The sphere cracked further. The blackness fell away like a shell, revealing what was inside.
A child.
Not a human child. Something older. Something that had been alone for so long it had forgotten how to be anything but empty.
"I was not always this," said the child. "I was a keeper once. Of a road that no longer exists. The Road of Silence. My job was to protect the quiet places, the spaces between sounds, the moments between thoughts."
"What happened?" asked Seong.
"The other roads forgot me. The other keepers stopped visiting. I was alone. And in my loneliness, I began to hunger. Not for food. For company. For anything that would fill the emptiness."
"So you began to consume."
"I did not mean to. It just... happened. The more I consumed, the emptier I felt. The emptier I felt, the more I consumed. It was a spiral I could not escape."
"You can escape now," said the queen. "You are not alone anymore."
The child looked at them. At the seven travelers who had come to help. At the memories they had shared. At the light that was beginning to fill the tower.
"Will you stay?" asked the child. "Will you help me remember how to be a keeper again?"
"We will," said Seong. "But first, you must help us. You must return what you have taken. The sounds. The colors. The memories. The people of Velos need to wake up."
The child nodded. And closed its eyes.