The explosion of sound was silent — a shockwave without noise.Sand erupted from the Forbidden Hourglass, swirling around the chamber like a storm made of years.
Lucienne gripped Nox's shoulder. "We are leaving. Now!"
But Nox couldn't move.
The sand-figure — the one who called him Thief — stepped forward with agonizing slowness. Each movement distorted the air, like reality struggled to accept its return.
Its voice scraped like broken time:
"You unmade me…and wore my hour like skin."
Nox's throat tightened. "I didn't choose—"
"Choice?" the Echo hissed, shape flickering. "You were given a life stolen from mine."
Lucienne pulled Nox backward, step by step, but the air thickened like syrup. Time was resisting them.
Cracks began crawling along the walls, glowing with violet light — as though history itself was splitting open.
The Echo extended an arm toward Nox, sand spiraling like a tether.
The mark on Nox's hand blazed — liquid silver burning beneath the skin.
The Echo recoiled, hissing:
"Verge-Touched… you still carry the fracture."
Lucienne's eyes widened. "He's reacting to you — or your Hourglass!"
Nox stared at the floating Hourglass inside his chest, visible now through translucent skin. Its crack pulsed violently.
He sensed something:
If the Forbidden Hourglass breaks completely…his own will shatter with it.
The Echo surged forward, sand spiraling into claws.
Lucienne shouted, "Nox!"
Instinct took over.
He raised his marked hand — and time stuttered.
Everything slowed.The sand froze.The Echo hung suspended mid-lunge.
Only Nox could move.
A whisper coiled through his mind — not from the Echo, but from something deeper.
You can push time forward… or pull it back.
Nox inhaled, terrified.
"I… don't know how."
You already did.You erased a fate once. Erase again… and survive.
He shook his head violently.
"No. I'm not doing that again."
The Forbidden Hourglass shuddered — sand shifting by a single grain.
Time lurched forward.
The Echo roared — a distorted, agonized sound — and slammed into Nox.
Claws of sand tore across his chest — but instead of blood, glowing dust spilled out, drifting upward like reversed gravity.
Lucienne screamed, firing a star-shard bolt that tore through the Echo's arm.
It screeched, stumbling back — body dissolving, then reforming, fighting to exist.
The entire chamber convulsed.
Lucienne grabbed Nox's hand. "Listen to me — we cannot win here! We need to escape before the hour restores itself!"
Nox staggered, clutching his chest. The ticking inside him now sounded like panic.
The Echo's voice warped with fury and despair:
"You can run, thief…but the hour will claim what was stolen."
Lucienne yanked Nox toward the stairs just as the platform cracked apart — plates of stone dropping into swirling nothingness.
They sprinted as the tower began collapsing — gears screaming, timelines peeling away into vortexes of light.
At the doorway, Nox looked back.
The Echo stared at him through the chaos — a hollow, grieving anger.
One last whisper reached him:
"You exist… because I do not."
The doors slammed shut.
The Clock Spire's great ticking stopped.
Outside, night air hit Nox like a shock.He collapsed to his knees, shaking.
Lucienne knelt beside him, voice trembling.
"Whoever that was… they weren't lying."
Nox stared at his glowing, cracked Hourglass — sand rising faster than before.
A realization struck him like a blade:
His life wasn't just a mystery.It was a replacement.
Lucienne held his gaze. "We need answers. Real answers."
And with raw fear hanging between them, the ticking inside Nox whispered what neither dared say aloud:
The truth wasn't lost.The truth was coming.