Across the house, Hilda dropped the basket of books she’d been carrying.
“Alarich?!”
She bolted up the stairs, heart pounding.
The hallway twisted with that same yellow hue—unnatural light bleeding from beneath his door.
She kicked it open.
Alarich lay on the floor, trembling, glowing veins of burning yellow crawling beneath his skin.
His eyes were open, but they saw nothing—locked in a vision, or a nightmare.
“Alarich!!” Hilda screamed, falling to her knees beside him.
He thrashed once, a sharp cry leaving his lips—
“↻ 𓂀 𐍈 Ⲛ—!”
Then silence.
But he was still breathing.
The glow faded slowly.
The room grew cold.
“What’s happening to you?” Hilda whispered, tears welling up.
“Why is this happening now…?”
She cradled his head against her chest, gently rocking him, whispering his name again and again.
In Alarich’s mind, he was drifting.
Somewhere between the Fool’s riddle and the edge of the Marile Pathway.
He had passed through a threshold.
And something… was watching.
Not Uki.
Not the Tower.
Something older.
Something vast.
And it whispered not in words—but in concepts, colors, and madness.
The yellow wasn’t just light.
It was memory.
It was noise.
It was everything he had never been told.
And somewhere in that maelstrom, a voice like laughter said:
“Welcome, Fool. You’ve finally begun to forget… just enough to remember.”
And Alarich slept.
The second phase… had begun.
Alarich’s eyes fluttered open.