Chapter 71: The Prism of Divided Realms
The silence of the cosmos cracked.
Not with sound, but with a sudden rift—a shimmering fracture that tore across the boundaries of known dimensions like a scar across eternity. From within it, colors bled—vibrant hues unknown to mortal perception—twisting through the fabric of reality in waves of chaotic order.
Kael stood before it.
His cloak, now interwoven with stardust and living glyphs, fluttered gently even in the absence of wind. The Authority Sigil burned faintly on his palm—the same palm that had once wielded balance, torn empires apart, and rewritten fate itself.
Behind him, the remnants of the Astral Council argued in hushed, fearful tones. The Elders no longer spoke as sovereigns—they whispered like mortals in the dark, afraid of what Kael was becoming.
What he was now... could no longer be contained in names or titles.
But Kael wasn't listening to them.
He was focused on the rift—the Prism of Divided Realms, a myth even the Primordial Gods treated as legend. It was said to be a nexus where timelines braided, where alternate selves collided, where one could face a thousand versions of their destiny—and choose.
Or be chosen.
"Are you truly doing this?" Elenai's voice trembled slightly, not from fear but from the weight of knowing what this meant.
Kael didn't respond at first. He simply stepped closer to the rift.
"I have to," he said finally, his voice distant. "There are versions of me... who never learned mercy. Others, who never rebelled. And worse—one who conquered the Eternal Spiral."
Elenai frowned. "But this could split you apart."
"Then let it," Kael said. "If I cannot face all of me, then I have no right to reshape existence."
A booming voice echoed from above, carrying the divine weight of a hundred collapsing stars.
"ENTER, AND BE JUDGED."
It was not a threat.
It was a statement of fate.
Inside the Prism
Kael walked forward—and was instantly fragmented.
He became twelve. Then a hundred. Then infinite.
In the mirrored halls of the Prism, his reflections took shape. One bore a crown made of blood and ruled with iron. Another carried children on his back, a father instead of a warrior. One wept in chains. One laughed as a tyrant.
And one...
One was a corpse, long decayed in a realm where he never fought back.
Kael stumbled, breathing hard. The air was heavy with identity. Each step was like walking through the pages of an unwritten autobiography, every version of him a possible truth.
"Pathetic," hissed a shadowed Kael who ruled the Scorched Infinity. "You chose weakness. Compassion."
"And yet I'm the one walking forward," Kael shot back.
"You think that matters?" mocked another, his armor made of screaming souls. "Kindness kills more kings than blades."
"Maybe. But I'm not here to argue."
"Then why are you here?"
Kael paused at that, and when he finally answered, the entire Prism trembled.
"I'm here... to merge."
The echoes fell silent.
The Trial of Union
A column of light descended. It wasn't divine—it was absolute.
And from it emerged The Arbiter of Mirrors, a being older than time and forged from the final truths of collapsing multiverses. Its voice was a harmony of Kael's own—every version speaking in unison.
"ONLY ONE TRUTH MAY REIGN. TO BECOME THE COSMIC BALANCE, YOU MUST INTEGRATE THE FRACTURED."
The mirror-Kaels surged forward, each trying to overwrite the original Kael, to become the dominant timeline. Battles erupted—philosophical, spiritual, metaphysical.
One Kael wielded Empathy like a blade.
Another launched Authority Ranks in cascades, screaming with the fury of Absolute Order.
Kael, the Prime, bled. Cried. Smiled. Endured.
One by one, he defeated them—not with dominance, but with acceptance.
He embraced the warlord Kael, seeing the necessity of strength.
He forgave the coward Kael, understanding the fear.
He mourned the tyrant Kael, shedding the corruption that nearly took him.
In the final convergence, the remaining selves stepped into him—voluntarily.
The Prism began to collapse.
Kael stood, alone and complete.
Ascension of the Singular Will
As he emerged from the dissolving Prism, the entire cosmos shifted.
The constellations reoriented themselves. The Throne Beyond Reality pulsed, recognizing a new dominion. Authority Ranks everywhere recalibrated, sensing a new singularity at their core.
Kael had become more than the Vessel. He was the Harmonizer.
The Living Balance.
Not just the wielder of power—but the reason powers could exist in equilibrium.
The Council knelt.
Even Elenai looked upon him with awe... and sadness.
"You're not him anymore, are you?" she whispered.
Kael turned to her. For a heartbeat, his eyes were the same—warm, human, filled with longing.
"No," he admitted. "But I remember him. I always will."
From his palm, a new Authority Rank bloomed—neither Light nor Dark, Chaos nor Order.
It was Unity.
To Be Continued...