The Aelthorn Path was a place written out of most maps for good reason.
Twisted bones lined the trail—not from beasts, but humanoids—some robed, others armored, all half-fused with stone or scorched clean by time. Names marked the stones beside them. Some etched in runes that hummed faintly with forgotten curses. Others were just... letters. Human. Ancient.
Tessia's voice was quiet, wary.
"This place isn't just old. It's wrong."
Kael didn't look at her.
"It's old enough that the world tried to forget it. That makes it valuable."
They passed a shattered statue of a figure with wings made of swords. One blade remained embedded in the earth, half-rusted, bleeding faint heat.
"You think everything broken is useful," Tessia muttered.
"Only the pieces people stopped looking at."
Further ahead, Sera walked in silence, leading the way with one hand loosely resting on the hilt of her blade. Every step echoed. Even the wind didn't dare enter the Aelthorn gorge.
Below them, the terrain shifted—from rock to glassy obsidian that reflected no light.
Zarith bent down. Touched the stone. Flinched.
"They died trying to not be remembered. The ruin swallowed their names, but their pain's still here."
"Memory-based terrain shift," Kael said softly. "We're nearing the epicenter."
Dren scoffed.
"What happened to ruins with treasure and puzzles? I miss those."
No one laughed.
At the bottom of the path, the world opened like a throat.
A massive bowl-shaped valley, black and hollow. No wind, no sound. The sky above was tinted red—not like sunset, but like bleeding clouds. There was no sun. Just light… refracted wrong.
At the center of the valley hovered a single, vertical thread.
Not string. Not cloth.
This thread was made of glowing red-gold energy, faintly vibrating in the air. It stretched down from the clouds, stabbing into the ground, anchoring itself into the world like a needle through fabric.
"That's not normal magic," Sera muttered.
"It's not magic at all," Kael said. "It's part of the Interlace."
Tessia squinted. "Explain."
Kael stepped forward slowly, as if speaking would wake something.
"The Interlace isn't just data or ruins—it's the code beneath this world. These threads are active pathways. Monitoring. Or… stitching."
"Stitching what?" Dren asked.
"Reality. Boundaries. Whatever breaks loose when something goes too far."
They were quiet as the thread pulsed—once.
Then again.
A third time.
And Kael moved.
He stepped forward, calmly, hand outstretched.
"Kael, don't—!" Sera called out.
Too late.
The thread reacted—wrapping around his wrist like fluid lightning, searing a symbol into his skin.
Kael's eyes rolled back.
He vanished.
Kael — Threadspace
There was no light here.
Only a plane of white, infinite, still. Kael stood alone in a space that did not obey physics. His own body felt slower—rendered rather than alive.
And then… a figure appeared ahead.
Sitting in a chair woven from images.
Its face was his.
Older. Worn. Tired.
Kael stared.
"Who are you?"
The echo of him smiled faintly.
"You. If you fail."
Kael's hands clenched.
"This another trial?"
"No. This is the checkpoint. You've reached too deep. You're triggering the deeper layers of the Interlace."
Kael walked forward.
"Then answer me something. Who wrote the system?"
"Not gods. Not mages. Not even time."
Kael frowned.
"Then what?"
The figure stood slowly.
"A soul. One fractured so completely, the world used it as a mirror. The Interlace is a reflection of something that should never have existed."
"Me?"
"Not yet. But maybe."
Kael stepped closer. The air began to crack with static.
"I don't want prophecy. I want answers."
The figure whispered,
"Then start by understanding: you weren't reborn. You were transplanted—violently. Something tore a hole to make room for you. And something else noticed."
Kael's vision twisted. Lines of code burned across the floor.
A voice deeper than the void itself whispered:
"Who walks with threadblood?"
The image of his future self snapped its fingers—
And Kael fell.
Back in the Valley
Kael slammed back into reality—collapsing to the ground with runes smoking across his forearms, eyes bloodshot.
Tessia knelt beside him.
"Kael—"
He grabbed her wrist.
"We're not alone."
Zarith was already facing the cliff edge.
"We've been spotted. Crimson Vultures on the ridge."
Dren swore.
"And Runeblade scouts behind us. Perfect."
Sera's hand hovered over her sword, eyes scanning the skies.
"Above."
Sky-skiffs. Black banners trimmed in gold.
House Veinhold had arrived.
Lightning curled in the clouds above—controlled weather magic. A display of power.
Kael stood, staggering slightly, then straightened.
"They didn't follow us."
"What?" Tessia asked.
"They were already coming. We triggered something. The ruin reacted by shifting everything."
Zarith looked shaken.
"The land moved."
Kael nodded.
"Reality repositioned. And they just happened to be at the right places to catch us after it reset."
Dren raised his blade.
"So we fight our way out?"
Kael's gaze turned south—toward the canyons.
"No. We lead them in."
Tessia narrowed her eyes.
"Into what?"
Kael's voice was calm now.
"Delta-9. A thread-infested fault zone. No map dares show it. But I saw it in the Interlace."
Sera stepped forward.
"They'll follow."
"Good," Kael said. "Let them. We bait them into a memory field. One that can't tell past from present. And while they drown in ghosts…"
His rune-marks pulsed.
"We walk straight into the core."
A thunderclap split the air. From the canyon's mouth, a beast howled—a sound not of flesh, but of breaking logic.
Kael turned calmly.
"Run. But let them chase. The ruin isn't hunting us."
He smirked.
"It's hunting them."
[ END OF CHAPTER 17 ]