The sanctum was quiet.
But Darius could feel it—the fraying at the edges of his mind, like a corrupted file unraveling with every heartbeat. The echoes of the Crimson Pact still clung to his skin, his soul humming with divine imbalance.
Celestia slept beside him, her breathing slow but troubled. Nyx stood at the door, sharpening a blade that didn't need sharpening. Kaela whispered madness into the runes etched on the walls, as if speaking to unseen things.
Darius stood in the center, staring at the mirror the Architect once used—a relic tied to the roots of the game's original source code.
"Show me… myself," he commanded.
The mirror flickered. Then cracked.
From the shatter, a doorway opened—fractal and twitching, leading into a swirling space of broken data and forgotten memory.
Without hesitation, Darius stepped in.
Realm of Fracture
The Labyrinth of Forgotten Code wasn't a place. It was a wound.
