The Human Trial Space changed again.
The endless field disappeared, replaced by a colossal stone corridor that stretched farther than Eryndor could see.
The walls were covered in unfamiliar symbols, some carved deeply into the stone while others seemed to move beneath its surface like living patterns.
Eryndor stood still.
He had learned not to trust the first thing a trial showed him.
The Tower had already tested his ability to observe, adapt, understand patterns, and make difficult decisions.
This time, however, something felt different.
There was no enemy.
No obvious puzzle.
No destination.
Only the corridor.
Eryndor took a step forward.
The symbols on the walls brightened.
A message appeared.
[Trial Phase: Resonance.]
Eryndor frowned.
“Resonance?”
The Tower gave no explanation.
He continued walking.
The farther he went, the stronger the strange sensation became.
It was not energy.
It was not pressure.
It felt almost like recognition.
Something in the corridor seemed familiar.
Eryndor stopped beside one of the symbols.
It was a circle surrounded by ten smaller marks.
He had never seen it before.
Yet something inside him reacted.
His mirror pendant became cold.
A fragment of memory surfaced.
A vast golden barrier.
A ruined landscape.
Thousands of people standing beneath a sky filled with darkness.
Then the memory vanished.
Eryndor pressed his fingers against his temple.
The memory had not belonged to the Tower.
It had come from somewhere deeper.
He continued.
The corridor eventually opened into an enormous chamber.
Eryndor stopped at the entrance.
Ten doors stood around the chamber.
Each door was different.
One appeared to be made of darkness.
One shimmered like glass.
One was covered in strange runes.
One seemed to be carved from living wood.
One radiated elemental energy.
One carried an oppressive demonic aura.
One shone with a faint celestial light.
One constantly shifted shape.
One resembled the entrance to a vast cavern.
And the final door was covered in patterns that resembled stars.
Eryndor stared at them.
He knew those symbols.
Not from the present.
From his memories.
The Ten Domains.
Vaelcrest.
Astravelle.
Drakemere.
Lunareth.
Caelthorn.
Veyrion.
Solmara.
Ravenholt.
Highmere.
Eldermere.
Ten ancient regions.
Ten remnants.
Ten dead Primordials.
Eryndor’s expression became serious.
The future memories had shown him these places.
He remembered people fighting over them.
Kingdoms rising around them.
Organizations attempting to control them.
Ancient ruins being uncovered beneath them.
He also remembered something else.
The golden barriers.
They had appeared when the world awakened.
But he had never understood why.
The chamber began to shake.
The ten doors vanished.
The walls disappeared.
Eryndor suddenly found himself standing beneath an enormous golden barrier.
It stretched across the sky like a wall between worlds.
Beyond it was darkness.
Within it was a landscape filled with ancient ruins.
Eryndor recognized the place.
Vaelcrest.
The region where he had grown up.
The golden barrier was enormous, surrounding an area larger than any kingdom he had known in his previous life.
Its surface contained countless patterns.
Some represented laws.
Others appeared to be remnants of ancient Authority.
None of them were moving with intention.
They were simply functioning.
Preserving.
Protecting.
Holding something in place.
Eryndor slowly raised his hand.
The barrier responded.
A single golden ripple spread across its surface.
Eryndor froze.
The reaction was subtle.
But it was unmistakable.
The barrier had responded to him.
“Why?”
There was no answer.
The golden light spread farther.
For a moment, Eryndor saw something beneath the barrier.
Not a person.
Not a spirit.
Not a consciousness.
A remnant.
Something ancient had been left behind.
A fragment of existence so powerful that even after its original owner had disappeared, it continued to influence the world.
Eryndor understood.
The barrier was not alive.
It wasn’t watching him.
It wasn’t choosing him.
It was reacting to a pattern within his existence.
The thought made him uncomfortable.
A notification appeared.
[Primordial remnant detected.]
Eryndor’s eyes narrowed.
The word carried weight.
He had heard it before.
Primordials.
The strongest beings from the ancient past.
The beings who had reached the highest heights of existence before disappearing.
The Tower’s records contained almost nothing about them.
But Eryndor’s memories did.
He remembered their names being spoken in fear.
He remembered statues.
Ruins.
Ancient weapons.
Dead civilizations built around their legends.
He also remembered that some of them would return.
But the memory was incomplete.
He didn’t know when.
He didn’t know where.
And he didn’t know which people they would become.
The golden barrier pulsed again.
Eryndor’s mirror pendant grew colder.
Another memory appeared.
Ten figures.
Standing together.
Their forms were impossible to see clearly.
One seemed surrounded by endless dimensions.
Another was covered in shifting darkness.
Another radiated overwhelming light.
Another possessed an enormous body covered in runes.
Another resembled a creature beyond ordinary imagination.
Another looked like a living constellation.
Another was surrounded by absolute emptiness.
Another was formed from countless elements.
Another stood among an endless forest.
The final figure was surrounded by strange shadows.
Ten beings.
Ten races.
Ten paths.
Then the memory shattered.
Eryndor stumbled backward.
He breathed slowly.
He had not remembered that before.
The Tower had unlocked something.
But before he could examine it further, the scene changed.
The other nine golden barriers appeared around him.
One by one.
Astravelle.
Drakemere.
Lunareth.
Caelthorn.
Veyrion.
Solmara.
Ravenholt.
Highmere.
Eldermere.
Each barrier appeared for only a few seconds.
Each carried a different presence.
Dimension.
Titan.
Chaos Tree.
Elemental.
Demon.
Celestial.
Chaos.
Supreme Beast.
Cosmic.
Eryndor watched silently.
These weren’t merely territories.
They were remnants of something much older.
The Tower showed him fragments of the ancient world.
He saw enormous cities beneath Astravelle.
He saw mountains carved apart in Drakemere.
He saw forests stretching beyond the horizon in Lunareth.
He saw oceans of elemental energy within Caelthorn.
He saw ancient demon ruins in Veyrion.
He saw brilliant structures within Solmara.
He saw impossible landscapes within Ravenholt.
He saw enormous beasts sleeping beneath Highmere.
And he saw stars moving across the skies of Eldermere.
Then the vision stopped.
Eryndor stood once again within the Tower.
The chamber was silent.
A notification appeared.
[Trial observation complete.]
He waited.
Another message appeared.
[Understanding insufficient.]
Eryndor almost laughed.
“Of course.”
The Tower wasn’t going to give him the answer.
It had shown him the existence of the Ten Domains.
That was all.
He looked down at the mirror pendant.
“You’re hiding something from me.”
The pendant remained silent.
Eryndor turned away.
He didn’t yet know what the Primordial remnants truly were.
He didn’t know why his existence had resonated with one of them.
He didn’t know why the Tower couldn’t determine his Core potential.
And he didn’t know why the future memories surrounding the Ten Domains were so incomplete.
But he understood something important.
The Ten Domains were not ordinary territories.
They were foundations left behind by beings who had existed long before the Awakening.
And whatever those beings had left behind was still powerful enough to shape the new world.
The Tower began to dissolve.
Eryndor expected another trial.
Instead, the Tower gave him something unexpected.
A single line.
[The first layer of the Trial has been completed.]
Eryndor stared.
“The first layer?”
The Tower said nothing more.
The entire space collapsed into darkness.
Then Eryndor returned to the shared Human Trial Space.
Hundreds of awakened humans were still undergoing their own trials.
Some had advanced.
Others had fallen behind.
Some had already discovered their limitations.
Eryndor looked across the space.
His eyes settled on the distant figures.
Everyone here was changing.
Everyone was walking a different path.
And somewhere beyond the Tower, the Ten Golden Barriers still surrounded the ancient Domains.
They remained silent.
They remained impersonal.
They did not know Eryndor.
They did not understand him.
They did not choose him.
Yet one of them had responded.
That fact remained in his mind.
Eryndor looked toward the enormous invisible ceiling of the Trial Space.
For the first time, he understood that the Awakening had not simply given the world new powers.
It had uncovered things that had been buried beneath it.
Ancient remnants.
Ancient bloodlines.
Ancient paths.
And perhaps ancient dangers.
He closed his hand around the mirror pendant.
Whatever had happened to the world before he was born, whatever the Primordials had left behind, and whatever his own forgotten existence was connected to, he would eventually find the answers.
But not yet.
The Tower had another trial waiting.
And Eryndor was beginning to realize that the path ahead would not be about remembering the future.
It would be about understanding the present well enough to create something the future had never contained.