The aftermath of the clash with Khael left a ripple across the realms — not just a tremor in power, but a change in the very currents of fate.
Moonfall Citadel shimmered in the new dawn. Light spilled through sacred archways, casting patterns of ancient runes onto marble floors. But within its heart, Zhen stood still.
He was staring at the artifact now embedded in his palm — the Loom Shard, a gift and curse from his clash with the Null Weaver.
> [System Update: Loom Shard Bound]
— [Warning: Artifact type—Forbidden Tier]
— [Integrating with Primary Core]
— [Fatal Risk: 19.3% | Destiny Disruption Detected]
The shard pulsed faintly. Unlike other artifacts, this one didn't feel dead or static. It was alive, humming with what felt like fragmented voices — threads of countless fates unraveling and crying out to be rewritten.
Ji Yuyan stood behind him, silent, but watchful.
"You should rest," she finally said. "Even power that listens to you may one day bite back."
Zhen shook his head. "This isn't power. It's a test."
He glanced toward the sky — above the citadel, realms were beginning to overlap. One could now see them: floating domains shimmering in and out of existence, like massive continents layered through the heavens.
Each one held enemies. Or allies. Or perhaps, fragments of himself.
---
▣ The Fractured Realms and Ancestral Echoes
In the War Council Hall, Shen Lian tossed a broken spear onto the table.
"That bastard Khael wasn't working alone," she muttered. "Found this embedded in one of his spectral guards. Insignia of the Hollow Realm."
Li Anhua leaned in, her voice low. "That realm's supposed to have collapsed centuries ago… devoured by its own fate lines."
Zhen touched the tip of the broken spear and winced. In that brief contact, he saw something — a vision, not of time, but of fate reversed.
A throne of bones. A girl crying beneath the stars. A crown forged from regrets.
"I've seen that place," he whispered. "Not in dreams. In the Unwritten."
Li Anhua's gaze sharpened. "Then you're getting closer. The fragment inside you—it's reacting to more than just power. It's reaching for your past selves."
---
▣ A New Companion: Xuanyin, the Veiled Mirror
That evening, as Zhen meditated by the Skyfall Pool — the sacred site where realm energies converged — he felt it.
A ripple. Not hostile. Not exactly friendly either.
"I wouldn't move if I were you," said a voice like silver bells in fog.
Zhen opened his eyes. A girl stood on the water's surface, bare feet never disturbing the ripples. Her long hair was bound in translucent veils, and her face hidden behind a mirror-like mask.
"My name is Xuanyin. I'm a Mirror-Walker. And I've come to ask for your help."
Zhen studied her. "You're from the Fractured Realms?"
"I am the last of them," she said simply. "My realm shattered when fate denied its thread. I survived by stepping between reflections… but the mirror is cracking."
She lifted her mask briefly. Zhen caught a glimpse — a single eye, filled with stars collapsing.
"I need your Loom Shard to mend the Mirror Path," she said. "But in exchange, I can offer something else."
She extended her hand. A mirror shard hovered above her palm, pulsing like his Loom Shard.
> [System Alert: Mirror Key Detected]
— [Linking to Forbidden Thread: The Veiled One]
— [Choice Required: Bind / Reject]
Ji Yuyan and Shen Lian arrived just as Xuanyin knelt in front of Zhen.
Li Anhua's breath caught. "The Mirror Key… she's not just a walker. She's a fragment bearer too."
Zhen closed his fingers around the shard.
"I accept."
---
▣ The Loom Reforged
At the peak of Moonfall Citadel, under the constellation of the Weaver's Gate, Zhen performed a rare ritual — binding two forbidden threads into one.
Xuanyin stood beside him, her veils fluttering in the wind, humming with divine resonance. The sky turned from blue to molten gold, and runes formed an ever-spinning circle around them.
> [System Notice: Ascension Path Unlocked]
— [Title Gained: The Loomborn]
— [System Alignment: Dual-Core – Temporal Fate + Mirror Cycle]
— [Ability Unlocked: "Echoweave"]
— Description: Unravel one outcome and restitch another.
— Cooldown: Variable. Risk: System Overload.
Shen Lian let out a low whistle. "You're officially insane now."
Ji Yuyan said nothing, but her grip on her fan tightened.
Li Anhua nodded slowly. "The Lords will see this as a declaration. You're not just awakening... you're rewriting the rules."
Zhen lifted his gaze to the stars.
"Then let them come. The ranking board will change, not because I climbed it — but because I'll break it."
The instant Xuanyin's mirror fragment dissolved into Zhen's chest, the world quivered.
It wasn't just a tremor in the air—it was something deeper. One star dimmed in the heavens above, and another blazed to life. Some part of reality had been rewritten. Subtly. Irreversibly.
Zhen slowly opened his eyes.
His irises gleamed like polished glass—worlds swirling within them, as though he now saw not just the world as it was, but as it could have been.
"You… rewrote something, didn't you?" Ji Yuyan asked, her voice almost a whisper.
"I didn't change anything," Zhen said quietly. "I simply… saw what should've been."
Xuanyin's gaze was unreadable. She floated beside him, robes rustling with unseen wind. Her eyes shone with mirrored light.
"You touched the reverse-flow band of fate," she said slowly. "That is not something even high-ranked sovereigns dare to do. Every choice you reclaim demands a collapse somewhere else. Every fixed path… costs another's undoing."
Zhen was silent.
Visions danced in his mind: a boy named Ling Yuan failing his breakthrough because his system was inexplicably retrieved… A white-haired youth about to confess love, only for time to rewind and erase the moment…
These weren't strangers. They were his echoes—fragments from other lives. Lost possibilities. Versions that never became real.
"You've been weaving," Li Anhua said softly. "This wasn't just a breakthrough. It was a convergence. A stitching of your scattered selves."
Zhen turned toward the shimmering gate opening in the ruins before them. Its frame pulsed with light that reflected no origin—like moonlight from a dream.
"We're going into the Mirrorworld," he said. "And no one leaves unchanged."
---
✦ Mirrorworld: Gate of Inner Fracture
Deep beneath Moonfall Citadel, a hidden gate activated for the first time in eons. Floating shards of crystal and obsidian formed a swirling passage of light.
"This is the Fractured Path," Xuanyin said, holding out an ancient bronze mirror etched with glowing runes. "Only those who walk with clarity of heart can enter."
Ji Yuyan stepped forward. "And what if we carry doubt?"
"You'll meet yourselves," Xuanyin said, voice low. "And not all of you will return."
Shen Lian scoffed, but even he looked hesitant.
One by one, they stepped through.
When Zhen entered, silence fell.
No sound. No stars.
Only a hilltop of grey sky—and himself, standing across the field.
But this version of Zhen wore no runes. No glowing armor. His clothes were plain, his eyes dimmed by a long-forgotten weariness.
"You regret it, don't you?" the mirrored Zhen asked.
"If you never awakened the system… If you'd chosen a quiet life. Wouldn't you be… happier?"
Zhen didn't answer right away.
He stared at the man he could've been. The farmer. The poet. The one who stayed behind.
"...I did regret it," he finally said. "In those early days… yes. But now I understand."
"I walk this path not to become powerful," he continued, eyes burning, "but so no one else chooses for me again."
The mirrored Zhen smiled gently… and vanished.
The world cracked open, and Zhen stepped through.
---
✦ Recalibration: Rise of a New Era
As they all emerged from the Mirrorworld, the very sky of Moonfall Citadel split with a golden flash.
Above them, an enormous list unfurled—shimmering across the sky like a god's decree.
[ MULTIVERSE RANK BOARD ]
→ GLOBAL RESET IN PROGRESS
→ NEW ERA DETECTED: LOOMBORN TRIGGER CONFIRMED
→ INITIATING: SYSTEM-WIDE REBALANCING
→ RELEASING: [ ERA TRANSITION PROTOCOL v0.1 ]
Names scrolled at blinding speed. Tens of thousands were struck from the list. A few hundred surged upward.
Zhen's name, which once hovered around rank #312, began climbing.
Faster.
Faster.
Up past #200. Then #140. Then #79.
Gasps echoed.
Even Ji Yuyan's usually calm face twisted in awe.
"You understand what this means, right?" she asked.
Zhen nodded slowly. "It means the Sovereigns are stirring. The Rankings are no longer stable. The Age of Hidden Kings is ending."
"And the Era of Revelation is beginning," Xuanyin added, her voice almost solemn.
Far in the distance, lights began flickering in the air—signals. Declarations. War hymns from other worlds preparing to breach.
"The gods are whispering again," Li Anhua murmured. "The last time they did… entire timelines perished."
Zhen raised his gaze to the golden list in the sky. He clenched his fist.
"They whisper because they're afraid," he said.
"Because this time, I'm not one of their pawns."