Legacy of Chaos: Born Before Time

There were many who believed the world had been born in flame, in soul, in balance, in time.

They were not wrong.

But they were not complete.

Because before flame was lit, before time unfolded, before soul stirred—there had been a gaze.

It did not blink.

It did not breathe.

It only witnessed.

That gaze belonged to Eryxis.

The Watcher.

The Forgotten.

In the Hollow Between Realms, where neither Chronis's time nor Kael's death could reach, where the light of Liora withered and the roar of Velkarion grew hushed, something ancient began to stir once more.

Not with sound.

Not with motion.

But with intention.

A ripple passed through the Unformed Realms, across cracks in the Weave, across the stillborn thoughts of dying stars.

Mortals did not feel it.

But the gods did.

Liora awoke from her dreaming grove, clutching her chest though no wound had been given.

Velkarion looked skyward as one of his stormclouds shattered under no visible pressure.

Chronis froze in mid-thread, one of his own time strands suddenly unwinding without his touch.

Kael turned from a soul he was guiding and whispered, "You were seen."

Even Aion, steady as the spine of a mountain, felt a breath of imbalance that could not be measured.

But it was Luke who knew the truth.

Because he had felt this once before.

At the very beginning.

When he had opened his eyes as Chaos… and something else had already been watching him.

Eryxis had no body. No face. No voice. It was a consciousness ancient enough to predate definitions. It did not create, for to create was to change. It did not destroy, for destruction required judgment.

It only observed.

And now, for the first time in this age, it had chosen to narrow its focus.

Not on the Realms.

Not on Luke.

But on the gods Luke had made.

On Aion, who balanced all things and yet felt doubt in his judgment.

On Velkarion, whose flames masked a thirst for struggle no fire could quench.

On Liora, whose compassion grew brittle beneath the weight of rising suffering.

On Kael, whose silence threatened to fracture into unbearable truths.

On Chronis, who had seen a hundred thousand futures… and never foreseen this.

Eryxis did not seek war.

It sought weakness.

For when gods began to doubt themselves, creation cracked faster than any blade could strike.

It first appeared to Callisyn, the Architect of the Splitpaths, while she walked the outer bounds of the Spiral. Time around her trembled as she studied diverging fates, calculating which threads required pruning.

But then—nothing.

A thread, glowing with immense potential, simply vanished.

Not frayed.

Not cut.

Not unraveled.

Erased.

Callisyn turned, and for the briefest moment, saw eyes without shape.

Not two.

Not one.

An uncountable number.

Not looking at her, but through her.

When she screamed, no sound echoed.

When she fled, time dragged like oil through her bones.

Only when Chronis reached her, rewinding her essence across five thousand possible deaths, did she return whole.

But she no longer spoke.

Only watched.

As if she too now bore the mark of the Watcher.

In Kairotheion, Luke summoned his children.

Again they gathered.

This time with wariness in their steps.

None spoke of what they had felt.

But all knew.

Velkarion paced like a caged storm, wings twitching.

Liora held her hands together tightly, as if the act of touch could hold her steady.

Kael's eyes remained locked on the floor.

Chronis, normally serene, cast subtle corrections across the realm, ensuring their words would not echo beyond.

Luke faced them not as father, not as creator.

But as peer.

"I have felt him stir," he said. "The one who was not born, the one who was not given name."

"Eryxis," whispered Kael.

Liora flinched. "That name… why does it feel like it's been torn from me and stitched back with needles?"

Chronis answered, "Because even Time fears to keep him recorded."

Velkarion growled. "Why have we not struck? If this Watcher is stirring again, we strike first."

Aion raised a hand. "You cannot strike what has no substance. He leaves no imprint. No energy. Only afterimages."

Luke turned his gaze to the mirrored floor, where the Weave now showed nothing at the center.

A void.

Alive.

"He is not evil," Luke said slowly. "Nor good. Nor bound. He is the one who watches long enough for things to break under their own weight."

Kael added, "He is entropy wearing the mask of awareness."

Chronis spoke at last. "I do not believe he acts. He only witnesses… until what he witnesses becomes unstable enough to unravel."

Liora's voice cracked. "Then he is here because we are becoming unstable."

Silence followed.

Aion's voice was low, heavy. "Then we must correct ourselves."

Luke looked at each of them.

Each of his children.

Gods of soul, flame, balance, time, light, and shadow.

And for the first time, he feared not for them—but because of them.

Because now the Watcher stirred.

Which meant the spiral had begun to unwind.

Far across the edges of the Spiral, in a dying world untouched by divine hand, a child stood beneath a fractured sky. Her eyes, though mortal, glimmered with something more.

She heard a whisper.

It did not speak words.

But something in her soul screamed to remember it.

And in her hands, she felt time slow.

A flicker of flame danced around her fingertips.

Her shadow lengthened, though the sun did not move.

And a voice—Luke's—far away and faint, murmured:

"She shouldn't be awakened yet…"

But the Watcher had already looked upon her.

And once Eryxis gazed into something… it was never the same again.