Valdas's lips parted in a frozen gape, his heels skidding back from the balustrade rail as Ignas surged upward. The distance, a daunting chasm for any other freshman, collapsed in a single, blurring stride. Ignas landed on the stone balustrade, not with a thud, but with the silent grace of a predatory wraith, boots planting against the carved stone. The ghost-scent of blistered flesh hit his throat, raw and familiar. Ten years ago, the stench of it had soaked into his lungs, his clothes, his very soul. He remembered the desperate, frantic scramble to brew, to concoct a restorative. *Just a moment, just a single, precious moment of hesitation.* He had paused, his mind wrestling with the 'Whispering Crucible’s' bizarre instructions, unsure if the flesh-warping recipe was a cure or a curse. That hesitation had finished her. Saule, beautiful and vibrant, had writhed on the cold stone, her skin blistering, her nails splintering against flagstones as marrow-poison ate her veins. He’d reached for her, but the corruption, faster than any elixir, had consumed her. Her dying shriek had rattled off cobblestones, an echo lodged beneath his ribs for ten years. He swore then, to whatever malevolent deities listened, that he would never hesitate again. Valdas, still reeling from the impossible feat of absorbing his necrotic blast, stumbled sideways against the rail. He stammered, a weak, indignant sound, “You… you pest! How dare you—” Ignas was already there, a blur of motion. His fingers hooked beneath the Director's cheekbones, prying the teeth apart with a splintering snap. Cartilage popped; Valdas gurgled into the grip. Before he could struggle, Ignas produced the reinforced vial from his tunic, the dark purple death-magic still swirling within. He inverted it, not gently, but with a savage, deliberate push, ramming the corked end deep into Valdas’s gullet. The Director’s body convulsed. A wet, tearing sound ripped through the silence, like ancient canvas being shredded. Valdas’s skin, taut and pale moments before, began to blister and weep, not blood, but a viscous, grey-black fluid that steamed upon contact with the stone. His pupils liquefied, washing out into oily, reflective craters. His bones groaned, stretching and reshaping beneath the liquefying flesh. His limbs elongated grotesquely, fingers fusing into chitinous claws. A second, weeping face erupted from his chest, its features contorted in silent agony, its mouth a gaping maw from which a low, guttural chuckle resonated. This was not Valdas. This was a crude, weeping avatar of the slumbering god, Zaltys, finally given physical form. “A fine vessel,” the new mouth rasped, a voice that was both Valdas’s and something infinitely older, fouler. “A pity you wasted such a potent morsel on him, little alchemist. That essence could have fed my awakening for an age.” The creature flexed its new, terrible form, its weeping eyes fixed on Ignas with a perverse amusement. “But it matters little. I am here. And soon, the world will drown in my embrace.” It lifted one of its monstrous, elongated arms, reaching for the shattered archway that led out of the Great Hall, intending to breach the Citadel’s outer wards. Its victory, however, was premature. Below, Saule dropped low onto the stone. She knelt beside a section of intricate runic carvings on the Great Hall’s floor, a section that, to the casual eye, appeared to be merely decorative. Her fingers, nimble and precise, traced lines that pulsed with a faint, internal light. She worked the groove where primary ward lines intersected, her palm slick with crushed cinnabar. "Hold," she muttered through clamped teeth. She pressed a small, crude stone, carved with symbols Ignas had never seen, into a specific node within the array. A deep hum vibrated through the floor, resonating up through the stones of the entire fortress. Blue light, vibrant and potent, surged along the ancient lines, forming a complex web across every entrance and exit, sealing the Great Hall within an impenetrable dome of protective magic. [Wards activated. External egress denied. Temporal distortion detected.] The Zaltys avatar laughed, a sound that tore at the fabric of reality itself. “Clever girl. You’ve trapped yourself with me. What good are your pathetic wards against a god, even one barely awakened? Time itself bends to my will.” The air around them shimmered, not with heat, but with a cold, impossible distortion. Colors bled into each other, sounds warped, and the distant screams of the remaining freshmen seemed to echo from both past and future simultaneously. The god-thing’s eyes, a swirling void, locked onto Ignas, then shifted, with malicious intent, to Rasa. “You seek to save your lover, alchemist? A noble, futile endeavor. But every choice has a consequence. Especially when you meddle with the threads of fate.” The Crucible burned cold in Ignas's marrow, ice crystallizing along his collarbone. He whipped his head around, his gaze snapping to Rasa. She stood frozen, watching the grotesque transformation, staring at the sloughing skin. Then, slowly, subtly, she began to shimmer. Her outline wavered, her vibrant hair fading, her clothes becoming translucent. The Crucible shrieked inside his skull, a jagged, grating pitch. The paradox. It wasn't a threat. It was already happening. He had saved Saule, prevented her original death. And now, the cost was being exacted. Rasa’s form grew fainter, like mist dispersing in the sun. A horrified gasp escaped her lips as she looked down at her own hands, seeing the stone floor through them. Her gaze locked onto Ignas from across the flagstones. A single tear, crystalline and bright, traced a path down her fading cheek. “Brother?” she whispered, her voice already distant, ethereal. Ignas lunged, pure instinct driving him, his hand outstretched, desperate to grasp what was already slipping away. But she was too far. The air between them felt like solid ice, impassable. Her fingers blurred, the fingernails dissolving into pale gray smoke. It was happening. His choice, his desperate, protective choice, was ripping her from existence. Rasa Veliura, his innocent, beloved sister, was fading. Right before his eyes.

Shattered Illusions