The door opened with a soundless shift, revealing a hallway unlike anything Kael had seen in the Tower before.
There were no flames, no traps, no shifting walls or monsters lurking in the dark. Just white stone. Smooth. Pristine. Untouched.
And mirrors.
Endless mirrors.
The walls, floor, and ceiling were all reflective surfaces, so perfect they showed not just images, but something deeper. The reflections felt *aware*, like they stared back, like they whispered secrets when no one was listening.
Kael stepped in first.
The moment his foot touched the mirrored floor, his reflection rippled — not like water, but like a memory shivering loose from its hiding place.
"Don't look too long," Veyr said from behind. "This floor… it's not meant to show you who you are. It shows you who you *could* become."
Kael didn't answer. He didn't need to.
He already knew.
As they walked forward, the air grew heavier. Not from heat or pressure — but from thought. From emotion. The mirrors began to shimmer with visions. Not monsters, not battles. Possibilities.
In one, Kael stood at the top of the Tower, crowned in divine light, surrounded by fallen gods kneeling before him.
In another, he sat alone in a field of broken stars, unmoving, unliving — a god in name, but with no one left to speak his.
In a third, he saw himself standing beside people he didn't recognize — a family, perhaps. A peaceful life.
He looked away.
The floor was trying to seduce him. With power. With peace. With fear.
"I don't trust it," Rina muttered. "It's too quiet."
Then, from the side, a mirror shattered.
A hand reached out.
Black, shadowed, skeletal — and far too familiar.
Kael turned just in time to block the strike of *himself*.
But it wasn't a mirror version. This one breathed. Moved. Laughed.
"Surprised?" the shadow-Kael said, grinning. "You shouldn't be. I'm you. The version that said yes when the Tower offered everything."
Kael clenched his fists. "You're not me."
"I'm better," the shadow replied, stepping into the light. His eyes glowed with divine fire, and his body was wrapped in armor forged of dead stars. "I didn't waste time protecting others. I didn't hesitate. I took what the Tower gave."
Veyr stepped forward, but another shadow burst from the mirror beside him — darker, colder. It looked like Veyr, but the emptiness in its eyes was chilling.
Then Rina's double. Mier's. Even Daren's.
Each of them was faced with the *worst* version of themselves. The version that gave in. That chose power over purpose. That abandoned the path.
Kael didn't wait.
He lunged at his double, fist glowing with the energy of the reforged shards.
The impact shook the chamber.
The fight was brutal. Unlike the shadow-echoes they had faced on the Watchers' floor, these were intelligent. Predictive. And worst of all — they had no fear.
Kael's reflection fought with elegance and brutality, wielding versions of his abilities twisted by selfishness. Where Kael fought to protect, his shadow fought to dominate. When Kael hesitated, his double struck.
They clashed again and again, mirror fragments flying, white walls cracking under the strain of their battle.
"Why do you fight it?" the shadow asked between blows. "You *know* how this ends. You ascend. You become a god. And you are alone. Always."
Kael's breath caught.
He knew it was true.
He had seen it — glimpses of a future where his companions fell, where he stood on the final floor without them, crowned in silent victory.
"I don't fight for the ending," Kael said. "I fight for the climb."
Then he unleashed the Shard of Binding — not to restrain his enemy, but to tether himself to this moment. To what mattered. He let his pain, his hope, and his *will* ignite inside him.
The divine reflection faltered.
Kael struck.
His double shattered into white glass and was gone.
Around him, the others had done the same — barely. They were bloodied, bruised, exhausted.
But alive.
The floor was silent once more.
And then, in the center of the chamber, a spiral staircase rose — this time not of stone or metal, but of mirrored light.
Kael walked to its base.
There was no warning now. No booming voice. No threats.
The Tower didn't need to say anything.
Kael had faced the part of himself that might have broken. And he hadn't.
He climbed the stairs without speaking, the others following behind. There were no words to say.
Only the quiet certainty that the next floors would not test their strength, but their souls.
And Kael wasn't sure how many more of those they had left to give.