The storm of sound did not cease—it intensified.
In the deepest sanctum of the Echoing Realm, where time bled and destiny splintered, the trio stood before a colossus of impossible dimensions. It was neither god nor ghost, but something forged from echoes of existence itself—a being that had never truly lived, yet remembered the memories of all who had.
Zhen tightened his grip on the Whispering Halberd, its ethereal blades humming with resonance. The air around them trembled, layers of temporal illusion fracturing like brittle crystal. He glanced at Liuyan, whose robes now shimmered with threads of living flame, and Qiyue, her long hair coiling in starlight as she drew a bow formed from pure causality.
"It's... watching us," Qiyue said quietly, her voice barely audible over the grinding crescendo of layered timelines.
"No," Liuyan corrected, her gaze focused and cold. "It's remembering us."
The Everfallen Will stirred.
Its form was an amalgamation of fragmented forms—shadows of kings, screams of broken empires, infant wails and the silent tears of the last living thing on a dying planet. Each motion it made echoed with a thousand outcomes, and each word it tried to speak collapsed into a thousand deaths.
It did not speak.
It roared.
The roar tore through reality, unraveling illusions and memories alike. Zhen staggered as a vision slammed into his mind—he was a child again, nameless, faceless, crushed beneath a collapsing mine. Then he was a general on a battlefield where everyone wore his face. Then a god falling, laughing, consumed by betrayal.
A hand caught his shoulder—Liuyan's. Her touch seared through the illusion, anchoring him.
"Focus, Zhen!" she yelled, unleashing a flare of sacred fire into the sky. The flames turned blue, then white, then refracted into strings of runes that danced like fireflies around them, pushing back the madness.
The Everfallen lashed out again, but this time Qiyue struck first. Her arrow split into seven, each a different moment of her own soul. The arrows collided with the creature's head, exploding into cascading echoes that fractured one of its countless memories—an emperor's coronation turned to dust.
Zhen surged forward. The Halberd of Whispers extended, absorbing the very sound of his steps, making him a silent blade against an ocean of voices. He leapt, spinning in mid-air, and slashed through one of the being's arms.
It didn't bleed.
Instead, a cascade of time fragments burst forth—scenes of Zhen's past, twisted and tormented: him kneeling before a false master, him losing Liuyan, him killing Qiyue. Illusions, perhaps—but real enough to wound the soul.
Zhen grit his teeth. "I define myself—not echoes!"
He slammed the halberd into the ground. A wave of Origin Qi erupted from beneath his feet, forming a rune array so vast it filled the sky above them.
Heaven-Inscribing Formation: Sovereign Rewrite.
The spell bent the laws of the Echoing Realm. Time stilled. The Everfallen paused—its eyes blinking in all realities at once.
Liuyan joined him, standing within the formation's core. "We'll seal it—not destroy it. It was never meant to be slain."
Qiyue stepped beside them. "It was meant to remind... but now it only devours."
Together, they raised their weapons.
The formation activated.
From above, a rain of celestial fragments poured downward—shards of old worlds, dreams that never were, timelines that fractured and died unborn. Each fragment was absorbed into the formation's lines, inscribing a new reality upon the old one.
The Everfallen screamed. Not in rage. In sorrow.
It began to collapse.
Not explode—collapse inward, like a story that realized its final chapter had been erased. One by one, its echoes vanished—the memory of kings, the screams of dying stars, the laughter of betrayed lovers. All faded, returning to the void between existence.
In its final moment, it looked at Zhen.
Not with hate.
With gratitude.
Then it was gone.
Only silence remained.
---
The trio stood in the center of the broken sanctum, the skies above them now clear—filled not with echoes, but with possibility.
Zhen exhaled, wiping sweat from his brow. "It's done?"
Liuyan nodded slowly. "This layer of the Echoing Realm... is stable. For now."
"But what was it really?" Qiyue asked, lowering her bow. "That thing. It wasn't just a guardian."
Zhen frowned, recalling the final look it gave him. "Maybe... it was once someone like us. A Ranker who rose too high and lost himself in the multiverse's tides."
"Or maybe," Liuyan added, "it was the first dream of the Multiverse itself—a memory that no longer had a place."
They fell silent.
Far above, the rift that had allowed them entry to the Echoing Realm's depths slowly closed. But a new gate shimmered in the distance—vast and golden, guarded by countless runes and forged with law and will.
Qiyue squinted. "Another trial?"
"No," Zhen said. "The next realm."
He stepped forward, eyes glowing.
"The Realm of Origin Memory."
The sky in the Echoing Realm shimmered with iridescent clouds, each one a memory echo trapped in vapor. Zhen stood at the heart of the Dreaming Basin, its ancient waters still rippling with illusions of ages long gone. The trial had twisted—no longer was it merely a test of power or will. It had become something deeper, something personal.
Across the mirror-like lake, Qiyue knelt before a monolith of silver light, her form flickering between adult and child, her memories laid bare and vulnerable. The rune of inner reflection had locked her into a vision of her deepest fear—abandonment. On the other side, Liuyan faced an obsidian gate that pulsed with violet light, her dragon blood reacting violently with the runes etched into its surface. She was being judged, not by a trialmaster, but by her own bloodline.
Zhen clenched his fists, feeling the weight of their burdens on his shoulders. He had passed through his own portion of the dream—a sequence of illusions where his multiverse identity fractured and reformed, where he saw lives he could've lived had he not ascended. A scholar. A tyrant. A savior. A forgotten child.
But now, the central core of the Echoing Realm pulsed with a new rhythm, a beckoning.
"System," Zhen muttered, eyes narrowing. "Give me a report on the current resonance field."
[System Notification: Echoing Realm's resonance field has stabilized. Fragmentary Dream Cores detected: 3. Trial Realm Ascension Phase initiated. Primary directive: Synchronize inner echoes and awaken Dormant Authority.]
"Dormant Authority… so this was the true purpose of this realm," he whispered.
A low rumble vibrated through the lake. Suddenly, tendrils of starlight surged from beneath the surface, coiling upward to form the shape of a grand, serpentine creature. Its eyes were voids, deep as galaxies, and its voice echoed in their minds like thunder wrapped in velvet.
"O Dream-Walkers... you have touched the fragments of your truths. But to ascend beyond this echo, you must unify them. Show me your resolved self. Not the strongest, not the most perfect—show me the version of you that accepts all other selves."
Zhen stepped forward, lifting his hand. The blade at his back—the Worldpiercer—began to glow with a soft, paradoxical light. It shimmered with fire and ice, with blood and divinity. It too was born of contradictions.
He closed his eyes.
In his mind, he stood again on the floating cliff from long ago—the place where his journey had truly begun. There, a child version of himself waited, eyes wide and filled with awe. Behind the boy stood another version: Zhen the Tyrant, wearing black armor stained with worlds. To his left stood Zhen the Protector, the one who had sacrificed love for duty. To his right, Zhen the Scholar, holding countless tomes with trembling fingers.
He faced them all.
"I am all of you," Zhen said. "And none of you. I won't deny the roads I could have taken. But I choose now. I choose this path. The one I walk with Liuyan and Qiyue. The one where I rise not alone, but with them. With truth. With unity."
His words became light. That light exploded outward.
The Echoing Realm howled—not in pain, but in resonance. Crystals shattered. Time fractured. And then reformed.
Qiyue and Liuyan, both bathed in their own respective auras, rose from their trials. Qiyue's hair was now streaked with silver, the mark of one who had walked through abandonment and returned whole. Liuyan's eyes bore twin dragon pupils, her bloodline finally acknowledging her as worthy.
The serpentine being above them bowed its massive head.
"You have passed."
Zhen's system chimed again.
[Dormant Authority Unlocked: Echo Ascendant Title Acquired. Fragment Rank increased to SS+. New Path Available: Multiversal Convergence.]
Qiyue approached him, her voice soft. "That… was terrifying. But also freeing. I saw a world where I never left my clan, where I lived as a tool."
Liuyan stepped closer, a faint fire glowing in her palms. "And I saw one where I ruled the dragons… and crushed everything under my heel. But this—this is the world I choose."
They stood as three figures against a newly forming sky. The realm had changed—it was no longer fragmented. The stars aligned above, as if awaiting command.
Zhen turned to the realm's heart, where a portal of multicolored starlight had begun to form. Beyond it lay something vast. Ancient. Untouched.
But also waiting.
Before stepping through, Zhen asked one final question.
"System. What lies beyond this portal?"
[System Notice: The path ahead leads to the Multiversal Labyrinth. A nexus of ancient trials, convergence anomalies, and the remnants of ascended civilizations. High-risk, high-reward. Estimated Survival Rate: 17%.]
Zhen grinned. "Then let's raise that number."
With a nod to his companions, he stepped into the light.
Zhen's mind raced as the sky cracked open above the Echoing Realm. From the distant void, time-shards bled light like shattered mirrors, falling slowly and leaving ripples of paradox in their wake. Qiyue stood beside him, her fingers glowing with a silver glyph of containment, while Liuyan's golden aura blazed outward, warding off the corruption slithering from the broken sky.
They had reached the Core Verge of the Echoing Realm—the fragment of the First World sealed beyond countless temporal locks. A basin of dreams, memory, and fragments of gods.
"The dream is collapsing," Liuyan muttered, eyes narrowed. "Something is forcing its way into reality."
From the rift above, a cascade of voices echoed downward. Not words, but raw thoughts—an invasion of will, each one like a needle piercing into the soul. Zhen winced as the whispers tried to pull him away, to drown him in phantom truths and false memories.
He activated his Worldmind Protocol, summoning a translucent circuit of radiant threads around his head. The murmurs dulled, suppressed by the sheer force of his ranked consciousness.
"It's the Dreamborne Sovereign," Qiyue whispered. "It was sealed here… but it's not asleep anymore."
Zhen nodded. "Then we don't just seal it—we end it."
With a wave of his hand, the Crimson Halberd of Heavenfall appeared, its blade pulsing with resonance. Liuyan's robes fluttered as she ascended above him, drawing upon the Celestial Bell Codex, which chimed with ancient harmony, each note rewriting local reality to match her will.
The battlefield formed as a field of memory: the broken remnants of a floating palace, tiled with fading scenes from countless lifetimes. Ghosts of the past flickered around them—echoes of previous challengers, guardians, and forgotten titans.
Then the Sovereign descended.
It didn't take shape in the conventional sense—its body was an amalgam of stories and sleep, forged from myths forgotten by even the gods. A towering, semi-translucent giant with eyes like black suns and tendrils of night trailing behind.
[You are not of the dream, yet you persist.]
The Sovereign's voice was neither angry nor surprised—merely curious. Zhen raised his halberd.
"I am Zhen of the Multiverse System. I am here to conquer, awaken, and ascend."
[You think existence bends to you?]
The Sovereign stretched out a hand, and from it fell a Clockwork Eternity Spear, formed from the gears of dead timelines. It struck the ground and exploded into paradox flame, instantly aging and reversing everything it touched. Entire islands were unmade and remade in flashes.
Zhen leaped through it, halberd cutting through the current of time. Every swing of his blade severed false moments, unspooling tangled loops of fate. But the Sovereign was fast—fast in a way that transcended speed. It appeared where it had never been, moved in ways that hadn't happened yet.
Qiyue formed a seal—Heaven's Cage of Reflection—binding part of the Sovereign's future self in a mirrored loop. But the Sovereign grinned and shattered it with a thought, scattering reflections of possible Qiyues across the air, screaming as they faded into nothing.
Liuyan sang.
Her voice was not merely beautiful—it was ancient law, bound in the Bell Codex's truth. Her song invoked Origin Light, the first glow of the multiverse. The Sovereign recoiled, black suns narrowing, its form flickering as if uncertain of its own beginning.
Zhen seized the moment and activated the Eighth Layer of Ascension.
Golden chains exploded from his body, each one formed from oaths, victories, and trials he had overcome across countless realms. They wrapped around the Sovereign's limbs, binding memory to reality.
"You wield story," Zhen growled, stepping forward, "but I wield truth."
He plunged the halberd into the Sovereign's chest.
Time shattered.
The battlefield collapsed into a sea of dream fragments. Zhen fell with it—spiraling through lifetimes, faces, possibilities. He saw himself as a tyrant, a savior, a forgotten wanderer. Saw Liuyan dead. Saw Qiyue turning from him. Saw realms burning.
But he held fast to one thread—the present. His truth.
And through that thread, he pulled himself back, tearing free of the Sovereign's delusion.
He awoke standing over its broken husk.
The Echoing Realm trembled. The sky closed.
Liuyan landed beside him, panting, her golden aura fading. Qiyue limped to him, hand over her chest, where a fragment of false time had cut her.
"It's over?" Qiyue asked.
Zhen looked to the dream-husk of the Sovereign, then shook his head. "No. That was one incarnation. But we've opened the path to the Origin Nexus."
Behind them, a great stairwell unfolded from the ground—formed from time-fragments and sealed with Twelve Guardian Seals.
From the sky above, the system's voice echoed:
[Warning: Ascension Threshold Detected.]
[Zhen: You have unlocked the path to the Primordial Ranking War.]
[All Rankers will now be notified.]
Liuyan's eyes widened. "We've just called every major Ranker… every enemy and ally… into one convergence point."
Qiyue nodded. "The true war begins now."
Zhen's eyes narrowed. "Then let them come."
The stairwell of time-fragments stretched endlessly before them, each step humming with ancient power. Zhen, Liuyan, and Qiyue exchanged glances — the weight of what lay ahead settling deep within their hearts. Beyond those steps awaited the Origin Nexus, a crucible of fate where the strongest Rankers across all multiverses would collide in a battle unlike any before.
As they ascended, the ambient echoes of countless battles reverberated around them. The walls shimmered with images — warriors wielding impossible weapons, empires rising and falling in moments, alliances forged and shattered in the blink of an eye. Each vision a testament to the cost and glory of ascension.
Liuyan's voice broke the silence. "Every step we take is a step deeper into legend — or oblivion."
Qiyue's gaze was fixed on the distant glow at the stairwell's end. "The Primordial Ranking War... it's more than just a contest for power. It's the test of existence itself."
Zhen nodded, his grip tightening on the Crimson Halberd. "And we've just sent out the call. Every Ranker in the multiverse knows now. The time for hiding is over."
They reached the final step, stepping onto a platform suspended in the void. Before them stood an immense gate forged from the purest starlight, inscribed with runes older than time. The Origin Nexus.
The gate pulsed once, then slowly opened, revealing a swirling vortex of energy — the heart of the multiverse's very will.
As they prepared to enter, a voice echoed from the shadows — a figure draped in robes woven from the fabric of reality itself emerged.
"You carry the burden of the Echoing Realm," the figure said. "But know this: the Primordial Ranking War is not merely a battle of strength. It is a crucible of spirit, mind, and soul."
Zhen stepped forward. "Who are you?"
The figure's face shimmered, never settling into one form. "I am the Keeper of the Origin. Guardian of paths, watcher of destinies."
Liuyan's eyes narrowed. "Then you understand what's coming."
The Keeper nodded slowly. "I do. And I offer you this: the choice to walk the path of unity or to forge alone. The multiverse will bend and break, and only those who understand their true self will survive."
Qiyue exchanged a look with Zhen and Liuyan. "We stand together."
The Keeper raised a hand, scattering glowing shards into the air. "Then enter, Ascendants. Let the Primordial War begin."
They stepped through the gate.
The multiverse shifted.
Stars exploded. Worlds collided. And from the cosmic chaos, a new chapter was born.