The Boy Who Burned the Heavens

"The cruelest erasure is not of pain… but of love."

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📖 [Scene: The Ashborn Encampment – Aedric's Tent, Night]

The Book of the Unwritten pulsed like a living thing, its spine cracking open without being touched.

Aedric sat cross-legged before it, flame flickering around his hands — not out of power, but fear.

> "It called to me," he whispered.

"Like it remembered me… before I remembered myself."

Lyara approached slowly.

> "You don't have to open it yet."

He shook his head.

> "If there's even a single story inside that needs remembering, I must."

The book opened — not to a page, but to a memory.

It wasn't written.

It was lived.

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🌀 Memory Projection – Location Unknown

Aedric stood in a dim, stone-walled room.

Candlelight flickered against old wooden furniture. A lullaby hummed from somewhere nearby — hauntingly familiar.

He followed the sound.

Through the door, he saw her.

Selene.

Not the cold-eyed betrayer she had become, but younger. Softer. Singing.

And in her arms…

A child.

A boy.

Maybe four. Black hair. Silver eyes. A mark of flame faintly glowing on his tiny chest.

> "He has your fire," Selene whispered — not to anyone present, but to the memory of Aedric.

> "And your silence."

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💔 The Forgotten Flame

The child laughed — chasing an ember in the air.

> "What's his name?" Aedric asked the memory, knowing it wouldn't respond.

But it did.

The walls whispered:

> "Riven."

Aedric fell to his knees.

He clutched his chest — the pain wasn't just emotional. The Flame Core flickered violently.

This child wasn't just someone he forgot.

He had been erased.

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🌑 The Divine Pact

The memory shimmered — shifting now to a council of gods.

Aedric, bloodied and chained, knelt before the Pantheon.

> "You have chosen mortality," one god hissed.

"Then you shall suffer its price."

Selene, desperate, screamed:

> "He didn't ask for this!"

The Masked God stepped forward.

> "Then we take… what he doesn't yet know he loves."

A sigil formed in the air — divine, absolute.

Riven's existence was bound in ink, buried beneath reality itself.

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⚠️ Back to the Present

Aedric gasped as he returned.

Lyara caught him.

> "What did you see?"

> "My son."

Silence.

> "He was erased before I even knew he existed."

> "Because I chose to be human."

Lyara gripped his hand tightly.

> "Then we'll burn through every page of that book until we find him."

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🛡️ New Quest Unlocked

> ✅ Quest: Remember the Lost Flame

Find the three fragments of Riven's soul hidden across the Divine Realms. Reforge his presence in the world before the Pantheon locks the Book forever.

> ✅ New Flame Signature: Father's Ember

Strength increases 2x in presence of children, or when protecting innocence. Immune to emotional manipulation tied to memory.

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👁 Final Scene – Caelen Reacts

Caelen stood in a mirrored sanctuary, watching the same memory unfold within his own ink.

> "So… the boy lived."

He closed the mirror.

> "And now he'll burn for both of you."

He turned to a cloaked figure.

> "Send the Pale Wardens. If Aedric tries to reclaim the fragments, make sure he loses something else."

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