The Piercer pulsed like a heart about to wake the dead.
This Gate… felt different.
Where the others had buzzed with foreign mana and fractured timelines, this one whispered. A low, ancient hum. A lullaby of stone and blood and divinity, woven into the deepest layer of the world's magic.
It was not a portal to another world.
It was a portal to my world, as it had been—thousands of years ago.
[SYSTEM WARNING: TEMPORAL RISK LEVEL – MAXIMUM]
– Events may rewrite existing reality.
– Extended presence may fracture identity anchors.
– System Anchor Protocols engaged. Proceed with caution.
"Anchor me," I ordered the Watcher's echo. "Lock my core. I'll walk the past as a god, not a ghost."
The Gate opened.
It did not shimmer or roar.
It breathed.
And I stepped through.
The air was heavier.
Not in weight, but in truth.
Mana flowed raw through the land—unrefined, unclaimed. Untamed dragons soared in the distance, unbound by pact or rider. Ancient trees loomed like towers, and buried beneath them were ruins not yet ruined.
This was Arkan'Zarath—the cradle of the First Empire.
Before the Kingdom of Nova Terra.
Before the System.
Before everything I knew.
My HUD cracked slightly.
Reality resists being observed here, the System whispered.
Time doesn't like being seen.
"Good," I muttered. "Neither do I."
Then I saw them.
Priests of the Origin Flame, robed in obsidian and silver, marching in formation around a ziggurat of glowing crystal. Their chants formed glyphs in the air—pure mana script, older than written language.
And on top of the temple stood a man.
No.
A child.
Barely older than I was now. Radiant. His eyes shone with pure mana. He raised his hand—and the sky opened. Not metaphorically—literally split, as if reality were paper.
Behind it?
A dark mirror.
Another Gate.
"He's the First," the System whispered.
"The first Chosen."
"The first System-Bearer."
My heart thundered.
That boy… was me.
Or rather, what I would have been had I been born then.
He turned his head slowly.
His gaze met mine across the span of millennia.
And then, impossibly—he smiled.
"Welcome back," he said aloud.
"We've been waiting."