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Chapter 13 - Chapter 13: The One Who Stays

It happened without warning.

No lightning. No sound. No ceremony.

Just the sudden stillness of everything — as if the entire world took one long, final breath.

And then the veil broke.

It was just after midnight when the stars blinked out for two full seconds, and when they returned, everything was slightly off.

The air felt denser.

The lanterns flickered, not from wind, but from time slipping.

And deep within the Imperial archives, scrolls rearranged themselves on the shelves — history rewriting itself, quietly.

In the watchtower, Eira fell to her knees.

She could feel it inside her ribs — the pull. Like gravity, like memory. Calling her home.

But which home?

Which life?

Which version of herself would she leave behind?

Kai caught her before she collapsed completely.

"It's starting," she gasped, her vision swimming.

He knew.

He'd felt it too.

"I think we're out of time," he whispered.

"Then tell me what you want."

He paused — not because he didn't know, but because he did.

And it terrified him.

"I want you to stay. But I won't ask you to."

She looked up at him, tears already on her cheeks.

"This is the third life, Kai."

"I know."

"The one that ends in choice."

He nodded.

A crack opened behind her — not in stone, not in the earth, but in reality.

It shimmered like a mirror dipped in water, showing flickers of her old world: city lights, rain-slick streets, the sound of traffic and distant voices calling her name.

Her name.

Not Eira.

Her real one.

"I don't want to forget you," she said.

"You won't."

"But I did before."

He smiled sadly. "And still… you found me again."

The crack grew wider.

A voice — hers, but distant — echoed from the other side:

"Wake up. Wake up, now."

The dream was ending.

Or maybe this one was beginning.

She turned to him, eyes blazing with something fierce and tender.

"If I go, will you remember this life?"

He took her hand and placed it on the ticking watch between them.

"I'll remember the weight of your hand, even if I forget your face."

"I'll remember the sound of your name, even if I can't say it."

"I'll remember the moment you almost stayed."

Then — choice.

Not fate.

Not prophecy.

Her.

She stood between two worlds.

And she chose.

One step back.

Into the veil.

Into the world of lights and machines and forgotten dreams.

She gasped as the wind caught her — pulled her — and the tower faded, and Kai's face blurred in the shimmer.

"I love you," she tried to say.

But the veil had already closed.

Back in the Phoenix Palace, the Emperor rose from a dream he could not name.

His heart ached, though he couldn't say why.

His hand reached for a watch that no longer existed.

And in the empty garden, a single silver orchid bloomed — out of season, unplanted, impossible.

But it bloomed all the same.

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