Darkness.
Not silence. Something worse.
A low buzzing, like broken thoughts crawling under his skin, filled the void around Shiku. He floated, weightless, his body numb, his mind fractured. There was no sky. No ground. No up. No down. Just the hum of a world that had broken its own song.
His last memory before this place was a face—Kaeli's. Alive again, then gone. A voice from a future that claimed to be him. A mirror shattering. Then—this.
Shiku opened his eyes. Or maybe he didn't. In this place, seeing and thinking felt the same. His breath was shallow, but not from fear.
From loss.
"Shiku."
It was a whisper, not from one voice, but a hundred. Then a thousand.
Each one was his own.
"You wished to change fate." "You defied your role." "You touched threads you could not understand."
He turned. Reflected in the dark were faces—his own—but twisted in impossible ways. One version of him wore a blood-red cloak, eyes hollow with grief. Another stood tall in iron armor, a tyrant who had conquered whole worlds. Another wept, covered in ash, his arms scarred by runes.
Each of them stared at him. Each carried a fragment of the truth.
He screamed. "What is this place?!"
A voice deeper than time answered:
"This is the Echo Between Wishes. The void that opens when a soul breaks its own thread."
Then the Mirror appeared.
Floating before him, silent, pulsing with fractured light. Its frame was made of bone and time. Its surface shimmered not with reflection—but with memory.
Shiku saw Kaeli.
Not one Kaeli. Dozens. Hundreds.
In one world, she was a warrior. In another, a healer. In one, she loved him. In another, she feared him. And in one—
She died by his hand.
Shiku stumbled back. "No. That can't be me."
But the mirror pulsed, flashing another vision—of Shiku on a burning hill, the wand in his hand, Kaeli falling in front of him, eyes wide with betrayal.
"I didn't do that," he whispered. "I would never…"
> System Notice: Identity Fragmentation Detected. Emotional Anchor Unstable.
His knees hit nothing—but the weight of guilt brought him down anyway.
The mirror cracked.
From it emerged threads—golden, silver, red. They wrapped around his arms, his chest, his mind. They pulled.
"You are one Shiku," the voices said. "But not the only one. You wished. You broke. And now… you bleed across all threads."
Suddenly, a familiar weight fell into his hand.
The wand.
But it was cracked, humming, sickly.
Then it spoke—not in the voice of the System.
In Kaeli's voice.
"You didn't break reality, Shiku. You revealed it."
The light from the mirror turned red. Then black.
Shiku screamed as the void twisted. Gravity returned. He fell.
---
He landed on a floor made of cold, dead stars. Around him, the Echo faded into shadow. He was alone again.
Until he wasn't.
Footsteps.
Out of the dark came a figure.
A boy. Maybe older. Maybe younger. He wore gray robes stitched with runes. His eyes glowed faintly. His face—Shiku's face. But calmer. Weathered.
"I remember this part," the boy said. "It's when I asked if I was the only real version."
Shiku stood slowly, staring. "You're me?"
"I'm the one who never made the third wish."
Before Shiku could ask more, the mirror behind them shattered—this time for real. But the shards didn't fall as glass.
They fell as memories.
Thousands.
Shiku saw them pouring into the void—lives where he had been a father, a monster, a rebel, a ghost. Worlds where Kaeli never existed. Worlds where she ruled him. Worlds where he died before he could even speak.
And all the memories turned toward him and screamed:
"You stole our thread!"
The wand flared, cracking louder.
> System Breakdown Initiated. Core Identity Fractured.
Shiku turned to the other him, breath hitching. "What does it mean? Why am I seeing this?"
The gray-robed version stepped back. "You wished to see your end. But not all ends are final. Some loop. Some punish. Some… awaken."
Suddenly, a light tore through the void.
A spotlight. Cold. Unwelcoming.
A court. Made of stars and shadows.
Judges began to appear. Thrones of every kind. And on each throne—
Another Shiku.
"Prepare yourself," the wand whispered, Kaeli's voice now fading.
"The trial begins… when you wake."
Then silence.
Then fire.
---
>Next chapter -----
Coming soon