By IMERPUS RELUR
--
Darkness did not come from absence.
It came from removal.
And in the far reaches of the divine cosmos—where ruined worlds floated like forgotten beads on a broken rosary—something stirred.
They had seen it.
The Watchers smiling.
The gods kneeling.
A nameless one turning memory into power.
And they hated it.
They, who had once followed gods that forsook them.
They, who had burned their own memories to become pure.
They, who believed that forgetting was the path to perfection.
They were the Cult of Hollow Light.
---
A black spire pulsing with false radiance towered in a vacuum realm where memory could not grow. Inside it, cloaked figures gathered around a spiraling crystal prism—one that shimmered with stolen thoughts.
Their leader, a faceless priest known only as Annullar, raised his hands.
> "The Rememberer walks. And the gods begin to kneel."
"He is the enemy of purity. He would bring back pain in the name of meaning. He would let gods carry shame… and call it light."
The cult chanted:
> "Hollow be the name. Erased be the truth. Forgotten be the divine."
Annullar turned to a sealed obelisk chained with silence.
> "Unseal the first Oracle. Let her scream. Let her shatter the realm of memory."
Chains broke.
A wail echoed—not in sound, but in pure negation.
A storm of anti-memory began to build.
---
Back in Auren's Domain…
The skies rippled—once again. But this time… something was wrong.
Auren stood beneath the light of the fifth Watcher. Eléa beside him, her wings folding tighter.
> "I feel… silence," she whispered.
> "Not peace?" Auren asked.
> "No," she said. "Something has arrived that cannot be remembered. A presence that rewrites the story as it happens."
The air tore.
A thin figure in white robes and a veil of false sunlight stepped into Auren's world. Their voice was calm, yet sickening.
> "We greet you, Nameless One.
And we reject you."
Auren narrowed his eyes.
> "Who are you?"
> "We are the Unlit, the emissaries of the Hollow Light.
The pure ones. We forget so we may ascend.
And you—who clings to sorrow and names—are the rot."
---
Boss Encounter – Unlit Oracle: Iresha, She Who Screams in Blankness
Type: Divine Nullcaster
Trait: Her presence erases memory of pain, truth, and even combat logic.
Effect: Any race fighting her forgets their abilities mid-battle.
The Remnari wavered. Their bodies flickered.
> "We're… forgetting ourselves," Eléa gasped. "She's undoing our root!"
Auren's chest burned. The Tear of Return flared.
He stepped forward, activating the Nameless Mantle. The cloak pulsed, anchoring his race's identity with a radiant glyph:
> "I name you again," he spoke. "Eléa. Remnari. Forgiven. Remembered. True."
One by one, his people stabilized.
But Iresha screamed again—an erasure wave that aimed to shatter even Auren's soul.
---
Auren raised his hand.
> "Then remember this."
He activated his newest ability:
---
Sutra Invocation – Resonant Bow:
A golden glyph formed above him.
Auren knelt—not in surrender, but in truth.
> "I bow… not to you, Iresha.
I bow to the truth within you… you've sealed."
The wave struck him—but stopped.
Because deep within the Oracle was pain.
Unspoken.
Buried.
And now—remembered.
A scream broke.
But this time, it was Iresha who fell to her knees.
---
> "He… he heard me," she whispered.
"He heard… my name… before it was burned."
She vanished in a burst of hollow light, but not as an enemy—
—as a soul released.
---
[You have defied the Cult of Hollow Light.]
[Their attention is now fixed on you.]
[You have retrieved a stolen Fragment: The Cry of the Unborn Oracle.]
A new seed of memory pulsed in Auren's palm.
And above… the sixth Watcher opened its eye.