Crownshade's old clocktower was abandoned—sealed decades ago after a ritual duel shattered its time-laced mechanisms. It now stood crooked against the edge of the academy ridge, shadowed and silent, its bells long rusted over.
Students passed it without glancing.
But tonight, Root stood before it—cloak drawn tight, eyes fixed on the thin trail of mist curling from beneath the door.
He wasn't here by accident.
He'd been summoned.
Not by the System.
By someone above it.
Hours earlier, after returning from the Nightbound Trial, a folded note had slipped beneath his dorm door.
No glyph signature. No traceable mana.
Just a line:
"Come alone. Or I'll know."
— C.
Now, the tower door creaked open as if it had been waiting.
Eidolorn didn't follow.
He didn't need to.
This was a different kind of fight.
The inside of the tower was more intact than Root expected—its broken gears still twitching like dying thoughts. Wooden floors creaked underfoot, and the stale scent of long-dead incense clung to the walls.
On the second landing stood a figure.
Tall. Cloaked. Masked—not like Eidolorn, but ritualistically, with half the face exposed in silver.
"Veras," the figure said. The voice was calm. Youthful. And dangerous.
"You're not on the official rankings."
Root didn't reply.
"You don't appear on the summon tier charts. No class tags. No bond tree. And yet…" He stepped forward, drawing back his hood to reveal icy silver hair and eyes like cracked glass. "Your summon moved like it's done this before."
Root still didn't answer.
The figure smiled faintly. "That silence confirms it."
[Name: Cendren Vale – Rank 1 Duelist]
Class: Chrono-Warlock (Advanced Timepath)
Summon: Unknown (Not Publicly Registered)
Affiliation: Headmaster's Watchtower
Root's gaze didn't shift. But inside, he was already calculating.
Cendren Vale. Number One. Chrono affinity. Dangerous.
"Don't worry," Cendren said, raising a hand. "This isn't about turning you in."
He drew a glowing glyph midair. It hovered, flickering, not System-born.
"This is about verifying the rumor."
Root finally spoke. "What rumor?"
Cendren's grin sharpened.
"That you're not playing the game—you're trying to rewrite it."
A pause.
"And that your summon isn't summoned."
Root said nothing.
Cendren's eyes gleamed.
"So. Let's find out."
He stepped back—and the tower groaned as the old runes around them flickered to life. Time slowed. The air grew thicker, like moving through oil.
[Duel Initialized – Unranked Clocktower Arena]
Restrictions: None
Witnesses: Sealed
Outcome: Burned into memory
Cendren raised one hand—and time fractured.
Root didn't flinch.
Because behind him, just outside the tower's door…
Eidolorn opened his eyes.
He wouldn't join the duel.
Not yet.
But something in the shadows marked the rhythm of the ticking clock.
The duel began without fanfare.
No countdown. No signal.
Just the click of a warped second hand.
Cendren moved first—naturally. His form blurred as time twisted around his limbs, every motion doubled and echoed. A strike came from the left, then rewound, hitting from the right before Root could pivot.
But Root didn't flinch.
He knew Cendren was faster.
He didn't need to be.
He only needed to last long enough.
The first blow clipped his shoulder—painful, but shallow. Root rolled back and tapped his ring.
[Passive Skill Triggered – Eidolorn Link: Shadow-Trace Deployed]
The air behind Cendren rippled.
No summon appeared.
But something cold whispered against his neck.
Cendren turned.
Nothing.
Root darted in with a blade feint—but it wasn't meant to hit. It was just to move him. Just enough.
The shadow-mark stuck to Cendren's side unnoticed.
Tick.
Root felt time slow again.
Cendren flicked his fingers, activating a chrono-loop. Three copies of himself rippled out—illusions that moved and struck with nearly real weight. He surged forward through them, aiming to disarm Root in a flurry of precision.
But Root didn't counter.
He dropped to one knee and whispered.
"Wraith Strikes."
Delayed cuts bloomed in the air behind Cendren like ghost blades. His own shadow moved out of sync.
Cendren stumbled.
[Passive Shadow Cut Detonated – 1.4 sec Delay]
[Eidolorn Phantom Hit Registered]
[Duel Arena Inconsistency: Tracking Error]
Cendren reeled back, startled—not by the strike, but the lack of warning.
"What the hell…?"
Root stood, wiping his lip.
"You control time," he said. "But not shadows."
Cendren's eyes narrowed.
"You're hiding him."
Root didn't deny it.
The next volley was brutal—Cendren used a time dilation zone to stack five seconds into one, landing three cuts across Root's thigh and ribs. Blood welled, but Root grit his teeth and moved with the distortion, throwing a dagger in a curved arc.
It missed.
But the shadow behind the blade didn't.
[Echo Bind – Prototype Thread Engaged]
[Target Slowed – Artificial Lag Triggered]
Cendren froze for half a second.
And half a second was eternity in a duel like this.
Root advanced.
Twilight Spiral ignited for the first time—Eidolorn's residual force spiraling along Root's arms like black wind. He drove his palm forward, not with strength, but timing.
The spiral struck dead center.
Cendren coughed and dropped to one knee, the time dilation breaking like shattered glass.
Silence.
[Duel Suspended – System Instability Detected]
Result: Indeterminate
Action Logged: Memory Sealed
Cendren looked up, half-laughing, half-winded.
"You're not a duelist," he said, voice rasping.
Root turned to leave.
"You're a lie the System hasn't read yet."
Behind him, Eidolorn emerged from the shadows for just a second—not fully formed.
Just enough to let Cendren see the mask.
Cendren's face shifted from confusion to… fear.
Not of Root.
Of what stood beside him.
The old tower doors creaked open behind Root as he stepped into the moonlight. The duel was over.
No announcement.
No crowd.
Just the quiet echo of an encounter too strange to be categorized.
Eidolorn flickered at his side now—half-visible in the shadows, his mask pulsing faintly with cold light. Root didn't look at him.
But he felt it.
Something had shifted.
Then—
Footsteps.
Cendren appeared behind them, slower now. Not in defeat—but in quiet calculation. He wasn't bleeding. He hadn't lost.
But something inside him had changed.
"You didn't win," he said. "But I didn't either."
Root didn't stop walking.
Cendren continued. "What you're hiding… it's not from us, is it? It's from it."
Root paused.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
Cendren gave a tired smile.
"No. But he does."
He nodded toward Eidolorn.
Not the summon.
The entity beneath the mask.
And for a heartbeat too long, the tower shadows didn't follow the moonlight—they bent toward Eidolorn instead.
"Take this," Cendren said, flicking something toward Root's back.
It was a bronze token etched with a temporal loop and three fractured lines. An override marker.
[Item Acquired: Duelist's Token – Rank 1 Privilege]
Access: Clocktower Archives, Floor 5
Use: One favor from Cendren Vale, no questions asked.
Validity: Until the next Duel Season reset.
"Use it wisely," Cendren muttered, turning back into the tower.
Root looked at the token, then at the fading duel glyph still flickering above the stones.
[EXP Awarded: +40 Hidden EXP]
Eidolorn Level: 6 → 7
New Skill Unlocked: Shade Clone – Hollow Divide
Description: Creates a perfect clone of Eidolorn made from compressed shadow and memory dust. Clone splits upon attack, leaving a delay-shred on enemies it passes through. Can exist for 6 seconds.
Root smiled slightly.
Now we're getting somewhere.
But before he could dismiss the interface, a new line of text scrawled itself across the bottom of his vision—jagged, raw, and not written in System glyphs.
This one looked… carved.
FORGOTTEN CODE SEGMENT REACTIVATED
:: MASK 1 OF 5 HAS STIRRED ::
"They do not yet remember your throne.
But soon, they will forget who theirs belonged to."
Root blinked.
But it was already gone.
Eidolorn looked at him, silently.
He didn't ask what it meant.
Because deep down, he knew:
This wasn't a duel.
This was the first echo of his real war.