-self cried behind her.
The memory-floor flickered under her palms.
Lioren gasped:
"Stop...please...you're not real....you're just....
you're...."
The shadow whispered:
"I am the part of you that knows the truth."
Lioren looked up with wet eyes.
"…What truth?"
The shadow leaned in.
"You're not worthy of being the anchor."
Lioren froze.
Everything inside her stilled.
She whispered:
"…Yes I am."
"Are you?"
"…Yes."
"Are you really?"
"…YES...!!" she screamed.
And the realm cracked.
A massive fissure split the world in two...light bursting from the break.
The shadow staggered.
The child-Lioren gasped.
And Aurelianth's voice roared through the crack:
"LIORRRRENNNNNN...!!!"
Lioren's breath hitched.
"Aurelianth.....?!"
Solance's voice cut in:
"LIORREEEEN....WHERE ARE YOU....!!"
Her heart surged.
"AURELIANTH....!!
SOLANCE...!!
I'M HERE....!!"
A golden light blasted through the realm..the tri-bond straining to reconnect.
The shadow-Lioren shrieked:
"NO...!!
YOU ARE MINE....
YOU BELONG TO FEAR....!!"
Lioren stood slowly.
Shaking.
Tears running down her face.
"…I belonged to fear.
But not anymore."
The shadow screamed.
Lioren stepped toward it.
And whispered:
"I choose them."
The entire realm split open.
Aurelianth and Solance crashed through the fracture in a burst of gold, silver, and amber light.
Aurelianth caught Lioren in his arms instantly.
Solance glowed so bright it burned the shadows away.
Lioren sobbed into Aurelianth's shoulder.
"You came....you came....you came....!!"
Aurelianth held her so tightly the realm itself trembled.
"Always."
Solance wrapped around both of them, crying.
"We will NEVER
Let you fall...never....
NEVER...!!"
The shadow-self howled...cracking apart as the tri-bond's evolving light destroyed every false version of Lioren's fear.
Lioren whispered into their embrace:
"I'm not the weak one.
I'm the anchor.
And I hold you both."
Aurelianth kissed her hair.
"Yes."
Solance pressed its forehead to hers.
"Yes."
The realm shattered to dust...breaking around their unity..and the Arbiter's voice echoed from above:
"….THE ANCHOR HAS PASSED."