chapter 5

All around them, the Mirror Hall melted into golden mist. In its place rose a glowing archway, carved with ancient runes that pulsed in rhythm with her heartbeat.

Beyond it: her final path.

Not a trial. Not a test.

A choice.

Kaelen turned to her.

“You may return to the world you came from, carrying all that you now are. Or you may stay, to guide others through their echoes.”

Enos stood at the threshold.

Enos stood before the glowing archway, its light beckoning her like a sunrise after a long night. But her feet remained planted, unmoving. Her wand lowered to her side, and she turned toward Kaelen with clarity in her voice.

“I will stay, Kaelen,” she said quietly, yet with the certainty of a soul that had looked itself in the eye and not turned away.

“Because it feels like I still forgot something… or someone I loved the most.”

Kaelen studied her for a moment. The pride in his gaze deepened, but so did a note of sorrow.

“The heart always remembers last,” he murmured. “Especially what it fears losing most.”

The mist around them shimmered, responding to her choice. The archway behind her faded into stardust, and in its place rose a silver staircase spiraling upward into a sky she hadn’t noticed before—soft, dark, and filled with stars that pulsed like waiting memories.

“Then your journey continues,” Kaelen said. “You are no longer a seeker of truth, Enos Azerial. You are its keeper. And you are close… so very close.”

A breeze swept through the realm, and with it came a whisper—not from the forest this time, but from her own heart.

A voice.

Familiar.

Faint.

“Enos…”

She turned sharply.

Someone was calling her name.

Not Kaelen.

Not the echoes.

But someone she once loved.

Enos didn’t hesitate.

The moment she heard that voice—soft as breath, yet heavy with emotion—her heart surged. She didn’t need to ask who it was. She knew. Not in memory, but in feeling. In soul.

She turned from Kaelen, her eyes fixed on the darkness where the voice had come from. It was a place beyond the silver stairs, beyond the mirrors and echoes—beyond everything she had faced so far. A place untouched, sealed by grief and fear.

But her feet moved, drawn not by logic, but by love.

Kaelen didn’t follow. He simply watched her go, his expression serene.

“Then go, Enos,” he said softly. “Where the heart leads, truth awaits.”

She walked through a veil of mist that parted like curtains drawn by unseen hands. Each step was met with flickers—faint visions of laughter, hands held in sunlight, promises whispered beneath stars. A silhouette began to form ahead… blurred at first, but growing clearer.

The air thickened, not with fear, but with emotion—so powerful it almost brought her to her knees.

And then—

She saw him.

Standing by a quiet pond beneath a moonlit tree was a boy—no, not a boy. A young man. Eyes the color of dusk. A smile like the first time someone says your name with meaning.

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***