The wall that still stands
To the east of all maps, where the wind has no name and the light filters timidly between the scorched mountains, there exists a city that has never changed: Varosk.
Once a cradle of wisdom, Varosk became, after the fall of the Tree, a fortress of absolute silence. There, judgment was replaced by a more strict rule: all flourishing is heresy.
Roots are not allowed. Emotions are not named. The soul is not spoken of. Everything spiritual has been replaced by strict civic structure . The words "resonance," "vibration," and "memory" are forbidden.
And for generations, Varosk endured.
But the living network no longer respected borders.
And that day, something changed.
The arrival of the rift
It wasn't an explosion. Nor a physical outbreak. It was a crack .
On Varosk's northern wall, a thin line appeared. A break in the perfect marble of the Integrity Wall, where the immutable laws are engraved.
The crack wasn't detected by sensors. But the children began to draw it.
With chalk. With charcoal. On their desks. On the floor. Without knowing why.
A boy named Salen looked at the real crack for the first time and whispered:
—"Something wants to get in here."
That night, Salen dreamed of a white flower… covered by a crystal veil.
III. The vigilance of the mental sentinels
Varosk's doctrine is upheld by an elite group of guardians called Mind Sentinels : people trained to detect any emotional or conceptual deviation. They don't interrogate. They readjust.
One of them, Iskarel , began to have visions. He remembered a face he'd never seen. A name he couldn't pronounce. A root he didn't understand.
And the most dangerous thing: he started writing.
He did it at night. On papers that he then burned. But the smoke had a shape.
And the shapes… were roots.
Mieral's whisper
Mieral arrived unseen. Not by magic, but because Varosk had no room for the unlawful.
But the white leaves appeared anyway.
One at the entrance to the University of Reasoning. Another at the door of the Chamber of Rules. One more… under Salen's pillow.
And when they touched them, they remembered without having lived.
Iskarel saw a version of himself singing in a city without walls. Salen saw his mother crying, something that never happened. And the Chamber of Rules… began to creak.
Subversion without explosion
The root didn't sprout in the streets. It sprouted in thoughts.
The sentences began to lose meaning:
"Structure is salvation" became "Salvation is seeking structure." "What is correct is what is permitted" was changed to "What is permitted is not always correct."
The city didn't rebel. It was confused.
And in the confusion… a bigger rift blossomed.
The meeting with Akihiko
Guided by the vibration of dissonance, Akihiko crossed the invisible border of Varosk. There was no alarm. Only silence.
The citizens ignored him. They couldn't see him.
But they do come out.
The boy approached. He didn't ask who it was. He just said:
—"The flower wants to come out."
Akihiko knelt beside the crack. He placed his hand. He didn't impose his energy. He listened.
And inside the wall… a transparent root lit up.
VII. The collapse of the Integrity Wall
That night, without anyone touching it, the Wall cracked. It didn't fall. It didn't explode. It opened up.
And behind him was a dry garden. One that had been covered over for centuries. Where, in the past, the founders of Varosk had buried the first roots of judgment.
There were names written in stone. And one of them… was Iskarel.
He, seeing him, remembered everything.
And he cried.
For the first time in his life.
VIII. The city that did not fall
Varosk wasn't destroyed. The citizens didn't rebel. But the Sentinels stopped correcting. Children began chanting names that weren't in the register. And roots began to sprout in the mist.
Not white. Not black. Not gray. Multiform. As if each person were generating a different root.
An entire city blossoming for the first time… without knowing it was blossoming.
Aeri watches from the rift
Aeri didn't go in. She didn't need to. From the edge of the rift, she saw everything. And for the first time, she wrote on her own scroll.
—"When the forbidden flourishes, it does so in a new form. It does so without permission, without a name… but with meaning."
And in the crack… a flower appeared that had never been seen before.
Transparent. With golden veins. And a dark heart that shone.
END OF CHAPTER 128