Lit only by glowing runes and sunstone lanterns, the deep vault below the Obelmar mountains breathed silence. Ancient walls bore fractured carvings, names that had been scraped off, and statues with erased sigils.
Ari stood in the center of it, accompanied by Cael and an echoing presence of Obelmar's Matriarch. Only they were allowed to witness what came next.
Ari stepped forward toward the central monolith, its smooth obsidian core surrounded by six locked sigil-circles. One by one, they reacted to his presence—not to his power, but to the soul-deep resonance of his lineage.
And then—a surge of light.
The floor fell away—not physically, but perceptually.
He found himself standing not in a crypt—but in a mirrored field of stars and stone. A simulation woven from memory and magic, only accessible by those who carried the original Thread of Originis.
One by one, spectral echoes began to appear around him. Not ghosts—fragments of ancestral consciousness, left behind like bookmarks on the edge of time.
Their forms were varied—men, women, children, warriors, scholars, caretakers. Some wore cloaks of solar silk. Others held books bound in dreamleather. Their features mirrored his own in ways—bone shape, eyes, aura.
"He lives," one said.
"He returns," whispered another.
An older man with sharp gold eyes stepped forward—bearing the markings of a former System Architect, long before the current System existed.
"We failed. Not because we were weak—but because we believed in power without guidance. They rewrote the world… and buried us with false names."
"But you—Ari—you were written outside the rewrite."
They all knelt—dozens of lineal echoes bending one knee to the young boy standing in silence.
Ari's throat tightened.
He'd never felt the presence of family like this before. Not in this life. And perhaps not even in the last.
"I don't want a throne," he said quietly."I want to bring the truth back into the world. No more erasures. No more lost names."
He looked around.
"You are not shadows anymore."
"From this moment on—your names are restored. You are Originis."
The stars above them pulsed as if agreeing. A distant sound—like a spell completing.
And with that, the simulation ended.
Ari stood alone again in the crypt—but now every broken sigil on the wall glowed faintly with reactivated glyphlight.
The names had returned.
As he walked through the courtyards of Sanctum under quiet starlight, Ari's thoughts were still in the vault. He held a sigil-crystal now branded with the true name of his lineage: Originis.
And above it, for the first time in history, the System acknowledged him not as Unbound, not as anomaly……but as Heir of Originis: Fragment of the Prime Syntax.
From within the internal System interface, a message pulsed:
Update Complete. Root Access Initialized.Lineage Restored: ORIGINISWarning: Administrative Tier granted.
Note: You are now a System Embodiment Candidate.
He exhaled slowly.
He wasn't just rebelling anymore.
He was writing the new chapter of the world.
Later that evening, Cerys found him by the balcony overlooking the forest beneath the academy.
"I saw the update," she said. "Your sigil… changed everything."
"Yeah."
"Are you okay?"
Ari didn't answer right away. Then he smiled, not out of joy, but calm certainty.
"They erased an entire family line. But they didn't erase me."
Cerys leaned beside him.
"They'll come after you harder now."
"Let them," he said. "This time, I'm not standing alone."
And from within the trees, eyes watched—others, old and new, who had once served the Originis bloodline… now awakening once more.