The world trembled.
As the echoes of the shattered crystal faded, Aran felt something crack inside himself—not pain, but recognition. Elira's touch steadied him, but her eyes… they were distant now, clouded with visions of time lost.
"Elira," he whispered. "What do you see?"
She didn't answer at first. Her gaze drifted beyond the chamber's walls, as though she stood in two places at once. Then softly, like a confession:
"A life we never spoke of. One where we failed."
The chamber darkened, and the crown above them began to glow with an eerie, amber hue. Images swirled through the air—visions of a ruined continent, oceans turned to ash, skies burned by flame not of this world.
In the center of it all… Aran.
But not the man he was now.
This Aran wore a black crown and bore a blade forged from a fallen star. His eyes—cold, golden, unrecognizable—held no promise, only power.
"You were called the Ash King," Elira said. "And I… I was the one who tried to stop you. But I failed. We both did."
Aran's fists clenched. "That wasn't me."
Elira looked up at him, tears brimming. "No. But it could be. That's what the Crown is showing us. Not what will be… but what might."
The man in star-threaded robes spoke again. "Now that she remembers, the path can change. But only if you accept who you once were—and resist the urge to become him again."
Aran stared at the image of his other self, silent.
Then he drew his sword—not in rage, but in understanding.
"I am not the Ash King."
And in the depths of the Spire, the visions began to fracture… revealing a path forward—uncertain, dangerous, but their own.
Together.