The Severed Tapestry

The ascent from the Heart Chamber was silent.

Ahri walked first, her fingers brushing the thread around her wrist, now dimmed to a faint shimmer. Each step echoed like a memory, tugging at something she couldn't quite place—an unfinished story, a voice caught mid-sentence.

Behind her, Jin moved steadily, her protective threads drawn close like a cloak. The Elder brought up the rear, staff pressed tight to his palm, his gaze unusually far-off.

When they emerged into the moonlit courtyard of the upper temple, the air was colder. Or perhaps something had been lost below, something that once held the realm in balance. The stars above flickered oddly—as if threads between worlds were being pulled thin.

Jin spoke first. "She wasn't just trying to hurt you, Ahri. Miran wanted you to see something."

Ahri nodded. "A warning. A dare. A key. Maybe all three."

The Elder paused by the courtyard's shrine, brushing a layer of ash from an ancient tablet.

"Many years ago," he said slowly, "there was a prophecy we refused to acknowledge. It was said that if the Heart of Binding ever cracked, a new thread would emerge—one untouched by fate's loom. Neither written… nor meant to be."

Ahri looked up sharply. "Unwritten? Like… someone without a destiny?"

"Someone," he said, turning to her, "who could alter the weave itself."

Before the weight of those words could settle, a sound rolled across the sky—deep and shuddering. Not thunder.

Unraveling.

The stars rippled. Threads of starlight broke and dangled in the night like frayed silk. And from that torn sky… something began to descend.

A figure, cloaked in strands of torn memory, drifted downward like a marionette cut loose. It did not walk. It hung, suspended by unseen strings that moved with each pulse of the broken sky.

Its mask was familiar—once white, now rotted to bone. Not Miran's.

Ahri felt a sharp twist in her chest. "That's… my mother's mask."

The Elder stepped in front of her. "No. That's not your mother."

The figure touched the ground. Threads of shadow coiled around its limbs. Beneath the mask, something wept—a sound not of sadness, but of emptiness.

The Elder gripped his staff. "That is a Hollowed."

Ahri had never heard the term before, but it felt right. Wrong.

Jin's voice trembled. "They're not supposed to exist in this realm."

"They didn't," the Elder murmured. "Until now."

The Hollowed raised one hand. Around them, the air cracked—dozens of spirit threads burst into visibility, writhing like panicked snakes. The entire courtyard shuddered as if being pried apart.

And then—Miran's voice echoed through them all.

"This is the truth the Weavers feared. Threads can be broken. And from the severed… new stories rise."

The Hollowed moved forward—not attacking, but pulling threads loose as it passed. Memories faded from the walls. Stones crumbled. Jin gasped, clutching her head.

"I can't hear the spirits," she whispered. "They're… gone."

Ahri's pulse raced. "We can't fight this here."

The Elder reached into his robes and pulled out a curved talisman, ancient and cracked. "We're not going to fight it. We're going to trap it."

He handed the talisman to Ahri. "It's not meant for you. But your thread responds to it."

She didn't hesitate. The talisman warmed in her grip, her golden thread swirling around it like it had found something long lost.

The Hollowed lifted its mask, just slightly.

And Ahri saw not a face—but a mirror. Her own reflection, aged, broken, threadless.

The vision staggered her, but she pressed the talisman forward.

A golden weave surged from her wrist, catching the Hollowed mid-step. It screamed—not in pain, but in recognition. As though Ahri had just spoken its true name.

The sky snapped shut.

The courtyard fell still.

And the Hollowed vanished—threads and all—into the talisman's surface, which dimmed to ash in Ahri's palm.

Silence.

Even the stars stopped moving.

The Elder finally exhaled. "That was only the first. There will be more. The Severed are tearing holes in the Loom. And the Hollowed… they're what's left behind."

Ahri closed her fingers over the charred talisman. "Then we find the Loom."

Jin met her eyes. "And we reweave what was broken."

"No," Ahri said. "We don't just fix the weave. We change it."

Above them, one star flickered back into place. But far in the distance, across the sky's seam, something vast stirred—coiled and waiting in the darkness between fates.