WHISPERS OF THE FORBIDDEN CREATURES: The Forgotten King's Journal

Chapter 34: The Forgotten King's Journal

Lila stared at the journal. It pulsed faintly, like it had a heartbeat of its own.

Her fingers hovered over it. One touch. That was all it would take.

She glanced back but the chamber behind her was silent and still. Niall, Thorne, Seris… gone. Or perhaps never here. The chamber seemed to exist outside of time, floating in a reality only meant for her.

With a deep breath, she touched the cover.

The moment her skin met the leather, the room exploded in light. Not blinding, but revealing. The walls lit up with glowing glyphs. Her pendant flared to life. And the book opened itself.

Pages turned without her help, as if drawn by a hidden hand. Then they stopped on a page stained in something dark and old. Ink, or something worse.

She began to read.

"To the one who breaks the veil…"

"I write this not as a king, but as a man who defied fate and lost."

"If you are reading this, then the curse has lifted or shifted."

"The veil was never meant to imprison magic. It was meant to imprison me."

Lila's eyes widened. Her breath hitched. Him?

She flipped to the next page, urgency pulsing through her.

"They called me a tyrant. A destroyer. But I was a guardian. I did what I had to do to protect the world from what I became."

"There is a creature beneath this world, ancient and hungry. It does not speak. It consumes. It bends reality. It sleeps now, but it dreams of freedom."

"And you...you, child of the bloodline have cracked the last seal."

Lila staggered back. Her pendant burned against her chest.

She had freed something. Not just the world from the veil but whatever the King had buried beneath it.

A sound echoed behind her.

She turned.

Niall was there—except… it wasn't him.

His eyes were empty. Black. His smile too wide, too wrong.

It spoke, in a voice that was layered and deep and ancient:

"Thank you… for waking me."