Quanus

Ten years ago, the Fragments fell from the sky and the world changed forever. Those who touched them either died… or became something else. The Broken: twisted beings with powers shaped by their deepest emotions.

Kade Veylan isn’t one of them. At least, that’s what he thought until his dormant Fragment begins to pulse, whisper, and speak:
“You were never meant to have just one power.”

On a world without modern technology, where nature is ancient and alive, and monsters that consume Fragments gain powers of their own, Kade begins his journey.
Not for power.
But for truth.

echoes of Sirius

She opens the door before I knock.

She turns before me, already walking.

"You saw someone," she says over her shoulder.

I hesitate in the doorway. "He didn't even touch the ground. Just floated there… like memory had weight."

Ena doesn't answer right away. Her room is darker than last time only two candles lit. One smokes. One flickers like it's unsure whether to stay lit.

"You weren't meant to see that yet," she says.

Ena pours tea darker this time, and sharp with iron.

"The echo doesn't follow time. It follows intention."

I blink. "What does that even mean?"

She sets the cup down between us and unrolls a scroll already half burned at the edges. On it: a map. But not one of Narrowridge I recognize. The layout is more… layered. Like it was drawn vertically, descending.

"It's a mark left behind by places that were forced to forget."

She presses a finger to the lower section of the map.

"This was once called the schaduw room. The Shadow Ledger. It kept names that didn't want to be kept. Or were too dangerous to remember."

"It was sealed generations ago. Beneath the city. Beneath even Oldroot."

Her eyes flash something between fear and inevitability.

"You'll try. You already are. That's what the Fragment does. It moves the soul toward what memory left behind."

She reaches under her chair and pulls out a stone object, small and heavy. A second figurine. A twin to the bone bird from before. But this one's wings are folded. The eyes are covered with a strip of iron.

"This was recovered near the entrance," she says.

We sit in silence for a while. My mind buzzes. So many names, so many paths converging.

I finish my tea. It tastes like forgotten things.

Ena doesn't try to stop me. But her voice follows me to the door.

"Don't speak a name down there unless you're ready to be known by it."

Evening pulls its cloak over Narrowridge.

I follow alleys that slope like old rivers. Past dead lanterns and whispering walls. Past markets where no coin is used only trade in memory and voice. There's a man who barters dreams in cracked vials. A woman who sings in a tongue that rearranges signs around her.

The deeper I walk, the less things stay where they belong.

In the Bodemdistrict, buildings are built on bones of others—structures from a time before written calendars. The stones are warm beneath my feet, like they still remember being part of something holy.

I stop at a bridge sagging under its own weight. Beneath it: a gate made not of metal, but layered black wood. A sigil carved at the center.

It pulses, once, in time with my chest.

The figurine in my pocket though I left it behind burns against my ribs.

"You weren't supposed to follow," I whisper.

A gust of breath escapes the seal. Dust and something colder than air.

The gate responds not by opening, but forgetting it was closed.

A word spoken in a voice like mine, but older. Fractured.

The hidden ledger