The echo crowned

They didn't feel pain.

They felt awakening.

The crown hadn't just entered their bones it had rooted itself in their very essence. Aure could feel it humming in their breath, their pulse, in the way the wind now waited for their footsteps.

Beside him, was the one who had no name stood radiant no longer flickering.He was Stabilized, Reborn, but different.

His eyes were no longer just gold—they shimmered with threads of amethyst and starlight. Like the universe had kissed him and called him worthy.

He looked at Aure and smiled like he were gravity.

"You brought me back."

"No," Aure whispered. "We brought each other back."

A sound echoed across the sky a chime. No, not a chime. A call.

The ground beneath them rippled, and from the cracks emerged five figures—cloaked, masked, eyes glowing with betrayal and fear.

"The Crown has chosen outsiders," one of them hissed. "Blasphemy."

"Abomination," growled another. "One without a name, and one born of two realms. You upset the balance."

Aure stepped forward, barefoot, hair like smoke and sky, voice steady as flame. "There was never balance. Only silence."

The leader raised a blade forged from fossilized time.

"You will not ascend."

The one who had no name moved like lightning, stepping in front of Aure, his own blade drawn not steel anymore, but a weapon forged from memory and fire.

The clash was silent.

And then chaos roared.

Steel met will. Memory met magic. Sigils glowed across their skin like battle hymns.

And in the middle of it all, Aure sang.

His voice wasn't melody. It was truth. It shattered one mask. Then another.

Until the last attacker knelt, shaking, whispering, "I remember… your name."

The name.

The forbidden one.

The one the Rift had taken.

Aure knelt, fingers on the man's temple. "Then say it."

And as the name returned, the skies split with thunder, and lightning spelled it across the clouds.

Lian.

He breathed in whole again.

And this time, Aure said it aloud.

"My name is Aure. And this is Lian."

"We are crowned. We are bound. And we are no longer hiding."