The tower room dimmed all at once, as if the moonlight itself had swallowed its breath. Nox froze. The Astrarium Hourglass—still floating inches above the stone basin—began to hum, a sound so soft he wondered if it came from within his own skull.
—tick—
Not a sound.A feeling.
One tick, echoing not in the air, but in his pulse.
Nox stepped back, clutching the silver hourglass key Lira had given him. The runes etched along its stem pulsed faintly, answering the Astrarium's call.
Then he heard it.
A voice so faint it reminded him of forgotten dreams.
"Second… Accord…"
Nox's breath caught in his throat."Who's there?"
The hourglass responded by unraveling like mist—sand rising upward in spiraling ribbons, forming symbols he could not read. They rearranged themselves, flickered, and then converged into a single sigil glowing above the basin: a circle split into four uneven arcs.
He felt it imprint itself into his memory.
The whisper grew clearer.
"The time you borrow is not free."
A surge of cold ran the length of his spine. Nox stumbled back, hitting the shelf of dusty books. One toppled onto the floor, opening to a page that depicted the very sigil hanging in the air.
"The Fourfold Axia…" he read aloud.An ancient cycle.A forbidden one.
The book described it only in fragments—scattered notes from scholars who had gone mad chasing it. The Axia was said to represent four temporal states: Origin, Echo, Verge, and Never. Those who stepped into its cycle could touch the flow of time itself… but only briefly. Borrowed moments always demanded repayment.
Always.
The hourglass pulsed again, drenching the room in shimmering light.
Nox shielded his eyes.
When the glow faded, the Astrarium Hourglass was once again still—floating silently, as if nothing had happened.
But the sigil remained branded inside his mind.And the whisper… lingered.
"Verge."
The voice called him by a name he did not recognize as his own. A shiver crept over him.
Footsteps echoed from the stairwell outside.
Lira burst into the room, breathless. "Nox! Did the Astrarium react?"
He opened his mouth to answer, but before he could speak, the hourglass emitted a sudden crystalline chiming sound.
The time around them… slowed.
The flames of the lantern froze mid-flicker. Dust motes hung motionless like stars suspended in glass. Lira's expression locked halfway through a blink.
Only Nox remained able to move.
A circle of silver sand formed at his feet.
And the whisper returned, this time inside his skull, clear—too clear.
"Candidate accepted.Verge-Bearer… walk."
Nox tried to take a step back, but his body obeyed the command instead.
The circle expanded.The tower room dissolved.Reality folded in on itself like paper burning from the edges.
And then—
He stood in a place that was not a place.
A vast, empty void, illuminated by drifting shards of broken time—moments, memories, futures, none belonging to him.
Before him stood a shadowy figure, tall and robed, with an hourglass embedded where its heart should be.Silver sand poured upward through it.
The figure raised its hand.
"Our pact begins."