Alaric's body floated in an endless void—a silence so absolute it felt alive. No heartbeat. No breath. No weight. Only the sensation of falling without moving, like drifting in the echo of a forgotten memory.

  Then, light.

  Not sudden, not blinding—just a subtle golden shimmer growing from within, as if the void itself remembered warmth.

  He opened his eyes. Or did his consciousness simply become aware?

  A fractured sky hung above—a canvas of stars bending unnaturally, as if space had folded in on itself. Beneath him, a translucent platform of luminous stone hovered in the void, etched with runes that pulsed in rhythm with an unknown heartbeat.

  “Where...?” The word barely formed on his lips before a vibration rippled through the air.

  A voice, ancient and feminine, like the breath of time itself, whispered into the edges of his soul.

  “You have returned... not as who you were, but as who you must become.”

  The runes flared in response. One by one, they lit up—first in gold, then shifting into iridescent hues: blue, violet, crimson. As they glowed, images danced across their surface—visions of realms, cities suspended in air, crystalline oceans, forests of flame, and towers built from thought.

  Alaric’s knees buckled. He gripped his head as memories not his own flashed behind his eyes. Wars he’d never fought. Voices he’d never heard. Stars he’d never seen.

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  Pain. Wonder. Fear.

  It was as if reality itself was trying to rewrite him.

  Suddenly, the platform shuddered. A crack split the stone beneath his feet, light pouring from the fracture. From it, six streams of energy erupted, each a different color, each swirling into the form of a gate.

  Above each gate, a name burned itself into the air:

  Lytherion. Necronia Prime. Nyx'Thar. Solmarion. Aetherion. Vesperia.

  Six Realms.

  Six destinies.

  Alaric took a step back, breath shallow. “What... is this place?”

  The voice returned, calmer now, but no less powerful.

  “This is the Axis Between Realities. The Threshold of the Meta Universal Dimension.”

  He reached toward one of the gates—Lytherion. Its magic shimmered with ancient energy, symbols dancing like fireflies in midnight. The moment his fingers brushed its surface, the scene changed.

  He was no longer on the platform.

  He stood atop a mountain surrounded by skies ablaze with auroras. Dragons soared overhead. An ancient city, carved into cliffs of crystal, pulsed with power below him. Cloaked figures whispered from shadowed alcoves, their eyes glowing with knowledge.

  But none of it was real. The moment stretched, then shattered, and he was back on the platform—panting, trembling.

  The gates flickered. Each one called to a part of him he didn’t understand. Each a different path. Each demanding a piece of who he was.

  “You are not whole,” the voice said. “You were broken long before you leapt. But your fracture is your passage.”

  He clenched his fists. “I didn’t ask for this.”

  “No soul ever does.”

  The crack beneath him widened. The platform groaned.

  “You have one choice,” the voice said. “Step forward, or vanish.”

  Alaric looked down into the light. It pulsed with echoes of voices long gone. Somewhere in the depths of that light, he felt something—someone—waiting.

  Seraphina.

  He didn’t know the name, but it clung to his mind like dew on morning grass. A promise. A presence. A part of him lost but not forgotten.

  He stepped into the light.

  And the world unraveled.