The Palace of Mirrors stood at the center of the Egoverse, a realm untouched by time, unburdened by gravity. Its walls shimmered with reflections not of light, but of memory—each pane a frozen triumph, each corridor echoing with the sound of self.
Pride sat upon the throne, legs crossed, chin tilted upward—not in arrogance, but in certainty. Its eyes were not eyes, but twin galaxies spiraling inward, devouring doubt. It did not blink. It did not breathe. It simply was.
The other sins watched from afar.
Greed, nestled in his vault of golden stars, counted the value of Pride's silence. Wrath, pacing across a battlefield of broken moons, clenched his fists with the rhythm of resentment. Lust, veiled in illusions, whispered to shadows that never answered. Envy, hunched beneath a cracked mirror, stared at Pride's posture and mimicked it in secret. Gluttony gnawed on the edges of forgotten realms. Sloth drifted, half-asleep, dreaming of stillness.
They did not speak of rebellion.
Not yet.
Pride rose from the throne, and the Egoverse trembled. Not from fear—but from recognition.
"I am the axis," Pride said, voice like polished obsidian. "The origin. The reflection that birthed you all."
No one answered.
Pride turned to the Mirror behind the throne—the First Mirror, the one that had dreamed them into being. Its surface was flawless. But Pride saw it: a hairline fracture, invisible to all but itself.
A crack.
A warning.
Pride did not flinch. It placed a hand upon the Mirror and whispered, "They will come."
And the Mirror whispered back, "They already have."