Tianmu: Eyes of Illusion

"You carry the eye, but not the vision."

— The Architect

The desert was gone.

Lucas now stood in a palace made of reflected silence — every wall a shimmering pane, every step echoing into eternity.

The Architect moved across the space without motion.

Her presence pressed gently but undeniably against the edges of Lucas's thoughts — not threatening, but foundational, like gravity.

"This is not a place," she said.

"It is the memory of a possibility."

Lucas didn't speak at first. He was still reeling — from the Gate, from the reflection, from himself.

But he finally asked:

"Are you… real?"

The Architect smiled, not kindly, but patiently.

"Does it matter?"

"You're speaking to me. You're listening. And now—deciding."

She raised her hand.

The mirrors around them rippled outward, revealing images Lucas had never seen but somehow remembered:

Cities suspended in dreamlike geometries.People with eyes made of stars.A world where thoughts shaped streets, and memories became law.

"This is the world before forgetting," she said.

"The true realm of Tianmu."

Lucas's breath caught.

"You mean… this was real?"

She nodded.

"And it can be again."

"You've opened the Third Gate, and passed the Trial of Echo. You are now eligible to take the Seat of Shaping."

A chair rose behind her — simple, black, unornamented. But Lucas felt its weight like a star pressed into the fabric of space.

"Sit," she said.

"And the world will obey you."

Lucas took a half-step forward.

Then froze.

"What happens if I do?"

"You'll become a Dream Architect," she said calmly.

"One of us. One who designs the unseen layer of reality."

"You'll reshape the rules—language, physics, belief—beneath the waking world."

"You'll forget pain. And hunger. And choice."

"But Nora won't follow."

That stopped him cold.

"Why?"

The Architect tilted her head.

"Because she still lives in time."

"You will not."

Lucas looked back at the seat.

It now pulsed with something familiar—comfort.

A place to stop.

To be done.

To escape.

"Why offer me this?"

The Architect's voice was soft:

"Because you made it farther than any human in centuries."

"And because I am tired."

Silence.

Then:

"Can I ask something first?" Lucas said.

She nodded.

"If this world was real… why did it fall?"

The Architect's expression finally shifted—something close to grief.

"Because one of us tried to reshape it too far."

"And in doing so… made everyone forget it existed."

"They called it illusion."

"But it was memory."

Lucas looked down at his hands.

They shimmered faintly—ghosts of glyphs running across his knuckles.

His blood remembered what he was.

But his heart…

He thought of Nora.

Her laugh in the rain.

Her hand on his when he almost lost control during the second ritual.

Her voice when he doubted everything.

"I can't take the seat," he said quietly.

"Not yet."

The Architect studied him, not disappointed—almost… relieved.

"Then wake up," she said.

"Before the Hunters reach her."

With a gesture, the world shattered.

And Lucas fell—

Not through space, but through intent.

He awoke on a rooftop, gasping, heartbeat thunderous.

The sky above Haleford was full of stormlight and fire.

And across the roof—

Nora was running.

Being chased.

By something wearing human skin, but not human at all.

Lucas stood, legs unsteady.

Eyes glowing.

"I said not yet," he whispered.

"But I didn't say never."

🔍 下一章预告（Chapter 19 – Hunter's Design）:

Lucas reenters the real world—but the Hunters have evolved. One of them has glimpsed the mirror realm… and now, it wants a Gate of its own.