The walls were old. Older than the Academy, older even than the era of the First Weave. They were made of blackmarble, etched not with modern glyphs but proto-glyphs—symbols that predated Signum and even Dreamscript.
Ari stood across from Cael, the dim glow of floating lantern sigils casting strange shadows.
"You said you'd explain. Why me?" Ari asked. "Why does the Echo Vault care? Why do you care?"
Cael exhaled slowly. Then he walked to the center of the chamber and tapped the floor with the hilt of his sigilglass blade. A lattice of glowing script bloomed outward in a perfect spiral, forming a System Map—a floating three-dimensional codex.
"This," Cael said, "is the Scripted Continuum. It's not just a map of magic. It's a map of people—their choices, timelines, and what the System expects from them."
Thousands—no, millions—of glowing lines stretched like threads of light across the model. Some intersected, some bent. Some were frayed. But most followed clean, elegant curves.
"Every life is a Thread, Ari. Not just magic-wise. It's a coded narrative. A beginning, middle, and end—carefully forecasted and loop-checked by the System to prevent instability."
"You mean people don't have free will?"
Cael smiled grimly.
"They do. But it's curated. The System gives you three choices, all of which lead to its intended result. It's not fate. It's self-maintaining logic."
He pointed to a glowing point at the heart of the map.
"This… was your entry."
Ari looked closer. It was unlike the others. Not a clean thread—but a jagged ripple. A fracture in the logic spiral.
"You were not written into the world, Ari. You were invoked. Pulled in from beyond the bounds of narrative code. Null-Origin is the academic term. But the Vault calls you something else."
Cael looked him in the eye.
"We call you a Corruption Seed."
"You destabilize causal relationships. When you act, it breaks the system's ability to predict outcomes. If you help someone who was meant to die, their entire line changes. Their decisions branch. Their future children make choices that never existed before."
"You're not just free. You're untethered."
"You are the only person on the Continuum who can't be simulated."
Ari felt the weight of that settle in his bones. It wasn't flattery. It was isolation.
"So I'm a mistake?"
"No," Cael said. "You're a test. Maybe even a rewrite key."
"Why not just let me live my life?"
Cael's eyes turned hard.
"Because the last Corruption Seed caused a Script Cascade. Thousands of threads unraveled. Magic bled into cities. Time warped. It took the Vault decades to restabilize the region."
"You're not just dangerous to people. You're dangerous to reality itself."
He stepped closer, placing a hand on Ari's shoulder.
"You don't get to be normal. And if you try... you'll still rewrite everything around you. Even by existing, Ari—you're changing the System."
"You have a choice now."
"Hide… and let the System erase you like the last Dreamer."
"Or learn to master what you are—and accept that the rules no longer apply to you."