Vortex Origins

Ash stared at Nox. Something about the boy no longer felt like a mystery. It was becoming clear, and that clarity was what unsettled him most.

He had entered Ash's soul. Increased his soul pool from nothing. Reached into a Soulspace while still a child. And now claimed to have Soulcores unlike anything that existed in Varagos.

Ash didn't need a scholar to spell it out. The signs were too many, too loud to ignore.

He met the boy on an asteroid. Of course, he wasn't from Varagos. That much was now a fact, not a theory.

Ash finally spoke.

"You're not from Varagos. I'm sure of it now. So tell me… what race are you?"

Nox tilted his head, almost as if the question itself didn't make sense.

"Oh. That. I don't know. It was blank when I heard it."

"Blank?"

That word echoed deep inside Ash's chest. Not because he didn't understand it, but because he did. His own Soulbound had shown up as blank. Even now, no one could explain it. And yet, a race being blank? That was something else entirely. Everyone belonged to something. That was the order of the world. Races existed so souls had a place to anchor. A place to return to.

A blank meant a soul without an origin.

Ash kept his eyes on Nox. The boy's expression had changed. The spark in his eyes dulled, like he was remembering something heavy and trying to bury it in silence. Ash said nothing more. He let it rest—for now.

The surrounding space shimmered in strange colors, a realm built from something not born in Varagos. Ash breathed it in and forced himself to focus on the now, not the unknowns.

"So tell me, Nox. You said you created all this with a soul skill. What are your skills… and how many do you have? Wait—more importantly—what stage are you?"

Nox stared at the ground, his voice low.

"I'm still at Stage One. My soul pool's growing, little by little… but for some reason, it stopped after you left Ironhold. And my soul skill—"

His gaze lifted, slow and cold.

"Why don't you see it for yourself? I couldn't hear all of it. There were too many."

Ash narrowed his eyes.

'Too many? He's still at Stage One.'

Nox looked toward the floating Soulcores in the sky.

"Soul Skill."

A faint shimmer passed through the air. Then, the Soulcores flickered. First in dim light, then with sudden bursts. One by one, smaller versions of the cores blinked into existence, orbiting in front of Nox like stars aligning for war.

Ash waited for the voice, for that subtle whisper his own Soulcore gave whenever it revealed something new. But there was nothing. No new sound or presence. Maybe that silence came because the skill wasn't his to hear.

The orbs continued to form, multiplying at a steady pace. White and green, their glow pulsing gently as they filled the space between the two boys.

Ash's body tensed. He tried to count them—but gave up. They kept coming. Ten. Thirty. Maybe fifty. Or more.

This wasn't normal. It wasn't even close.

No ascended had ever held this many Soul Skills. Not even the record holders—the freaks born with perfect dual cores.

If a Stage One ascended has One Soulcore. That should mean just three Soul Skill slots. That was the rule carved into the foundation of the Soul. You master all three, your Soul space allows you to evolve. You ascend to Stage Two. Then, and only then, it grants you three more slots.

And so it continued.

Stage Three, another three. Stage Four, again. That's the rhythm of the cycle. Simple, brutal, and unbreakable.

But Nox…

Ash's mind worked fast. A second Soulcore meant double the slots, but it came with a cost. Twice the effort to master the skills. Twice the pain to evolve. If even one Soulcore failed to advance, the entire soul would lock down.

But this wasn't just because of his second core. This was something else.

Ash didn't move. He didn't speak. He just watched those Soul Skills form like an army assembling in silence.

And in that silence, something stirred. Not a sound. Not a whisper. But a weight in the air—like the world had just noticed Nox for the first time.

The person with the highest number of skills was a nightmare given form—a rogue Ascended of the Seventh Stage.

He possessed not one, but two Soulcores—an impossibility for most. And unlike others bound to teams or the military, this man walked alone. A ghost with purpose. He hunted creatures not for vengeance or duty... but to steal from them. To tear their essence apart in search of new skills, just like how Ash once ripped the skill—Dark Blade from the corpse of a fallen creature.

But what Ash stumbled upon once—this man made a ritual.

So far, he'd extracted eleven different skills from slaying creatures that shared the elemental resonance of his cores. It was a method that should've been rare, almost mythical. A tale to warn fools from chasing death. Yet he made it work... again and again.

And there was something else—something darker.

Once an Ascended reached Stage Six, a second method of skill creation whispered itself into existence. Ash didn't understand the full mechanics, not yet, but it involved fusing existing skills to form something new. The result wasn't just an upgrade... it was evolution.

Through this obsession, the man grew even deadlier. The people of Varagos began to speak of him with reverence and dread. They called him:

The Hollow Archive.

A man addicted to skills. A collector of the forbidden.

Last Ash checked, he had 67 skills. Maybe more. Ash had stopped counting.

But the boy standing before him…

He had more.

Ash stared in silence, his breath caught in his throat.

For the first time since becoming an Ascended, he didn't understand what he was seeing.

He stammered, voice cracking from the weight of disbelief.

"W-What the hell are all those? Are you saying... those are your skills? But you're only Stage One…"

The boy tilted his head, blinking slowly like a creature trying to understand a lesser being.

"Is that not normal? I thought we all get skills once we awaken our Soulspace."

Ash's pulse slowed.

Then quickened.

Then stopped altogether for a moment.

This wasn't just strange. This was impossible.

Skills weren't handed out. They were earned, stolen, bled for. An Ascended had to learn from a master of a certain skill, risk their lives to buy a skillbook, or throw themselves blindly into trial and death. Some spent years chasing just one.

But this boy...?

He got them freely.

Like it was nothing.

Either he was some kind of broken prodigy or something was very, very wrong with the world.

Ash is someone who struggles with learning skills. Not by choice but by nature.

He was stuck at Stage 1. Not because he lacked talent. But because no one could teach him what he needed to know. No one alive, at least.

There were no dark ascended left. Every one of them had vanished or died. Even the old tomes, the skill books tied to the Dark Core, were missing. Not hidden. Gone. As if someone had hunted them down and wiped them out completely.

Ash didn't understand how that was even possible.

And worse—his own mother, a Dark Ascended, had refused to teach him anything concerning the dark soul core.

There had to be a reason.

He remembered stories of the war between Light and Darkness, but the histories always felt incomplete. Sanitized. As if someone had carved the truth out of them and stitched the remains together with lies.

Still… that war had ended long ago.

So why did it feel like he was still caught in the middle of it?

"...Ash?"

Nox's voice pulled him back. Ash looked up, eyes meeting the boy's wide, curious gaze.

Nox tilted his head, like a child trying to understand what their parent was thinking. As if he was the confused one.

Ash dropped his gaze and sighed.

'I should be used to this by now…' he thought.

But nothing about this made sense. Not the twin Soulcores. Not the kind of world Nox came from. Not the way this Soul Space worked.

There was too much hidden beneath the surface. Too much buried in silence.

He looked up again, locking eyes with the strange boy who had flipped everything upside down.

"Alright… I think I get it now," Ash muttered in a low tone.

"Whatever you are, you're not normal. When I say normal, I mean Varagos normal. You're nothing like the other kids. You're this young, but you already have a Soul Space. That shouldn't even be possible."

He let out a breath and added,

"At this point, I shouldn't even be surprised anymore. Even if you—"

Ash's voice was cut short.

The world around him began to shift.

The lush green vanished—replaced by swallowing black. The warmth bled out of the air, replaced by stillness colder than death. It wasn't just the field collapsing. It was the space itself.

He spun toward Nox.

"What's happening?"

Nox's form flickered, the edges of his silhouette breaking like ash in the wind.

"I'm running out of energy," he said, his voice seemed to be fading.

"I used too much to reach you... and even more trying to bring you here. My soul pool's not strong enough yet. I won't last much longer."

The darkness spread, eating away the horizon.

And then, for a flicker of a moment, Ash found himself alone in his Soulspace again.

The cold had returned. So did the silence. Above, the glowing Soulcores hung like distant, watching stars—burning too far to touch. His breath echoed faintly against the void.

But then… the warmth rushed back.

The world twisted again. Grassy fields bloomed beneath his feet. A clear sky opened above. It was beautiful—but artificial. A fragile illusion made by a tired soul.

Nox sat in the middle of it, barely holding shape. His voice was smaller now.

"Ash… I think I'm going to sleep for a while. I'm down to two percent. When I recover… let's meet again."

Ash gazed around the soul space. The field looked peaceful now. A stillness that didn't belong to the living.

He turned back to Nox, gave a half-smile.

"Yeah. Sure… Oh, and when you wake up add some trees next time, will you? This place is way too empty."

Nox chuckled weakly.

Ash's eyes opened.

He stood in Thornrest again. The corrupted field groaned beneath him. The pressure of the Dread Mark returned like a claw on his chest.

He looked down into the stream. His reflection stared back—blank, unreadable. A mirror of a boy walking further away from what he used to be.

Ash exhaled, then murmured into the wind.

"So… a child lives in my soul. A forgotten child with no memories."

His fists clenched.

"What was your past, Nox? And why did you lose it?"

There were no answers waiting in the water.

Only silence.

Then—a sharp beep echoed from his wristband.

Ash raised his head. The sky above Thornrest had changed. Far in the distance, a speck moved—small at first, but growing fast. A ship cutting through the sky.

The ship sent by Max had arrived.

And like that, his strange journey here has ended.