Time had no meaning in the Shadow Realm.
It moved sideways, in spirals, or sometimes not at all. It twisted memory and bent will, feeding on regret and guilt. For Graxion, it had become both prison and penance.
He walked endlessly through a landscape of ever-shifting forms—black mountains that whispered, rivers that reflected faces he'd failed to save, skies that wept ink. The ring, or what remained of it, pulsed against his chest like a dying heart, hanging on a chain. Its power fragmented. Its soul tethered to a future not yet written.
Until today.
A tremor rippled through the shadows.
Graxion stopped.
Another tremor. Then a pulse.
A heartbeat.
Not his. Not the child's. Someone else had touched the ring—someone in the real world.
"No," he muttered. "It's too soon."
But the pull was undeniable. The ring had found a candidate. Someone worthy. Or desperate.
He gritted his teeth. "I need to see."
Graxion reached into his chest, where the last of his shadow essence remained, and tore it open. The pain was searing, even here. He flung his consciousness through time and space, through light and dark, and into a fractured memory preserved by the ring.
---
Elsewhere. Centuries later.
A boy stumbled through an alley, bloody and bruised, clutching his side. His name was Quinn Talen, and he didn't know yet that he was the last of something ancient.
He had no family. No friends. Nothing but a school bag and the ring his mother had hidden before she vanished.
The ring called to him now. It pulsed with warmth and cold all at once. A whisper curled in the back of his mind—not words, but feelings.
Loneliness. Rage. Destiny.
He slipped it onto his finger.
And the world shuddered.
The alley vanished. Shadows reached for him like vines, pulling him through the cracks of reality and into the space between.
"W-What's happening?!"
He screamed, but there was no one to hear.
---
Back in the Shadow Realm.
Graxion watched it unfold through the mirror of shadows.
Kaen's voice echoed beside him, though the man had long since faded into memory.
> "You really think someone else can handle it?"
> "One day, someone will. Someone who doesn't want the power… but needs it."
Graxion clenched his fists. "I didn't choose this either."
Another pulse. Stronger. Quinn was drawing more of the ring's essence than any bearer before. Even the cursed godling hadn't awakened it so completely.
The shadows began to react, not with fear… but obedience.
"No," Graxion whispered. "You can't take it all. You're not ready."
He stepped forward—and for the first time in centuries, the Realm resisted him.
The shadows weren't his anymore.
They were Quinn's.
---
Somewhere in the real world, a boy opened his eyes. His wounds were gone. His fear was gone.
In their place was something else.
A shadow moved behind him, mirroring his stance.
And from deep within the ring, a voice long forgotten whispered:
> "Remember my sins… and choose your own path."
The Ring of Remembering had chosen its heir.
And the shadows would rise again.