Rivan had always believed in reason. In records. In logic.
But now, the records began to change on their own when touched. Symbols that had once been still now moved, and reality no longer felt solid.
Something in the world was cracking. And the cracking… centered on one person: Zeo.
Rivan sat in his house, staring at the map of the village and the circles of blood that had appeared in various spots. The pattern was not random. There were faint lines—like spider webs—that led to a central point.
Zeo was not being chaotic. He was forming something.
And if Zeo was indeed a portal, then he was not alone. He might just be an extension of something that wanted to enter fully.
Rivan closed the map, then walked to a place he had always avoided: his father's old warehouse, which had once been a place to store forbidden books.
Beneath the worn floorboards, he found what he had hidden all those years ago:
The Book of Cracked Mirrors—a book written by one of Darzel's defected followers.
It was not a manual for destroying chaos.
But it tied him.
Rivan opened the first page, and it was written there:
"You can't stop the hole. But you can be the cover. For a price."
His hands trembled. He knew what it meant.
To stop Zeo, he had to start changing into Zeo. Touching the magic that shouldn't be touched.
And from the back window of his house, as if answering his thoughts, he saw Zeo standing far away at the end of the village road. Their eyes met.
Zeo didn't speak.
But from his gaze, Rivan knew: Zeo already knew he knew.
And the time to choose sides… was over.
Rivan sat in the center of the chalk circle, candlelight surrounding him, and before him—the Book of the Broken Mirror, open to a page marked with symbols of dried blood.
"To bind chaos, you must open the most broken part of yourself. Do not fight it. Let it show itself."
His hands trembled. He knew this was not the kind of magic that could be tried and undone. Once he summoned it, he could not expel it.
But he also knew: Zeo would not stop. And Darzel? He was not even fully here yet.
Rivan drew the first symbol—a circle broken in three. Then he recited the incantation under his breath. The words were rough, foreign, more like vomit than language.
The air around him grew heavy. Small voices began to emerge. Not ordinary whispers—but voices like… himself, screaming from the future.
"You will be destroyed."
"You are not a savior."
"You will be a mirror of Zeo."
Blood began to trickle from his nose. But he kept reading.
Suddenly, the chalk circle lit up briefly. And in an instant, Rivan was no longer sitting alone.
In front of him—his own shadow. But his eyes were black. His pupils shrank like the eye of a needle. The voice from his mouth came out hoarse:
"Finally you're willing to talk."
Rivan knew this was not an outsider. This was himself—the version he had suppressed, kept, rejected.
And to master the power of this book, he had to win against his own shadow.
Not with magic.
But by admitting who he really was.
An hour later, Rivan came out of the warehouse.
His steps were slow. But his eyes… were no longer the eyes of an ordinary person.
In his hands, the book burned slowly—not destroyed, but changed shape. Becoming a mark on the skin of his chest, directly embedded.
And when he looked up at the sky, the mist began to swirl slowly.
Zeo… would feel this.
Because for the first time, two parallel forces had been born in that small village.