Night in the royal gardens of Arcanum Academy was a thing of crafted beauty.
Moonlight poured over marble pathways, glittering across enchanted orchids that bloomed only at midnight. Silver-winged fireflies danced in silence, casting soft pulses of light across statues of forgotten gods. The air smelled of lavender, wet soil, and something faintly sweet — like a memory.
Aedric walked alone.
His boots didn't make a sound. Not because of magic — but because his body remembered death. It remembered how to walk like a ghost.
The garden twisted and forked in too many directions — just like the people who walked its paths.
He paused beside a statue of the Flame Goddess — hands extended, a crown of stars on her brow. Her eyes, though made of stone, seemed to judge him.
"I prayed to you once," he whispered.
Silence.
"Then you watched me burn."
---
He kept walking.
Every step deeper into the garden was a step into memory.
> This is where it happened…
Ten years ago — on this very path — Aedric had walked here unaware. A warm night. A glass of wine. A promise from his brother. He'd been smiling.
By the roses.
That's where Orien, his personal knight and the man he'd once called "brother," had drawn his dagger and slit his side open.
> For the throne.
For Caelen.
---
Tonight felt the same.
Too quiet. Too clean.
The fireflies were still. The trees didn't sway.
Aedric stopped. Closed his eyes.
Listened.
Nothing.
> Too perfect... too controlled.
He didn't look up when the leaf rustled.
Didn't flinch when the first shadow flickered past the corner of his eye.
But he smiled.
"Late."
---
A black-robed figure lunged from the hedges, blades curved and poisoned.
Aedric moved like wind.
He ducked low, spinning beneath the strike, grabbed the assassin's wrist mid-air and used the attacker's own momentum to slam him into the cobblestone.
The crack of bones.
The body twitched once, then stilled.
Before it could fall, another came — this one from behind, silent, ruthless.
Aedric rolled forward. The blade missed his spine by inches.
He turned and raised his hand — the black flame flickered alive.
A whip of shadow lashed out from the third attacker — dark magic meant to choke and bind.
Aedric caught it in his bare hand.
The shadows hissed in pain — the black flame devoured them like dry leaves in a furnace.
The attacker gasped, clutching his chest. Aedric crossed the space in two strides, grabbed his face—
"Tell Caelen... I'm awake."
—and drove the assassin's skull into the tree trunk. Once. Twice.
Silence.
---
Three down.
But he felt the fourth.
This one didn't attack.
He was watching.
Familiar presence.
Aedric's expression faltered for the first time.
He stepped through the rose archway — and there, standing in the moonlight beside the same silver fountain where he'd once laughed ten years ago...
Was Orien.
His old knight. His brother-in-arms.
Wearing black.
Face tight. Eyes hollow. Holding a blade.
"You're supposed to be dead," Orien whispered.
"And yet… here I am."
Aedric took a step closer.
"I trusted you once."
"You still should," Orien replied, shaking. "But I had no choice."
"They took your sister," Aedric said.
Orien's face paled.
"You remember?"
"I remember everything."
---
A long silence.
Even the fireflies stopped glowing.
"I didn't want to do this," Orien muttered. "They said... if I failed... they'd burn her like they burned you."
Aedric sighed.
"You had ten years, Orien."
"What?"
"Ten years to be the man you pretended to be."
He stepped closer. Orien raised his blade — but his hands shook.
"And now you come here… with lies in your eyes and Caelen's leash around your neck?"
"I—"
"You don't deserve mercy."
---
Before Orien could react, frost bloomed across the ground.
A snowflake touched the edge of his blade.
And then she stepped forward.
Lyara Nox.
Hair silver like winter.
Eyes glowing violet.
"You're bleeding regret," she whispered to Orien.
"You won't survive that."
Orien turned to her, startled. "Who—"
But his words froze in his throat — literally.
With a gentle wave of her hand, Lyara sealed his legs in crystal ice.
He gasped. Fell to his knees.
"You should've told him," she said.
And then stepped back.
---
Aedric looked down at Orien.
"I wanted to believe in you again."
"You still can," Orien begged. "Please—my sister—"
"I'll save her," Aedric said coldly. "But not for you."
His fingers ignited with black flame.
"I died once with forgiveness in my heart."
He pressed his hand against Orien's chest.
"I won't make that mistake again."
The flame surged.
Orien didn't scream.
The cold took his voice before the fire could.
---
Silence returned to the garden.
Only the stars watched.
Aedric stood still, the black flame crackling softly around his palm.
Behind him, Lyara said nothing. Just watched. Like she understood.
Finally, Aedric spoke.
"The timeline is already shattering."
"You changed the thread," Lyara whispered. "Now even fate can't see clearly."
Aedric turned, eyes distant.
"Good."
And from high atop the palace spire, Caelen Valtoris watched from shadow, one hand resting on a burning crystal orb.
"Little brother," he said, voice like a prayer and a curse, "you really are defying death."
---