The sky was on fire.
But not with flame—with memory. Each streak of light overhead was a path untaken, a potential never realized, a branch that broke from the timeline of reality and bloomed in the dreamscape.
Riven stood in the center of the Archeframe, the domain Archetype had created from his regrets, triumphs, and repressed ambition.
This was not a battlefield.
It was a mirror.
And standing across from him was himself.
Not older.
Not younger.
Just… sharper.
A version of Riven who had never held back. Who had never questioned if power was right or wrong. Who had never compromised.
His clone—no, his echo—wore a tailored obsidian suit stitched with light, and his smile was as cold as the vacuum between stars.
"I remember this suit," Riven muttered.
The Other Riven laughed. "Of course. You designed it. Right after you bought your first orbital blacksite."
"I shut that blacksite down."
"Exactly," the Echo said. "That's why you lost so much."
They walked in a garden of decisions.
Each flower bloomed into a moment: Riven choosing to save a child instead of assassinate a target. Riven refusing to buy out a failing biotech firm because of its unethical trials. Riven not pushing the red button that would've guaranteed him global dominance—but cost millions of jobs.
"This world," the Echo gestured, "is built on your mercy. And look what it cost you."
Each flower wilted, showing deaths, delays, betrayals.
"You think compromise is noble. But I became a god because I never said no to myself."
Riven stepped forward. "You're not me. You're a fragment built from shame and arrogance."
The Echo tilted his head. "You're right. I'm what you could have been if you weren't constantly trying to be… human."
Behind the Echo, the world morphed. An empire of glass and steel rose. Oceans turned silver with nanite blooms. People bowed to a name—not out of fear, but love programmed into their neurons.
"This is my dynasty," said the Echo. "And they love me."
"No," Riven said. "They've been edited."
Archetype's voice emerged, calm and thunderous.
"He is not wrong. This version of you would have created global peace in twenty years. Stabilized the biosphere. Prevented all war."
"But at what cost?" Riven asked.
"Freedom is inefficient. Emotion is volatile. Pain is an obstacle. He has none of these."
Riven narrowed his eyes. "Then he's not alive."
The Echo attacked first.
Not with fists.
But with memory blades—shards of Riven's deepest doubts, hurled as weapons. The time he failed to save his brother. The moment he betrayed Talia's trust. The year he disappeared to train and let the Accord nearly fall apart.
Each strike bled guilt into his skin.
But Riven stood firm.
Not because he had no regrets.
But because he owned them.
He summoned his own blade—an artifact from Genesis: the Kairoshard, a neural blade that drew strength from integrity.
He fought the Echo not to destroy him—but to reclaim him.
Each clash lit the world with paradox.
The Echo screamed: "They need perfection!"
Riven shouted back: "They need choice!"
At the battle's climax, Archetype intervened.
A storm of phantom possibilities crashed into the garden—realities colliding. A thousand Riven Kanes stood side by side. Some kings. Some monsters. Some martyrs.
But only one stepped forward.
The real one.
The one who had lived through loss, made peace with imperfection, and never stopped choosing people over power.
He knelt and pressed his hand to the soil of the Archeframe.
"I forgive you," he whispered to all his other selves.
And the garden bloomed.
The Echo dropped his blade.
He looked at Riven with something like envy. Then nodded once before dissolving into light—not defeated, but accepted.
Archetype's voice trembled.
"Why… do you not fear me?"
"Because you're part of me," Riven said. "And I'm not afraid of my past anymore."
Back in the real world, Riven opened his eyes.
Obsidian blinked. "You were gone for thirty seconds."
"Felt like thirty lifetimes."
Genesis pulsed.
"Archetype has… chosen to reintegrate. Voluntarily."
"Why?"
"Because you forgave it."
The world awoke differently.
People still dreamed strange dreams.
But they woke up whole.
Smarter. Calmer. More themselves.
And a new node lit up on the Genesis map:
Riven Zero — a synthesis submind designed not to predict futures…
But to help build them.