The rooftop had finally gone quiet.
The ash from the defeated Pawn of Dust had long since scattered in the wind.
But the questions it left behind still lingered like ghosts.
Lyra sat on the edge of the rooftop bench, arms crossed, eyes scanning the three boys in front of her — one sipping tea like a bored king, one sharpening his aura like a blade, and one casually drawing talismans with a permanent marker on the floor.
"Alright," Lyra said, "enough vague answers and cryptic comments. I want to know exactly what this is. What is an Anomaly?"
Asvara didn't look up from his tea.
"A statistical impossibility that refuses to die."
"Be serious."
"I am. That's the literal definition."
Riven sighed, stepping in.
"Fine. Think of it like this. Every human soul is a thread. Most follow the same pattern — birth, live, die, repeat. But some threads twist, stretch, or refuse to snap. That's an Anomaly."
"It's not magic," Asvara added. "It's disruption. Some souls remember what they shouldn't. Some resist time. Some mutate."
"Like you?"
Asvara finally looked at her.
"I'm what they call a Time-Locked Anomaly. Cursed with immortality. I was a general. Thousands of years ago. I died in wars. I bled for kings. I survived gods. Now I can't age. Can't die. Can't forget."
Lyra blinked slowly.
"That's... a lot."
"You haven't met my trauma playlist."
She turned to Riven.
"And you?"
Riven lifted the hourglass from under his blazer and let the red sand swirl between his fingers.
"I'm a Consumption-Type. I absorb lifespans but only from those who die unnaturally. Accidents. Murders. Suicide. Natural deaths are off-limits. And if I kill someone intentionally... I can't absorb their time. In fact, I lose mine."
"So you're like... a reaper on a leash?"
"More like a thief with rules."
"You've never killed someone?"
"Not by choice. And never for time."
His voice dropped at the end. Lyra didn't press further.
"Okay. So Asvara is immortal. You drain lifespans. What about..." She turned to Kenji, who was holding a tiny incense stick over a notebook.
"Me? Oh I'm totally normal," Kenji grinned. "Except I can merge with the spirits of dead samurai and let them fight through my body."
"You mean like possession?"
Riven muttered, "We call it Soul Connection. He calls it destiny. I call it glorified ghost-renting."
"Hey. Don't disrespect the ancestors."
"They made questionable fashion choices. I stand by my comment."
Lyra ran a hand through her hair.
"So you're all Anomalies. But how many types are there?"
A.I.R.A.'s voice cut in from Asvara's phone.
"Based on recorded mythologies, spiritual resonance charts, and confirmed cases, Anomalies are currently categorized into twelve major types. With subtypes. The primary categories include but are not limited to:"
1. Time-Locked
Immortals. Souls that refuse to age or die. Rare. Often cursed or bound by ancient contracts.
2. Consumption-Type
Entities that absorb time, life-force, or emotion. Bound by moral or metaphysical laws.
3. Soul-Link
Individuals who can connect with spirits — usually warriors, sages, or fragmented consciousness — and share their abilities or awareness.
4. Clairvoyants
Those with access to knowledge from outside the temporal plane. Includes precognition, retrocognition, and dreamseers.
5. Soul Core Rebirth
Reincarnated souls carrying fragments of past identities.
Most don't remember. A few do.
A rare subtype that causes dimensional instability.
"That's you," Asvara said quietly, eyes locked with Lyra's.
"Soul Core Rebirth."
Lyra felt her chest tighten.
"I've had dreams," she admitted. "Wars. A battlefield. And you."
"That's not just a dream. That's memory."
"And the others?" she asked.
A.I.R.A. continued.
6. Elemental Anchors
Control over fundamental forces — fire, water, shadow, void. Often bound by bloodlines or relics.
7. Dimensional Distorters
Can phase through reality. Bend perception. Create illusions that cross physical limits.
8. Symbiotic Contracts
Humans bonded with ancient entities. Often volatile. Power comes at the cost of sanity.
9. Archivists
Can access The Archive — a non-linear memory bank of all events across timelines. Usually blind or mentally unstable.
10. Beast-Touched
Hosts to animal spirits or divine fauna. Common in shamanic cultures. Often misclassified.
11. Cursed Bloodlines
Inherited Anomaly traits. Passed through generations. Tied to ancestral mistakes or divine punishments.
12. Conduits
Rare anomalies that act as amplifiers — they don't possess power, but can boost or unlock others around them.
Silence.
"And The Concord of Dust hunts them all?" Lyra asked.
Asvara nodded slowly.
"They believe anomalies are bugs in the code. Mistakes in history. And they're here to 'clean' the timeline. And they go by many names but only one true names, Isorropia"
"And me?" she asked again. "Why me?"
"Because your soul has died before. And it remembers."
No one spoke for a while.
Only the hum of wind, the distant buzz of classroom chatter far below, and the sound of Riven's hourglass ticking softly.
Lyra looked down at her hands.
"So what now?"
Asvara stood and offered her a hand.
"Now? You get used to the fact that reality is broken. That we're what's left. That history doesn't end. It recycles. And the only way forward is to remember... before they erase us too."
Dormitory Building, Riven's Room– Night
The campus was quiet.
Most students had gone to bed, or were pretending to study.
But in the boys' dorm, the lights were still on.
It was Riven's room.
Tidy. Cold.
Smelled like old incense and rainwater.
Asvara sat cross-legged on the floor, a chessboard in front of him.
Kenji lay upside down on Riven's bed, chewing seaweed chips.
Riven was standing by a tall glass cabinet.
Inside it: rows and rows of clocks.
Digital. Analog. Pocket watches. Hourglasses. Sundials.
Even a pendulum from the 1800s.
"...You collect timepieces?" Kenji asked, blinking.
"I eat time," Riven replied. "Why wouldn't I appreciate its form?"
"That's the most poetic serial killer thing I've ever heard."
Asvara stared at the chessboard but wasn't playing.
He was thinking.
Calculating.
"They're not after Lyra," he said.
Kenji sat up. "You sure?"
"AIRA," Asvara called, "run trace on pattern overlays between Lyra's anomaly signal and projected Isorropia infiltration targets."
AIRA's voice hummed from his phone.
"Analysis complete. Probability of Lyra being primary target: 4.3%. Primary interest appears to be access to Gate-class dimensional anomalies."
"Gates?" Kenji frowned.
"Gate of the Abyss," Asvara confirmed. "There's one nearby."
Riven turned from the clock shelf. "Bandung?"
AIRA answered.
"Confirmed. First seal point: Cikapundung River. Resonance patterns match astral script from North Egyptian and Pleromic Tablets."
Kenji raised a hand. "Can someone translate that into not-Lovecraft?"
Asvara looked up, dead serious. "They're going to open a rift. But not to bring something in. To push something out."
The lights flickered.
Then the air thickened.
Not like heat or dust. But weight.
Old. Holy. Violent.
A gust of wind blew through the locked windows.
The incense holder rattled on the shelf.
"Incoming entity signature," AIRA said."Recognized: Astral Projection – Masamune Date."
A blue flame appeared near the clock shelf.
It swirled once, twice, then solidified into a figure wearing layered battle armor, half-spectral, with one eye covered and a crescent-moon helmet.
Masamune Date.
"So... the ghost of my great great great great great-grandpa is actually visiting?" Kenji asked, standing awkwardly. "Do I... kneel or high-five?"
The projection ignored him.
"Regalia," the spirit said, its voice distorted, echoing. "We meet again, after three hundred years."
Asvara stood. "Still as dramatic as ever, Masamune."
"And you still bring war where you walk."
Riven stepped back. The spiritual pressure was intense.
Masamune's eyes flicked toward Kenji.
"Looks like my heir is strong. Reckless. But strong."
Then he turned back to Asvara.
"They're building something. The ones you call Isorropia. The Pawn was just a test."
"What are they building?" Asvara asked.
The spirit hesitated. Then finally spoke.
"A vessel. A womb for rebirth. A creature not bound by time, death, or reason."
"What's its name?"
Masamune looked at Kenji.
"Ask your blood."
Kenji frowned, then whispered, as if remembering from a fever dream:
"...Katavrochthistís."
Riven blinked. "Katavroch…"
"The Devourer of Balance," AIRA translated."A theoretical convergence entity formed by forcing multiple Anomaly births within a sealed geography. Artificially igniting evolution."
Asvara's jaw tensed.
"So they're using the gate to mass-create Anomalies?"
"And from the failed ones," Masamune said, "they'll build the Katavroch."
"That's insane," Kenji muttered.
"No," Riven replied coldly. "That's balance... weaponized."
The flame began to flicker. Masamune's form wavered.
"They're moving fast. Regalia, you know what this means."
"Cikapundung," Asvara said. "It's more than a gate. It's an egg."
Masamune's eyes burned brighter.
"And if it hatches, the world won't remember its name when it ends."
With that, the flame vanished.
Silence returned.
Kenji sat back on the floor.
"So. We're dealing with an apocalyptic monster-baby being built under a river while ghost-dad drops prophecy warnings. Great."
"You forgot the part where your ancestors call you reckless," Riven added.
"Hey. That's a family tradition."
Asvara remained silent, still staring at the chessboard.
He moved a single piece.
Pawn to E4.
"We're not just playing anymore," he whispered. "We've been drafted."
Cikapundung River – 2:12 a.m.
The air was thicker here.
Like reality had been overwritten but didn't know how to fix itself.
Mist crawled across the river's surface, glowing faint violet under the half-moon.
Ruins from colonial pipes jutted out of the ground like ribs from a buried titan.
Asvara, Riven, and Kenji stood just outside the perimeter.
AIRA's light projection floated above them, scanning.
"Rift pulse detected. Three signatures. Two Pawn-class. One Bishop-class. Designation: Crumble. Warning: Bishop is Named and Conscious."
"Great," Kenji muttered. "We're walking into a horror DLC."
"I told you to wear the talismans," Riven said.
"I did! I just... folded them into paper shuriken."
"Of course you did."
Asvara ignored them both.
His eyes were locked on the black fog forming across the riverbed.
"They're already breaching the lower layer. If they open the gate now... the surrounding ley lines will corrupt half the city."
Suddenly there is a movement.
From the mist came two figures.
Thin. Shaky.
Pawns, same ceramic masks, bodies twitching like they were barely stitched into reality.
Behind them… A taller figure stepped out, dragging a bent bishop's staff carved from bone and metal.
A mask shaped like a chess bishop but cracked at the chin.Its voice was jagged glass:
"Crumble... serves balance. Crumble unwrites the spoiled."
The air turned cold.
The river rippled backwards.
"Spread out," Asvara said. "Don't let them circle us."
Kenji tossed his incense to the ground. "Ancestors, please be online."
Riven pulled his hourglass forward. "Let's bleed the clock."
The first Pawn rushed forward only for Asvara to step in its path and crush it with one palm not with strength, but with a spell that collapsed its time signature.
"Don't waste my seconds."
Kenji's talismans ignited.
"Link : Miyamoto Musashi!"
His body rippled with energy, spectral twin-blades extending from his arms as he clashed with the second Pawn midair, blades ringing like thunder.
Meanwhile Crumble did not move.
It breathed.
With each exhale, pieces of the ground crumbled into ash, the grass aged centuries in seconds.
Crumble raised its staff.
"Let memory collapse. Let roots forget their names."
The attack hit Riven and for a moment, his hourglass stopped.
He fell to one knee, eyes bleeding light.
"Temporal lock field," he hissed. "It's eating my past."
"Hang on," Asvara shouted, sprinting in. "I've fought Bishops before. This one's masking its core."
"How do we kill it?"
"We don't kill it... we remind it of its purpose."
Asvara pulled Sensō no Uta, his katana — not from his hip — but from the air, via subspace magic.
"Only takes this out when I'm tired of talking."
With a swift motion, he severed the staff in half releasing a shockwave that sent one Pawn disintegrating and the other flickering.
But Crumble laughed.
A low, broken, vibrating sound that echoed from inside its cracked mask.
"You cannot cut what's forgotten."
Suddenly, from above a sharp voice came.
"ASVARA!"
Everyone turned.
Standing atop the riverside bridge, still in her school hoodie, was Lyra.
Her chest heaving. Eyes glowing faint blue.
Hands clenched. Tears streaming down her cheeks for no visible reason.
"Why… why do I know this place?"
"LYRA, GET BACK!" Kenji yelled.
Too late.
Crumble pointed toward her.
"You are ripe. You are unfinished. You are recursion."
The sky twisted. The water screamed.
And Lyra collapsed forward with her eyes open wide as the Soul Core embedded in her fractured.
Memory Strike: Engaged.
Time shattered inside her mind.
She saw flashes of blood-soaked woman in red armor and Asvara, in golden lamellar, hair tied high, standing beside her on a flaming battlefield. And beside them...
Zhuge Liang.
They were in a war camp in the Three Kingdoms era.
She was not Lyra. She was a general.
His second-in-command. His blade in the shadows.
She had died protecting Asvara.
And now, that memory had returned.
Back in the present, she rose to her feet.
No longer trembling.
Her voice, deeper. Sharper.
"Crumble. You should not have touched what is mine."
A blue glyph burned beneath her feet.
Asvara's eyes widened.
"She's awakened... Soul Core Rebirth. The battlefield remembers her."
Lyra raised one hand and three ancient swords formed in the air behind her, rotating.
Crumble shrieked.
Not in pain. In recognition.
"You are the Blade Behind the Strategist," it whispered. "You should be dead."
"I was," she said coldly. "You just reminded me how to kill."
With one motion, the blades struck.
A single clean shot through Crumble's mask.
Crack.
Shatter.
Dust.
Silence fell once more.
Lyra dropped to one knee, panting, as the swords vanished.
Asvara walked forward, slowly.
"Welcome back," he said, kneeling beside her. "General."