Chapter 18: Reflections Unbound
Noah didn't remember leaping.
One moment he was on the ridge, staring down at an army of distorted versions of himself. The next, he was in the air—Veil Coin humming at his belt, the second shard pulsing in his grip, heart pounding with something dangerously close to fear… and fury.
His boots struck the cracked stone ruins.
The echoes moved instantly.
They didn't run.
They glided—jerked, twisted toward him like puppets tugged by invisible strings. Their faces wore too-wide smiles, their eyes not quite right. One had a shattered glass crown. Another dragged a silver chain of bones. A third had no mouth at all.
"They're reflections!" Lyra landed beside him, shouting over the rising storm. "They copy your intent—twist it. Think something else or they'll predict you!"
"Got it!" Noah ducked as a mirrored shard slashed past his head, cleaving a stone column behind him in two.
Then Riven came down like a thunderclap, blades flashing through air and enemy alike. "Then let's make them regret mimicking me!"
He tore through the front lines—echoes shattering on impact, dissolving into smoke and splinters of light. But more surged in.
Dozens.
Hundreds.
Too many.
Noah gripped the shard tighter. "We're not going to reach the center at this rate!"
Lyra dropped beside him again, coat flaring with glowing runes. "Then stop holding back."
"What?!"
"You have two shards. The Coin. The Sight. Use them."
"I don't know how!"
"You don't need to know. Just choose."
His instincts screamed against it—but he obeyed.
Noah pressed the second shard against the Coin.
And the world fractured.
Not frozen. Folded.
Suddenly, he stood in a dozen timelines at once. The battlefield flickered—one where they lost, one where he died, one where corruption took him.
And one…
Where they won.
He fixed his gaze on that version.
The Veil responded.
Silver light erupted from his chest. Runes laced across his arms, danced up his throat, burned down his spine. A mirror rose before him—and inside it, his true reflection stared back.
It didn't smile.
It nodded.
Then shattered.
The energy wave blasted outward in a pulse of shimmering force. Dozens of echoes exploded into dust. Others reeled, flickering wildly. For the first time, they looked… afraid.
Lyra stared at him, wide-eyed. "What did you just do?"
"I don't know," Noah said, breathless. "But I want to do it again."
Together, they charged forward.
Each step was madness. Reflections hurled warped versions of his own power—illusion-fire, mirror-light, false-memory blades. But something inside Noah had changed.
Every attack taught him something.
Not about them.
About himself.
These echoes weren't just enemies.
They were possibilities.
Cowards. Tyrants. Martyrs. Monsters.
Every version of himself he could have been—every road he hadn't walked.
Understanding them was the key.
At the heart of the ruins, the third shard floated—larger than the others, cracked and bleeding light. It pulsed like a heartbeat.
Noah reached it—just as the final echo moved.
It looked exactly like him.
No distortion.
No corruption.
Just tired.
It didn't attack.
It whispered, "If you take it… there's no going back."
Noah didn't hesitate.
"Back to what?" he said quietly. "Normal? That was never an option."
He reached out—and took the shard.
There was no explosion. No scream.
Only silence.
The echoes vanished—every single one.
Even the tired one.
The light faded. Stillness settled over the ruins.
Riven stood, panting. "...Did we win?"
"I think so," Noah murmured.
Lyra stepped close, her hand on his shoulder. "You just claimed the third shard. That's never happened. Not in any version I've ever seen."
"Great," Noah muttered. "So… what now?"
She didn't answer.
Her gaze had shifted past him—toward the edge of the ruins. Toward the horizon.
Something stirred there.
The sky bent.
A shape emerged—titanic and impossible.
Not human.
Too real to be a shadow.
Its eyes were mirrors.
It spoke without speaking.
"The Anchor awakens. The Gate will open."
And then it was gone.
Noah stared at the place it had stood.
Lyra's voice was low, urgent. "We need to move. Fast. That wasn't an echo."
Riven's expression hardened. "That was a Watcher. They don't show up unless something's about to end the world."
Noah pocketed the shard. "Then we get there first."
But behind them—unseen, forgotten—one broken echo of Noah cracked open its eyes…
…and smiled.