The Weave of Choice
The Source pulsed before them, a heart of endless becoming. Its radiance bathed them in visions—of what had been, what could be, and what must never come to pass. Mira felt its hum inside her bones, as if her very soul resonated with its truth.
Caelen stood closest, arms open to the weave of possibility, threads of potential binding to him like ribbons of light. His voice was calm, almost reverent.
"I see the better world," he said. "One without decay, without the old rules that held us captive. We can write a new pattern—one where the Balance does not dictate, but obeys."
Mira approached, the others flanking her.
"Every Keeper saw things in the Source," she said. "Most turned away. Because they knew power without cost is illusion."
"There is cost," Caelen replied, gesturing to the fragments of himself already dissolving into light. "But I choose to pay it. Why shouldn't we shape a world free of pain?"
Lena's eyes narrowed. "Because pain teaches. Balance isn't the enemy—it's the story. Life and loss. Creation and decay."
Bram stepped forward. "You can't burn the book and call it a better story."
The Source stirred. A ring of light emerged around them, casting each into their own vision—a final test.
Mira stood alone, offered a future where she ruled the world in peace, but at the cost of memory.
Lena saw herself rewriting the magic of the world, curing all ills, erasing death itself—but only by becoming something no longer human.
Elric faced a world where his brother lived, where war never came—but where he never met Mira.
Bram was offered silence. An end to the voices. To be free from the Between, but severed from all he had become.
Each hesitated.
Each chose to let go.
The visions faded. The Source calmed.
Caelen stood alone, threads of his new world falling from his hands, rejected by the truth of their choices.
"You failed," he whispered.
"No," Mira said. "We remembered."
Together, they reached for the Source—not to reshape it, but to mend it. To restore the fracture. To honor the story.
Light engulfed them.
The Between sighed.
And the world began again.