Legacy of Chaos: Born Before Time

Time did not break all at once.

It frayed.

Silently. Patiently. Like a rope worn thread by thread, until what once held together entire realms became nothing more than dust between fingers.

In the days after the second gathering in Kairotheion, each of Luke's children returned to their domains—older, heavier, silent.

None spoke of what they felt, but each knew:

Something had shifted.

And that shift had already begun to corrupt the pattern.

The Weave, which once hummed with steady rhythm beneath all realities, now pulsed unevenly. Moments doubled upon themselves. Mortal dreams began to echo out of order. Deaths occurred days before births. Prophets awoke from visions that had not yet happened, screaming names they did not know.

And in the distance—always in the distance—the gaze of the Watcher remained.

It did not move.

It did not speak.

But it saw.

And in being seen, the divine began to come undone.

In the gardens of Verdara, Liora found herself struggling to breathe.

Life had always obeyed her hand. She spoke, and forests bloomed. She wept, and rivers overflowed with gentle rain. But now her command met resistance.

Seeds refused to grow.

Flowers bloomed too quickly and died before she touched them.

She placed her hand upon a mortal babe, and instead of laughter, it screamed with eyes that looked too old to belong in such a small body.

She recoiled.

Something inside her whispered a truth she did not want to hear:

"Hope can sour, when planted in poisoned soil."

She wept—but the tears no longer watered the earth.

They burned it.

Far above, in his mountains of fire, Velkarion began to lose control.

His storms, once wild but loyal, now turned on him.

Winds howled through his own temples, tearing the wings from lesser dragons who could not withstand the onslaught.

He roared back, and the clouds screamed in return.

Once, when he summoned lightning, it obeyed. Now, it struck him. It lashed his scales. It did not miss—it chose.

At first he blamed the Architects of Time. Then the Titans. Then Kael.

But in his solitude, he wondered—

What if the chaos he claimed to wield was no longer his?

What if it had never been?

In the Spiral, Chronis was dying.

Not in body, for gods do not die as mortals do. But the threads he had once tended—flawless, infinite, interwoven—now snapped faster than he could rebind them.

Entire timelines collapsed into void without cause.

Others repeated themselves endlessly—mortals trapped in lifetimes they could not escape, reliving betrayals and deaths and hopes that never reached conclusion.

The Architects grew frantic. Eonel stood before the Chronospire, weaving six timelines at once, sweat beading across a face that shimmered between centuries.

"Something is feeding," they muttered. "Something outside the stream."

Chronis knew it was true.

But he had no hands to stop it.

Only time—and time no longer answered him.

Kael had never feared silence.

But now, his realm spoke to him in ways it never had before.

Souls passed through the Veil twisted, echoing with voices that were not their own.

Some came bearing knowledge they should not have possessed.

Others came half-alive, bearing wounds no mortal blade could inflict.

And one soul—one child—looked at him and said, "You are not the end. He is."

Kael demanded the name.

But the child simply whispered, "He saw me."

The Veil trembled.

Kael withdrew to his sanctum and locked the Mirror of Echoes. He did not look into it again.

Even he was not ready to see what it now reflected.

Aion was the first to call for another gathering.

Not because he sought unity—but because he feared he would soon have to choose a side.

In the realm of Kairotheion, the gates opened again.

But this time, each god arrived slower. With less trust in their eyes. With fewer words.

When all were gathered, Aion stood and said, "The balance has begun to fail. Not in mortals, not in flame or law—but in us."

Silence.

Velkarion crossed his arms. "Are you suggesting this is our doing?"

Liora closed her eyes. "We are gods of concept. If the concepts rot…"

Chronis's voice was weak. "We may be unraveling from within."

Kael did not speak.

Luke watched them all. Not from above, but among them. He looked tired. Older than he had ever appeared, though time had no claim over him.

"I gave you life," he said quietly. "But I did not give you certainty. That is what makes you real."

"We were perfect once," Velkarion muttered.

"No," Luke said. "You were new."

That silenced even the dragon god.

Aion stepped forward. "If we cannot correct this—if the threads continue to snap—creation may not need war to end. It will simply collapse into silence."

Chronis raised a hand, trembling. "There is… a solution."

They turned to him.

"I can isolate the corrupted strands. Bury them. Cut them off."

"You'd erase them," Liora whispered.

Chronis did not deny it.

Luke stared into the mirrored floor where all of this was being reflected.

And he saw it.

Himself.

Not as he was now, but as he had once been—Chaos given form, given thought, given will.

And over his shoulder, a shadow.

Eryxis.

Still watching.

Still waiting.

That night, across all realms, the first true collapse began.

In the realm of flame, a dragon prince turned against his mother—not for power, but because he had been born with a vision of a future that should not have been.

In Verdara, one of the angels, Elyndra—once questioning, now enraged—tore her wings and fell, screaming, "There is no mercy in a god who forgets her children!"

In the Spiral, Callisyn, once silent, now screamed to the void. "I SEE YOU! WHY DO YOU WATCH? WHY DO YOU NOT SPEAK?!"

In the Veil, Kael opened the Mirror of Echoes.

And this time, it did not show him truth.

It showed him possibility.

And it lied.

In the farthest edge of creation, that mortal child—the one the Watcher had gazed upon—stood at a cliff of shattered time, eyes glowing.

She reached out.

And the Weave bent around her fingers.

Chronis felt it.

Aion sensed it.

Kael feared it.

Luke whispered.

"It's beginning…"

The child spoke one word, and reality rippled.

"No more gods."

And somewhere, far beneath everything…

Eryxis smiled.