Chapter 183: Whispers of the Lost Realm

Nightfall in the citadel was rarely quiet anymore. The once peaceful skies were now haunted by floating shards of broken stars, fragments of fractured realms drifting like ghosts across the void. The Spiral's corruption had etched itself into the sky, a constant reminder that reality itself was fraying.

Zhao Lianxu stood at the edge of the Grand Spire, the highest point in the Stronghold of Aeons. Below him, the city breathed with muted defiance—its people battered but unyielding. Torchlight flickered like dying constellations, casting long shadows over the bloodied stones of the fortress walls.

"They're waiting for your decision," said Xiyan as she joined him. Her voice was low, steady, but beneath it lingered tension, coiled and sharp. "The Path to the Lost Realm won't open forever. We either seize the moment, or we fall into silence."

Zhao didn't turn to look at her. His gaze was fixed on the horizon, where the light of the multiverse dimmed, like a candle guttering in a storm. He was quiet, not out of doubt, but out of knowing.

"The Forgotten Realm isn't just a place," he said finally. "It's memory, grief, regret—everything the Spiral thrives on. If we step into it, we risk more than our lives. We risk our truths."

Xiyan crossed her arms, golden eyes never leaving his face. "And if we don't step in, we let the Spiral consume all of it. All the bloodshed, all the resistance—for nothing."

A beat of silence passed between them.

"Gather the others," Zhao said at last. "We leave at dawn."

The Council's preparations were hurried but deliberate. Yanmei, whose body was now half-devoured by cursed darkness, sat meditating in the lower chambers of the citadel. The flickering torches did not dare cast light upon her entirely. Her power, dark and unfamiliar, hummed beneath her skin, her breath steady despite the pain.

She opened her eyes as Zhao approached, his presence breaking her trance like ripples across a still pond.

"You're ready to lead them into madness," she said without greeting.

"No," he replied. "I'm ready to lead them into the truth."

She chuckled softly, though it sounded more like a rasp. "Truth is more dangerous than madness."

He knelt before her, placing his hand on her shoulder. The cursed essence pulsed, but did not attack. It recognized him now. Feared him.

"That's why I need you beside me. You've walked its edge. You've come back."

Her eyes, swirling with the abyss, met his. "Then promise me this. If we lose ourselves inside... you'll be the one to end it. Whatever it takes."

Zhao did not hesitate. "I promise."

By dawn, a shimmering rift opened at the heart of the altar grounds, guided by ancient glyphs and blood-etched ritual. The Path to the Lost Realm revealed itself as a staircase of floating stones, spiraling into the sky and vanishing into a tear in the fabric of the world.

Only the chosen could enter.

Zhao, Yanmei, Xiyan, and five others stepped forward. Among them was Seru, the last Timeborn of the Vanished Clan; Kael, a mute swordsman with a blade forged from voidsteel; and Linya, the Soulweaver who could bind memory into form.

As they ascended, the multiverse shifted.

Reality blurred.

The Lost Realm was not a world.

It was a memory.

A thousand overlapping echoes of past lives, forgotten timelines, broken promises. It stretched before them like a dreamscape: skies painted with flickering auroras of emotion, rivers flowing backwards through fields of petrified starlight.

Zhao staggered as they stepped through, the world pressing into his soul.

He saw his mother—not as the Demon Princess of lore, but as a girl, weeping in a cage of divine light.

He saw himself, still a child, walking alone among burnt ruins.

He saw his father, the Prime Minister of the Multiverse, standing before a council of gods, refusing to bow.

"This realm..." Seru whispered. "It doesn't show us the past. It shows us what we tried to forget."

Xiyan gritted her teeth, gripping her weapon tighter. "Then we must remember it all."

Hours passed. Or years. Time had no meaning here.

They moved through echoing ruins, silent temples, weeping mountains.

In one chamber, they were attacked by Mirrorborn—creatures formed from their own suppressed fears. Yanmei battled a version of herself fully consumed by the darkness, her screams torn between rage and despair. Zhao faced a reflection that mocked his every choice, each blow revealing how close he was to becoming the very tyrant he swore to defeat.

They barely survived.

But Linya saved them, binding memory to sword, slashing through illusion with the weight of truth.

And still, they pressed deeper.

At the heart of the Lost Realm, they found it:

A pulsing cocoon of light and shadow, encased in crystalline roots that stretched across dimensions. It was ancient. Living. Breathing.

The seed of the Spiral.

Zhao approached it slowly, his every step a trial.

"This is where it began," Seru said. "Before corruption. Before war. A failed creation."

Xiyan's voice shook. "It's not evil. It's incomplete."

Yanmei stepped forward, placing a hand against the cocoon.

"It wants to be whole. It feeds because it's broken."

Zhao unsheathed his blade. Space trembled.

"Then we must either fix it... or end it."

The cocoon pulsed once. Then split open.

A blinding figure emerged—neither god nor demon, but something both.

It looked like Zhao.

But older. Twisted. Burned with light.

"I am what you will become," it said. "If you destroy me, you destroy the part of you that can end this war."

The team spread into formation, but Zhao raised a hand.

"Let me speak to it."

He stepped forward. Heart racing.

"You are not my future. You are my failure."

The figure blinked, uncertain.

Zhao raised his sword.

"But even failures can be rewritten."

And he attacked.

The battle was not of fists, but of wills. Memory against memory. Truth against illusion.

Every strike Zhao landed showed a different ending—his death, the fall of the multiverse, Yanmei alone on a ruined world. But he did not waver.

He struck with every piece of himself—the child, the warrior, the heir, the broken prince.

And when the final blow landed, the cocoon shattered.

Not in destruction, but in release.

The seed of Spiral disintegrated into starlight.

And the Lost Realm... began to heal.

When the team emerged from the rift, the citadel welcomed them with stunned silence.

Zhao fell to his knees, not from weakness, but relief.

They had not ended the Spiral.

But they had changed its song.

They had remembered what the world had forgotten.

And the war, now, would be fought on new terms.