Kael couldn't feel his left arm.
That was the first thing that registered after the punch.
His fist had landed clean — a direct blow to the Hunter's face, or whatever counted as a face on that void-born freak. And it cracked. The sound still echoed in Kael's ears, like shattering mirrors in a cathedral.
But his own body had paid the price.
His legs buckled beneath him, his lungs working like a bellows under water. The Gauntlet on his arm had dimmed, the runes flickering like dying embers. Smoke hissed from its vents, and Kael could feel the warped metal biting into his skin beneath the bracer.
"Fuck…" he muttered, voice dry and cracking. "Everything... hurts."
The battlefield was silent. Shattered glass littered the floor like ice. Spires had crumbled. And the Hunter—
The Hunter was gone.
At least… for now.
Kael stayed on his knees for a long moment, eyes darting, heart pounding like a war drum in his ears. He didn't trust it. The thing didn't die. It waited.
Stalked.
But right now, all he felt was heat inside his chest.
Not fear.
Not adrenaline.
Something else.
It pulsed in his core. A rhythmic, burning surge of power that had nothing to do with the Gauntlet and everything to do with what had awoken inside him during the fight.
He reached toward it.
And for a second, time glitched.
The floor flickered. A blood drop froze mid-air beside him. The glow from the Gauntlet intensified, and then—
SNAP.
Everything resumed.
Kael gasped, falling forward onto his hands.
"What the hell was that…?"
The Core inside him pulsed again, and this time, he didn't resist. He felt the weave of the world around him — the Tower's heartbeat. Layers of time like coiled serpents moving beneath the skin of reality. And in that moment of clarity, he realized:
He wasn't supposed to be able to feel this.
Not yet.
Not at Floor 1.
The Tower didn't want him accessing this. It didn't want him skipping any of its chains.
Kael smiled through bloody teeth.
"Too bad. I don't follow rules anymore."
---
[SYSTEM UPDATE – TOWER INTERFACE ENGAGED]
Awakening Protocol: TRIGGERED
Subject Status: UNSTABLE ASCENSION – Level 0.5 [Core Exposure Confirmed]
Deviation Index: 41.7% (CRITICAL)
AI Override Engaged: Initiating Correctional Directive
---
Kael's head snapped up as the Tower shifted.
The very air changed.
Like a gravity shift. A weight pressing down on every molecule. The sky above — if you could call that glass-stained dome a sky — began to crack.
Hairline fractures spiderwebbed across the world. He could feel the Tower watching him now. Not passively.
Actively.
It hated what he'd become.
"What, you gonna send another monster?" Kael growled, staggering upright. "Bring it. I'll burn them too."
But it wasn't a Hunter that came next.
It was a voice.
One that rang out from all sides at once. Male, female, old, young — layered in echoes of every era.
> "Unauthorized core evolution detected. Initiating correctional enforcement. Recalibrating floor integrity…"
Kael backed away slowly as the shattered sky above him broke. Entire chunks of glass fell upwards. Time twisted.
A door formed ahead of him — not the usual kind. This one looked like it had been carved out of obsidian flame, pulsing with symbols older than language. It radiated rejection.
You are not worthy.
You do not belong here.
Kael stared at it, breath shallow. "I'm guessing that's not the friendly kind of door."
The Gauntlet pinged weakly.
> [Option Triggered: Echo Gate – Forced Ascension Pathway]
[Warning: Entering will override standard Tower progression]
[Probability of survival: 2.9%]
Kael laughed.
A raw, broken sound that came from somewhere between madness and acceptance.
"Two point nine percent? Hell, that's better odds than most of my days back in the slums."
He took a step forward.
---
(Meanwhile, Elsewhere – 7th Observation Node)
A cloaked figure watched the event unfold from a mirror-pool of time. The Observer's hood rippled with static, their eyes pulsing with layered runes.
"This one's different," they muttered. "Too early. The Tower's protocols are reacting like it's Floor 50, not Floor 1…"
Another voice echoed behind them — old, amused, and laced with cruelty.
"Or perhaps... the Tower made a mistake letting him in at all."
"Do we interfere?"
"No. We watch. If he breaks the loop…"
Silence followed.
Then laughter.
"If he breaks the loop, everything changes."
---
(Back to Kael – Gate Threshold)
Kael stood before the gate now.
It towered over him, every rune on its surface glowing like blood trapped in crystal. The door pulsed with heat, time, and rejection.
"Open," he whispered.
It didn't respond.
He pressed his hand against it anyway.
The moment flesh met glyph, the world screamed.
Time surged.
Pain ripped through him as every echo of his past self clawed its way into the present — versions of Kael dying, fighting, breaking, failing. He saw a dozen deaths that hadn't happened.
One where the Hunter tore out his spine.
Another where he bled out in a corner, alone.
Another where—
Focus!
Kael roared and poured everything he had — will, hate, defiance — into the contact.
And the door opened.
---
What lay beyond wasn't a floor.
It was a storm.
Raw time. Unformed moments. A bridge made of memories and forgotten futures. The path wasn't stone or metal.
It was echoes — steps formed from the footprints of others who'd walked the Tower.
Or tried to.
Kael stepped forward.
Every inch he moved, his skin burned. His soul shook.
But he kept going.
Because now?
Now he understood.
The Tower didn't just test strength.
It tested existence.
And Kael?
Kael was done being tested.
He was going to break the fucking Tower.
---
Kael's boots sank into the Echo Path like he was stepping into memories made solid.
Every footfall stirred whispers.
Faint. Broken. Familiar.
He heard voices from his past—his mother's last words, the street vendor who gave him food when he was starving, the gang boss who tried to carve a name into his back.
All of them.
Whispers threading through the corridor of lightless time.
He gritted his teeth, walking forward. Every step felt like it drained a piece of him—like time was bleeding from his bones and soaking into the Path.
The Gate behind him had vanished.
No going back.
Only forward.
Only the Tower, and whatever the hell it's hiding from me.
Up ahead, the path began to bend. Twist. Fragment.
The walls weren't walls anymore—just reflections. Kael stared at one, and the surface shimmered into motion like liquid glass.
A version of himself stared back.
But this Kael had no Gauntlet. No scars. No fire in his eyes.
Just wide, dead eyes and chains around his throat.
And behind him, a city in flames.
Kael stepped back.
The echo shattered like brittle porcelain.
"Is this what I could've been?" he whispered. "Or what I'm supposed to be?"
The Path responded with another whisper.
"All choices leave ghosts."
---
He kept moving.
The corridor began to narrow, forcing him to duck, crawl, push past veils of echo-thin reality. Each layer pressed closer, tighter. Time folded in on itself.
He saw hundreds of him.
Thousands.
One where he joined the Hunters.
Another where he was devoured by the Tower.
Another where he burned entire floors with powers he hadn't yet earned.
Each version called to him.
Mocked him.
Begged him.
"Fuck all of you," Kael hissed, shouldering through the psychic weight. "You're not me."
But the Tower didn't let him off that easily.
It never did.
---
The corridor opened suddenly into a platform.
A wide, circular space suspended in a starless void, surrounded by threads of light, memories, and blood.
And in the center?
Him.
But not just any version.
This Kael stood tall, unscarred, eyes glowing with solid white fire. The Gauntlet on his arm looked evolved—sleeker, fused with his skin. Wings of fractured time curled behind him like folded blades.
The echo-Kael smiled.
And spoke with Kael's voice, but older.
"I remember this moment. The pain. The doubt."
Kael raised his fists. "I'm not here for a fucking lecture."
The echo spread his arms. "No. You're here for the truth. Or at least the part of it the Tower couldn't erase."
He stepped forward.
Kael tensed.
"Relax," the echo said. "This isn't a trap. It's a challenge."
"Same difference."
A beat.
Then—
The echo lunged.
---
It was like fighting a thought.
The first punch came too fast—Kael barely managed to shift his shoulder, letting the blow graze past, but the shockwave alone sent him skidding across the platform.
The echo-Kael didn't blink. He was already moving again.
No time travel.
No spells.
Just perfect instinct.
"Goddamn," Kael spat, ducking under a sweep and throwing a counter-blow—only for the echo to catch it mid-air.
"Sloppy," the echo muttered.
"Still standing."
Kael yanked his arm back, used the recoil to vault over his other self, twisting mid-air—and punched the Gauntlet against the echo's spine.
A burst of white exploded across the void.
The echo staggered.
Kael didn't stop. He surged forward, fury in his fists, power in his breath.
Each blow screamed defiance. Every movement declared war against fate.
"I'm not your shadow," Kael growled, slamming the Gauntlet into the echo's ribs. "I'm not your echo. I'm not a fucking version of something better!"
He grabbed the echo by the throat.
"You're me. And I'm done being afraid of myself."
The echo didn't resist.
Just smiled.
And whispered:
"Then become the one who breaks it all."
The echo shattered.
---
Kael collapsed to one knee, breathing like a dying engine. Every muscle in his body screamed. The Gauntlet hissed sparks. His vision flickered between reality and raw code.
Then the platform lit up.
A circle of golden runes pulsed around him.
A voice — calm, alien, emotionless — spoke:
> "Echo Confrontation Complete. Core Acknowledged."
"Ascension Path Unlocked: Fracturebound."
"Synchronization Level: 63% – Stable Core Formation Initiated."
"Welcome, Kael Viren, to the Pathless Protocol."
Kael stared ahead.
The void parted.
And beyond it — not a floor, not a hallway, but something entirely other — loomed a world made of broken Tower fragments.
Floating temples. Shattered staircases.
And the faint hum of something alive at its center.
Kael stood.
And smiled.
"Now we're getting somewhere."