The air had shifted since the Reaper left. The chamber no longer felt ancient—it felt expectant, like the temple was listening now.
Aethon stood frozen before the mural, the one showing a man being consumed in light at the center of the ritual. His features weren't drawn clearly, but something in the stance… the shape… it was unmistakable.
He whispered, "That can't be me…"
Leloid didn't answer.
Aethon turned. "You've seen this before?" Leloid nodded slowly. His expression, usually calm and collected, had cracked into something heavier—like a man carrying a secret too long. "I didn't want you to know this way."
"You told us there was a sacrifice," Eira said, voice low. "But not what."
Leloid looked between them. "Because I was still hoping I was wrong."
"But you weren't," Aethon said.
Silence.
The glowing shard in Aethon's palm pulsed faintly, echoing a heartbeat that wasn't his.
Leloid finally spoke. "The ritual needed to destroy the Architect entirely… doesn't just demand power. It demands a soul tethered to him. One created the moment he bent reality—when he forced himself into this world."
Eira's brows pulled together. "A tethered soul?"
Leloid's voice cracked. "You, Aethon. You carry a fragment of the Architect. Whether he placed it there through time manipulation or cursed fate itself, I don't know. But when he arrived… when he shattered the laws of life and time, something bound you to him."
Aethon staggered back, breath caught. "So that's why he said it… 'You are me… soon enough.'"
Leloid nodded.
"And the ritual to destroy him… it kills the tether too."
A long pause.
Then Eira stepped forward. "No. There's another way. There has to be."
"Not according to the Joker Mage," Leloid said bitterly. "Not according to the texts he left behind. He tried everything before betraying the Architect. Every spell, every glyph, every cheat he could find."
"And the Reaper?" Aethon asked.
Leloid's face hardened. "He doesn't care. He has one of the shards, and he's waiting for the rest to come together. He'll make the sacrifice. Gladly."
A heavy silence fell.
Then Eira grabbed Aethon's hand—the one holding the shard.
"No one's killing you," she said firmly.
The shard glowed a little brighter.
"We'll find another way," she added. "Even if we have to rewrite the rules like the Architect did."
Aethon looked at her, unsure whether to believe in her hope or fall into the weight of what he'd just learned.
"We move forward," he said at last. "We finish what we started."
From the corner of the room, the mural shimmered faintly. A new detail revealed itself beneath the light of the shard—a set of coordinates etched in tiny script beneath the ritual circle.
Aethon knelt beside it. "Another fragment."
Eira smiled faintly. "Then we're not done."
They left the temple, its stone doors sealing behind them like a chapter closing.
But far behind them, in the chamber where time flickered backward and forward, the mural shifted again—just for a moment.
The face of the man being sacrificed… grew clearer.
And it was Aethon.