Chapter 53 – Shards of the Forgotten

There was no sky in the First Void, no earth, no horizon. It wasn't dark, nor was it vacant. Just… absence, stretched out so long it twisted the mind. Quiet and cold and still—and yet motion seethed within it.

Cities were suspended upside down and inside out, their spires reaching out like broken bones through air that was not air. Amorphous shapes floated past: murmurs of worlds Yusuf had touched, each world crumbling as soon as his gaze lingered.

And there was the Tree.

It towered at the center of all things, impossibly distant and excruciatingly close. Its roots poured like rivers of darkness through the void, splitting into infinity, while its branches burned with light that flickered between gold and ash. Yusuf could not tell whether it was living or dying, whole or already shattered.

The ground beneath his feet was not ground. Each step landed on splinters—fragile disks of recollection that suspended in air, trembling under his footfall as though they would break. He did not wish to look down, yet could not help himself.

Each splinter contained a piece of a world.

On one, he saw the river he had once battled to reclaim, its bridges contorted, its waters choked with sediment. Time had stalled mid-stream, water droplets paused like glass beads in the air. His chest ached at the sight, for he remembered how he had struggled, how much he had bled to give that world back its flow. And there it stood, still and shattered, as if his efforts had been in vain.

On another shard, the kingdom stuck in the repeating day glowed faintly. The market bustled, the sun stopped high in the air, merchants froze mid-cry. A boy held up a wooden toy to his mother—and she would never see it, never turn, never smile. The cycle trapped them even here.

And then there was Rae.

She was in the corner of a shard, her hair a shadow-fire, her archivist robes torn by ash. Her hand reached out to him—but when Yusuf dived forward to touch her, the shard dissolved like mist. Gone.

"Rae…" His voice cracked. He hadn't realized how much he'd longed to see her face again.

The void gave no answer. Just silence, heavy enough to press on his ribs.

He forced himself to walk on. Step by step.

The Codex beside him burst open. Its pages fluttered, ink swirling up like smoke and curling into frantic words:

SHARDS DECAY. THREADS BREAK. THE ROOT CALLS.

And below it—smaller, neater, almost as if in a whole different hand:

Do not look back.

Yusuf slammed it shut, his throat burning. Don't look back? That's all I've ever done. That's all I am.

But the shards around him didn't seem to think so. They glowed and began to move.

They drifted like leaves on water initially. Then they circled him. Sharper, quicker. Their edges glinted with light so sharp it could cut.

Each shard spun, and within them faces formed.

His father.

Rae.

The faceless child.

Even himself.

Mouths opened, closing over words he could not hear. Silent screams, silent laughter, silent blame.

The circle constricted. The edges brushed against his arms, slicing skin, making red lines that didn't fall but hung in the air like glass threads. Yusuf stepped back, but there was nowhere to move.

The shards moved in. And then—

The air tore.

It was not a sound but a sensation, a rending in the marrow of his bones. Nothing stretched, then broke, and from the gash came figures.

Tall. Rigged. Cloaked in robes of pale light that flowed though there was no wind. Their faces were smooth silver masks, featureless and gleaming, mirroring the light of the Tree. Their bodies shimmered at the edges, forms of men and not-men, as if memory itself had only halfway finished the act of sketching them.

Guardians.

The wardens of the Root.

One raised a staff, hacked from the branch of the Tree itself, its surface charted with living light. Its voice grated like rock dragged over rock:

"Archivist. You walk where you ought not."

Another let its mask fall, voice less rough but colder:

"The Root is not for your handling. You are breakage, not repair. To continue is to unravel."

A third tilted its head, silver face unreadable:

"You carry the Codex. You carry destruction."

Yusuf's legs wanted to collapse beneath him, but he braced them. His hands were damp against the Codex. He was more aware of the weight of his transgressions pressing down here, where everything could not be hidden.

"I did not seek this," he said, too loudly in the endless emptiness. "But I have come so far. I will see it through."

The Guardians' masks glowed. The shards spun faster, the faces in them screaming silently, mouths Opening into black vortexes of desolation.

The first Guardian's staff fell to the ground. Light radiated outward like a shockwave, and Yusuf stumbled.

"The Root has no use for you," the voice boomed.

"The Root rejects you."

And the void trembled.

The splinters cut closer, slashing at his arms, his cheeks. Blood swirled like ruby dust around him. His breath came shredded, but he would not back away.

"Then tell me why I was brought here," Yusuf growled, anger sparking. "Tell me why you let me walk the threads, repair what you told me was damaged, if it was for nothing. Tell me why I've bled, why I've lost everything and everyone I ever loved. If the Root will not have me, then why has it not rejected me?"

The Guardians hesitated.

The shards ceased their rotation, tips mere inches from his neck.

And the Tree shuddered. A surge traveled its branches, echoing like a heartbeat through the First Void.

Yusuf felt it. In the marrow of his ribs. A rhythm, faint but steady.

One Guardian loosened its staff slightly, its mask inclining as if to hear.

Another spoke, in a less harsh tone, almost diffident:

"The Root stirs."

The first Guardian spat, mask gleaming:

Do not be fooled. The Root only remembers itself. The Archivist is a mistake, a scar stitched into its bark. He will spoil what he handles."

Their voices crashed against one another like waves, jarring and discordant.

Yusuf shuddered, but in that moment, he sensed something shift. Not in the void, but within himself.

The Root had moved. Responded.

And it hadn't expelled him. Not yet.