They left at first light.
If it could be called that anymore.
The sun rose twice and set once within the span of an hour as Lira, Ashrel, Kaelen, and Davin began the ascent.
The world was bent.
Not broken, yet—but folding. Like a book read out of order.
And the closer they came to the Mount of Origin, the heavier time became.
"I think it's older than memory," Ashrel whispered, breath misting though the air was warm.
"Older than memory?" Kaelen echoed. "What does that even mean?"
Lira didn't answer.
Because the Flame in her chest had begun to speak.
Not in words, but in pulls.
Each step felt like following the gravity of something she had never truly left.
By midday—though the sky said it was dusk—they reached the middle path.
There, carved into the living stone, were statues.
Each one bore a face.
Some human. Some animal. Some elemental.
Some wore no face at all.
Davin counted aloud.
"One hundred and nineteen."
"What does that mean?" Lira asked.
Ashrel looked at her, suddenly pale.
"They're bearers."
Lira turned to the last statue.
It was incomplete.
Unfinished stone. Just the beginning of a face.
It looked like hers.
Beyond the statues, the wind changed.
It wasn't air anymore.
It was memory.
Soft voices brushing their skin. Laughter from lifetimes ago. Cries of war. Songs of peace. Promises broken and reborn.
And then came the Voice.
Not from ahead—but from within.
"Lira of the New Flame," it said.
"You carry fire as if it belongs to you."
She dropped to one knee, clutching her chest.
Ashrel caught her just in time.
The others froze, instinctively stepping back.
"You are not the first," the Voice continued.
"But you are the first to come willingly."
A figure stepped from the stone itself.
Not the Presence from the sky.
Not yet.
This one wore nothing but silence.
Skin of smoke.
Eyes like glowing scrolls.
Lira rose, breathing heavily.
"Who are you?"
The figure bowed.
"I am Precursor. Not god. Not ghost. Not judge. I am what remained after fire was born and silence died."
"Why are you here?"
"Because the Flame has awakened too much, too fast. It has remembered things that were not supposed to be remembered together."
"What happens now?"
The Precursor did not answer.
Instead, it turned to the unfinished statue.
And with a single touch, it completed her face.
Then the mountain shuddered.
Far above, a rift opened in the sky—no longer just light.
It was a tear in possibility.
And descending slowly through it came the true Presence from before the Flame.
It was neither creature nor concept.
Just was.
Lira stepped forward.
"Are you the one who lit the First Flame?"
A pause.
Then the figure answered—without voice.
"I am the one who watched while it was done. And the one who buried the price beneath this mountain."
"What price?"
"The name of the one who paid it."
Kaelen stepped beside her.
"What is it you want, then?"
The entity raised a hand.
The world blinked.
And for a heartbeat, they were not on the mountain—but in a city made of fire and ink, where every breath was memory and every footstep wrote history.
Then back.
The entity lowered its hand.
"I want you to choose whether this world will be written… or remembered."
"What's the difference?" Lira asked.
The Presence offered no answer.
Only a path.
Upward.
To the summit of the Mount of Origin.
Where the First Flame's cradle still burned—
and something beneath it still stirred.