Chapter 86: The Mirror That Sees All
The winds howled through the shattered remnants of the Skyfall Temple, its sacred stones now scattered across the edges of a floating ruin. What once stood as a monument to the gods had become nothing more than a fractured memory, teetering on the edge of a reality no longer stable.
Kael stood at the precipice, his eyes locked onto the horizon—where the sky bled into itself, folding and unfolding like a breathing veil. Behind him, Elenai, cloaked in silence, stepped lightly across the fragmented bridge of thought-imbued crystal.
"You've felt it too," Kael murmured, his voice devoid of surprise.
Elenai nodded. "The Mirror of Aeons has awakened."
Below them, the swirling void yawned wider, and within it shimmered visions—past, present, and futures that had not yet been born. Somewhere within the tangled folds of time, the Mirror awaited… but it was no longer merely reflecting.
It was watching.
The Forgotten Vault of Aeons
They descended into the rift between realities, riding a tether woven from Elenai's Authority of Threads. This passage wasn't part of the known cosmologies—it was the path forgotten by even the gods.
As they approached the Vault, Kael felt the pressure in the air change. It was not magical pressure—it was conceptual weight. Every moment, every decision, every discarded possibility pressed against him. The Mirror of Aeons did not lie. It remembered everything.
Zeraphin awaited them at the threshold, his wings folded back, his form cloaked in equilibrium. "You came faster than I expected," he said.
"We didn't have the luxury to wait," Elenai responded, her tone sharp.
Kael stepped forward and touched the gate. It opened not with magic, but with recognition. The Vault accepted those who had truly glimpsed beyond reality—and been changed by it.
Inside, time was fractured. Seconds looped. Words echoed before they were spoken. And at the center, the Mirror of Aeons hovered—an obsidian surface that shimmered with multiverses.
The Mirror's Judgment
Kael gazed into it, and it gazed back.
He saw… himself. But not just himself—an endless array of Kaels.
One who became a tyrant and enslaved entire galaxies.
One who sacrificed himself to save a single soul.
One who was broken, mad, forgotten.
And one… who sat upon a throne beyond reality, reshaping everything.
"The Mirror doesn't just show," Zeraphin whispered. "It selects."
"Selects?" Kael asked, brows furrowed.
Elenai answered this time. "It chooses which version of you is closest to manifestation. It reflects probability shaped by will."
Kael took a step closer, and the Mirror began to glow. His heartbeat synchronized with the ripples in its surface.
Suddenly—visions exploded outward.
Authority Ranks were shown in luminous hieroglyphs of cosmic data.
Kael's current state:
Rank: Primebound
Potential: Transcendent
Resonance: 82.4% Alignment with Conceptual Will
The Mirror surged again, and then… showed something impossible.
A Kael beyond Authority. Beyond Rank. A being marked: "Unquantifiable."
Zeraphin staggered. "That's… not supposed to be possible."
Kael clenched his fists. "But it is."
The Mirror Cracks
Just as Kael reached out to test the Mirror, the Vault trembled. A shrill laughter echoed across the realm—Miraxis, the Authority of Madness.
"Ah, so the child of paradox has found his face in the mirror!"
Kael turned as a distortion tore open the side of the Vault, and Miraxis emerged, a swirling figure of fractured logic, his form constantly rewriting itself.
"You think this mirror will help you ascend? No, Kael. No mirror gives power without taking something in return."
"What do you want, Miraxis?" Elenai demanded, drawing her blade formed of universal truths.
Miraxis smiled—six mouths forming simultaneously. "To see what happens when the mirror shatters."
And with a gesture, he sent a wave of madness crashing into the Mirror of Aeons.
Kael leapt forward, raising both palms, forming a barrier. The collision rattled the Vault, and the Mirror began to crack—not break, but distort. The versions of Kael inside began to bleed together.
Fusion of the Infinite
Kael screamed—not in pain, but in sheer intensity. The Mirror wasn't showing him versions anymore—it was merging them.
His mind reeled as lifetimes, deaths, victories, betrayals—all converged into his soul.
Zeraphin yelled, "We need to sever the merge!"
"No," Kael roared, eyes glowing. "I accept it!"
In that moment, he embraced all his selves.
The tyrant. The martyr. The guardian. The destroyer.
And when the merge was complete, Kael stood taller, his aura not of flame or light—but of possibility.
A New Ascendance
Authority Update
Rank: Beyond Primordial
Class: Architect of Paradox
Signature: Echo of All Selves
Kael raised a hand, and reality around him reassembled into coherent structure. Miraxis reeled back.
"You've become… something impossible!"
Kael stepped forward, his voice calm and thunderous.
"No. I've become what was always possible… if I chose to become it."
With a gesture, Kael touched the cracked Mirror—and it didn't shatter.
It healed.
And within it, a single reflection stared back.
Not a version. Not a possibility.
But the truth of who Kael had chosen to be.
End of Chapter 86