The light swallowed everything. For a moment, Taye couldn't breathe. The air around him shimmered, heavy and alive, like it carried a heartbeat of its own. His feet felt weightless, and then, darkness.
When his eyes opened again, he was standing on soil that pulsed faintly beneath his boots. The air smelled like rain and ash. The sky above wasn't black or blue, it was something in between, a storm frozen in time.
"Nnena?"
His voice echoed too loudly. He turned around, searching. The river was gone. The city too. Just endless gray land, scattered with broken pillars and twisted trees that bled faint light.
"Nnena!"
No answer.
Taye's chest tightened. The pendant around his neck glowed dimly, trembling as if it sensed something. He took a slow step forward. The ground beneath him rippled... like it was alive... and from the mist, a faint shape began to form.
It was a gate,smaller, cracked, and carved with the same spiral marks. In front of it stood a figure.
She was facing away from him, long dark hair flowing down her back. When she turned, Taye's breath caught.
"Aisha."
But she looked different....older, her eyes burning faint gold.
"You shouldn't have come here," she said softly. Her voice echoed like wind through water.
"I didn't have a choice," Taye said. "Where's Nnena? What is this place?"
She stepped closer. "This is the Between. The world beneath memory. The place where what's forgotten waits to return."
He frowned. "I don't understand...."
"You sealed the River Gate once," she interrupted. "And when you did, you trapped parts of yourself here. Every memory, every power, every truth you couldn't bear."
Taye felt the air shift. "So I'm missing pieces of me?"
Aisha nodded. "And something else. Something you left behind… woke up."
Before he could speak, the ground shook violently. The mist twisted and a dark wave rippled through the air, like a shadow swimming beneath glass.
Aisha's eyes widened. "He knows you're here."
"Who?"
She didn't answer. Instead, she grabbed his hand and pressed something into his palm..... a shard of crystal, glowing faint gold. "Find the Echo Stone. It will lead you to your lost light."
"What about you?"
She smiled faintly. "I was never really here."
And then she faded, dissolving into the mist like smoke.
"Taye!"
He turned.... relief flooding through him. Nnena stumbled out of the haze, coughing. "Where the hell are we?"
He ran to her. "You okay?"
"Barely. One minute, we were stepping through light, next thing, I'm falling through fog." She looked around, frowning. "This place feels wrong."
"It's not real," Taye said quietly. "Or maybe it's too real."
Nnena gave him a look. "That's not helping."
Before he could reply, a low rumble rolled across the land. Both turned as shadows began to rise....tall, thin, bending like smoke. Dozens of them, eyes glowing faint red.
Nnena's hand went to her gun. "Tell me those aren't people."
"They aren't," Taye muttered, stepping forward. "They're memories… corrupted ones."
"What does that even mean?"
He didn't answer. The pendant flared suddenly, light bursting from it. The shadows screamed, recoiling. Instinct took over. Taye lifted the pendant higher, and words spilled from his mouth....ancient, rhythmic, not his own.
The air split with a pulse of gold light. The shadows vanished, swallowed back into the mist.
Nnena stared. "You wanna explain that?"
Taye lowered the pendant, panting. "Later. We need to move."
"Move where?"
He pointed toward the horizon. Faint light shimmered in the distance....like a heartbeat calling them. "That way.
They walked for what felt like hours, though time didn't seem to exist here. The ground kept shifting... one moment stone, the next, sand, then water. At times, they'd hear whispers, soft and broken
Once, Nnena stopped. "Did you hear that?"
Taye paused. The whisper was faint but clear...Eran… come home.
His skin prickled.
Nnena looked at him carefully. "Who's Eran?"
He swallowed. "Someone I used to be."
They continued. The path finally opened into a wide clearing. At the center stood a ruin.... stone towers wrapped in roots that glowed from beneath. And floating above it all, a massive crystal pulsing gold and black at once.
The Echo Stone.
Taye stepped forward slowly. "That's it."
But as he moved closer, a voice drifted from behind the crystal, deep, smooth, and sharp as ice.
"You shouldn't have come back, Eran."
Nnena froze. Taye's blood ran cold.
A figure stepped out of the shadow. Cloaked in black, eyes burning like dying coals. His presence bent the air itself.
"The Shadow Lord," Taye whispered.
The man smiled. "You still remember my name. I'm touched."
"Stay back," Taye warned.
"Still pretending to be human?" The Shadow Lord chuckled. "How pathetic. You sealed the gate, abandoned your realm, and hid in flesh, all for what? To forget who you were?"
Taye's grip on the pendant tightened. "That's enough."
"You can't silence me," the shadow said. "You can only delay what's coming." He gestured toward the crystal. "The Echo Stone holds your truth, Eran. Touch it, and you'll remember, but you'll also wake what sleeps inside it."
Nnena whispered, "Don't do it."
But the pendant was already humming, the same rhythm as the crystal. Taye stepped forward. "If that's what it takes to end this, then so be it."
The Shadow Lord laughed softly. "Then welcome home, my fallen brother."
Before Taye could react, the ground split apart. The crystal cracked, releasing a shockwave of light and shadow. Nnena screamed as the force threw her back. Taye fell to his knees, clutching his head.
Images flashed.... war, rivers of fire, wings of gold tearing apart. His own voice screaming in another language.
Then silence.
He opened his eyes... the world around him trembling, torn between dark and light. The Shadow Lord was gone. The crystal had shattered. And in his chest, something burned,a symbol glowing faintly through his shirt.
"Taye!" Nnena crawled to him, face pale. "What happened?"
He looked at her, his eyes now faintly gold again. "I… remember."
"What do you remember?"
"That this isn't over."
Behind them, the ground cracked again and from the mist, hundreds of shadow forms began to rise, crawling, whispering, reaching toward them.
Nnena stood, pulling him up. "We need to go, now!"
But Taye didn't move immediately. He stared at the horizon where the gate once was, voice low.
"They're not just coming for us. They're coming for the city."
The pendant flared once more, and a beam of light cut through the mist, opening a faint path back toward the world they came from.
Nnena grabbed his arm. "Taye!"
He nodded once, eyes still locked on the rising darkness. "Go. I'll hold them back."
"The hell you will," she snapped. "We go together."
For a second, they just looked at each other and then both ran into the light.
As the world folded behind them, the Shadow Lord's voice echoed through the collapsing mist:
> "Run while you can, Eran. The river remembers everything."
Outside, the river churned violently as two figures stumbled out onto the bank. The morning sun was rising, but the water beneath it was dark, almost black.
Taye collapsed, breathing hard. Nnena knelt beside him, shaking.
"You okay?" she asked.
He nodded weakly. "Yeah. But he's coming. And next time… he won't just send shadows."
Nnena looked toward the river. "Then we better be ready."
The pendant flickered once, then dimmed completely
And beneath the river's surface, something huge shifted..... eyes opening slowly, glowing red beneath