Chapter 51 — Chains of Silence

The world inside the toll trembled as if it were alive.

Kael sank deeper, his body pulled into the roots of silence. He should have drowned—but instead, he found himself standing at the heart of a vast abyss.

Chains. Endless chains, stretching into the void. Each one hummed faintly, carrying the echo of a bell. And bound along them were silhouettes—echoes of people he had never met, yet somehow remembered.

Lost souls. Forgotten warriors. Their mouths moved, but no sound escaped.

Kael reached toward one. It stared at him with hollow eyes before disintegrating into silver dust. The dust clung to his arm, burning, crawling beneath his skin.

“Don’t touch them,” said the reflection—still there, walking parallel. “They are the erased. To bear them is to lose yourself.”

Kael gritted his teeth. “Then why do they cling to me?”

“Because you’re the only one who can still remember them.”

The words cut deeper than any blade.

The chains rattled, and the sound wasn’t hollow anymore—it was alive. Each toll was a shackle. Each soul a fragment of the bell’s true weight.

And now, the toll was trying to anchor him.

Chains shot upward and bound his arms. The reflection smirked as Kael was dragged toward the center, toward a colossal shadow hanging above: the Bell of Silence, its cracks glowing faintly with silver fire.

Kael screamed, pulling against the chains. The silver dust crawled faster over his skin, searing. For a moment, his outline flickered like the erased silhouettes.

The reflection stepped close, placing a hand over his heart. “See? You are already fading. Give in, and at least you’ll remain here—part of something eternal.”

Kael’s head dropped. For a heartbeat, it looked like surrender.

But then—he laughed. Quiet at first. Then sharper. A laugh with teeth.

“You still don’t get it, do you?” His eyes blazed with defiance. “I don’t fight to exist. I fight so the world remembers it can’t erase me.”

With a roar, he dragged the chains taut. The silver dust on his arm flared—and instead of devouring him, it bent. The erased souls’ whispers surged into his veins, not consuming him, but fueling him.

The reflection froze. “That’s… impossible.”

Kael lifted his arm, the chains cracking under his grip. “No. That’s erosion. I rewrite the toll.”

The abyss quaked. The Bell of Silence tolled once—not in domination, but in protest.

And Kael, bound and burning, began to turn the chains into his weapon.