Rain.
Not heavy, but persistent—fine mist carried on cold air that clung to everything. The world had the scent of rust and electricity, a storm just beginning to growl.
Liam stood in the middle of the avenue where he once waited for a bus to college. Now, its glass shelter was broken, the bench torn from its bolts. The digital billboard nearby flickered violently, flashing a looping message:
"STAY INDOORS. CURFEW ENFORCED. TRUST THE WATCHERS."
"What happened to this place?" Nyra asked, hood pulled over her hair.
"Something turned this city into a husk," Kael muttered, gripping the hilt of his wind-forged blade. "There's no balance here. Just dread."
"We need to find the fragment," Aeris said softly. "Quickly. Before whoever else is hunting it gets to it first."
Liam looked up at a familiar skyscraper. It loomed over the district like a sleeping god—his old university library, now wrapped in black vines that pulsed like veins.
His eyes narrowed.
"I think I know where it is."
The Library of Shattered Knowledge
The library's entrance had caved in. With Aeris's guidance and Kael's strength, they broke through a side service door. Inside, the silence was suffocating. Rows of ancient books now hung from their shelves by tendrils of shadow, suspended midair like corpses on strings.
The scent of ink, mold, and magic filled the room.
"Liam," Aeris whispered, eyes wide. "This place… it's not just decaying. It's shifting."
Books moved on their own. Pages turned as if inhaling. The architecture no longer made sense—stairs that curved upward and ended in walls, hallways that changed direction when unobserved.
"It's a fragment's influence," she continued. "It's trying to protect itself... or trap intruders."
Kael moved forward, blade drawn. "Then we cut our way through."
But before he could step, a ripple moved across the ceiling.
A presence.
A laugh.
Mocking.
Liam spun. "Did anyone else—"
"Yes," Nyra whispered. "It's here."
A shadow dropped from above—thin, elongated, moving like liquid smoke. It hit the floor and reformed into a hooded figure cloaked in darkness.
But it wasn't faceless.
It had Liam's face.
Except wrong.
Eyes hollow. Smile too wide.
"Welcome home," it rasped in his voice. "You left the doors open."
Battle Among the Broken Stacks
The fight erupted like a match in dry leaves.
Kael rushed forward, wind erupting around his sword in a spiral slash. The fake Liam blurred, twisting sideways like smoke dodging the wind. Nyra chanted behind them, summoning two flame spirits in a blink—twin burning wolves that leapt at the entity with snarls of fire.
The doppelgänger raised its hand, and a mirror-shield erupted from the ground. The wolves slammed into it and burst into flickering sparks.
It countered instantly.
Dark tendrils whipped toward Nyra. Liam dove in front of her, barrier spell flickering just in time to absorb the blow, but the force knocked him back into a bookshelf that exploded into splinters.
Aeris stepped forward, both palms glowing blue.
"Get. Out."
She fired a pulse of raw memory—magic shaped from her own recollection of this world, of this library, of truth.
It hit the shadow like light through fog.
The doppelgänger shrieked, its form cracking—revealing a fractured mirror beneath its skin.
It staggered back.
"It's not alive," Aeris hissed. "It's a shard. A remnant defense mechanism. A fragment of Liam's memory corrupted."
Liam rose slowly, wiping blood from his lip. "Then I'll purge it."
He raised his hand—and from deep within, a pulse of ancient energy rose. The fragment inside him responded.
With a wordless roar, he unleashed it.
A burst of white light exploded from his chest, wrapping around his arms like threads of glowing scripture. The spellbook's power—fragmented but growing—blazed to life.
The shadow screamed, caught in the light. Cracks raced across its form. Its false face melted.
And then—
Silence.
Ash fell where it stood.
The Vault Beneath
At the heart of the library, beneath the collapsed archives, they found it.
A sealed vault, once untouched by time, now glowing with soft blue light. Aeris approached it, breath hitching.
"This is it," she said. "The third fragment."
Liam placed his hand on the stone door.
It opened.
Within, no monster. No trap.
Just a single book on a pedestal. Its cover bore a shimmering symbol—one he had seen in his dreams. A teardrop within a mirror.
As he reached for it, he felt not pain, but peace.
The third piece of the spellbook merged into him—and this time, a vision followed.
Flashes.
A young girl. A burning village. A man with golden eyes standing atop a tower—Nytherion, untainted, holding the full book.
And then—Aeris, cloaked in shadows, walking away from the flames.
Liam stumbled.
"Are you alright?" she asked.
He nodded slowly. "I saw you."
Aeris's face tightened. "What did you see?"
But he didn't answer. Not yet.
Outside, the wind howled.
The next hunt would begin soon.