The void folded. Stars twisted. Elara's sigil blazed in Nameless's palm, a beacon dragging them across unseen currents. The transition was not a smooth passage—it was a trial. Screams clawed at their ears, whispers of false promises, fragments of lives that never belonged to them. Ryne clutched her head, snarling against the illusions, but Nameless only bared his teeth. Deception could not wound him further; he had already lost everything true.
Then, with a sound like glass shattering, they broke through.
The Second Realm unfurled before them.
A world of mirrors and mazes stretched across an endless horizon. Skies of fractured crystal reflected a thousand false suns, casting shifting shadows that moved even when their owners stood still. The air itself seemed to hum with lies, every breath tasting of something different—honey, ash, blood.
Below, the land was a labyrinth of shifting architecture. Cities rose and collapsed in moments, towers crumbling only to rebuild themselves into impossible geometries. Rivers flowed backward, carrying whispers instead of water. And scattered across this ever-changing domain lurked its children—beasts of deception.
Shades cloaked in faces not their own prowled the streets, their bodies flickering between human, beast, and nightmare. Serpents with wings of glass coiled in the skies, their reflections devouring themselves in the air. And in the distance, rising over it all, loomed the Hall of Echoes—a citadel that never looked the same twice, yet always watched, always waiting.
Tianlong's voice thundered above the distortion. "This is the realm of Lianxu, The Great Echoveil, He is the Deceiver. One of the Seven who tore you apart. His dominion is lies given form. Here, even truth bleeds into falsehood. Trust nothing you see, not even each other."
Nameless's crimson eye glowed, unblinking. "Good," he said, drawing the sigil tighter against his palm. "Then let him lie. Let him weave a thousand illusions. I will carve through them until only his throat remains."
The ground shifted, an echoing laugh reverberating through the shattered skies. The realm itself seemed to welcome them with open jaws.
And in that moment, as Tianlong's wings folded and they descended toward the Hall of Echoes, the war against Lianxu began.
The descent was not gentle.
Tianlong's wings beat against the fractured sky, forcing a path down through clouds of mirrored shards. Each shard reflected a different version of the world below—one burning, one drowned, one abandoned, one teeming with life that had never existed. The realm was a liar even to itself.
Ryne held onto the dragon's scales, her eyes narrowing against the glare. "I hate this place already."
Nameless said nothing. His gaze swept across the shifting landscape as they neared the ground. It was worse than a battlefield—it was a performance, a stage where every stone played a part in deception.
They landed on what appeared to be a city square, though the buildings bent at wrong angles, their windows opening onto corridors that led nowhere. People were there—or what passed for people.
At first glance, they were human. Their faces were tired, their clothes ragged. But the longer Ryne stared, the less she was certain. Their smiles never reached their eyes. Their footsteps never made a sound. And when a child reached for her mother's hand, her fingers passed straight through it.
"They don't even know," Ryne whispered. "They're trapped in illusions, living lives they can't tell are false."
"Not trapped," Tianlong corrected grimly. "Fed. Lianxu sustains himself on their confusion. Their devotion, their despair, their hope—every false moment is nourishment to him. And they will never question it."
Nameless's jaw tightened. "Then we tear it down."
But the realm was listening. It always listened.
The ground beneath them rippled like water. From the false crowd, one figure broke away—a woman with pale skin and bloodstained lips. Her eyes glowed with recognition.
"Elara."
The name left Nameless before he realized he'd spoken it.
Ryne snapped her head toward him, eyes wide. "Nameless, wait—"
The woman stepped forward, her voice soft, trembling, achingly familiar. "You came back."
Nameless froze. The weight of memory—of failure—crushed against him. It was her voice. It was exactly her voice.
But Tianlong's snarl cut through the illusion. "Do not be deceived!" His scales flared with starfire, revealing the truth.
The "woman" twisted, her face splitting into dozens of others—Ryne's, Elara's, even Nameless's own. A chorus of voices spilled from its throat: every vow, every scream, every word he had spoken.
It grew taller, limbs unraveling into tendrils of glass and shadow. Its body was a shifting mosaic of stolen identities, each fragment reflecting lies back at him.
The Warden of Echoes had arrived.
Ryne drew her blades, fury burning through her fear. "Of course he sends one of these things first. It doesn't kill you. It breaks you until you beg for its lies."
The creature's voices rose, echoing in unison, a mockery of truth. "I swore to protect you. I failed you. I wasn't there."
Nameless's crimson eye flared. His hand found the hilt of his blade, knuckles white with restraint. "Then let it echo."
He stepped forward, his voice cutting like a blade. "I will show it what my silence sounds like when it breaks."
The Warden screamed, its thousand faces shifting in fury. And the battle for the Hall of Echoes began.