The silence after Orion's revelation stretched long and heavy.
Lyra's grip on his arm remained firm, her gaze searching his face. "What do you mean, you weren't supposed to exist?"
Orion swallowed hard. The words from the Keeper of the Forgotten still echoed in his mind, reverberating through the very fabric of his thoughts. "It said… I was chosen. But that was a mistake."
The Vault Keeper's expression darkened. "That shouldn't be possible." He stepped closer, scrutinizing Orion as if seeing him for the first time. "No one enters the Archive without purpose. If you weren't meant to exist, then how—?"
A deep tremor shook the ground beneath them.
The obelisk had vanished, but the chamber still pulsed with residual energy. Symbols on the walls flickered between states, distorting as if struggling to hold form.
Lyra's voice was quiet but sharp. "Something's wrong."
Orion felt it too. A presence. A lingering force, coiling unseen.
The Keeper of the Vault turned sharply. "We need to leave. Now."
Orion hesitated. "But—"
The chamber shuddered.
A sound—not physical, but felt—resonated through the stone. A low, crawling hum that set Orion's teeth on edge.
The walls shifted.
No, not the walls—the space around them.
Lyra's eyes widened. "The Vault is… changing."
The air grew heavy. The patterns on the walls unraveled, twisting into forms that Orion's mind rejected on instinct. A whisper slithered through the chamber—no words, just intent.
Something was watching.
Orion's breath caught. "It's still here."
The Keeper of the Vault didn't answer. His eyes had locked onto the far end of the chamber, where the stone peeled away like torn fabric—revealing nothing. A depth beyond depth. A wound in reality itself.
Lyra reached for her weapon. "Orion—"
A figure stepped through.
Not like a living being. Not like a shadow.
It unfolded. Bled into existence.
No face. No shape. Just the absence of all things.
And yet, Orion knew.
Somehow, impossibly, he knew.
It was the same presence he had felt in the void.
The Keeper of the Vault took a sharp step back. "No. That's not possible."
Orion's chest tightened. "You know what this is?"
The Keeper's voice was low. "The remnants of something that was never meant to be remembered."
The whispering grew louder. A crawling pressure against Orion's mind.
Lyra raised her weapon. "Then let's make sure it stays forgotten."
Orion wasn't so sure it would be that simple.
The thing took another step. And the world split apart.