Emiren stood at the edge of a stone platform, hanging over an abyss. Below, amid swirling grey mists, golden time patterns flickered—branches of countless future possibilities that he could touch but not yet comprehend.
His thoughts were heavy. He had already seen how a choice alters reality, how even the smallest action creates new offshoots in eternity. But today, he faced a trial of an entirely different nature.
Before him stood Ardalys. No, not the Ardalys he knew—the wise, majestic figure with eyes that saw through ages. This was the young Ardalys, the one he had known centuries ago. His long dark hair fluttered in the wind, and his eyes glowed with challenge. He was alive. But that was impossible.
“Is this an illusion?” Emiren whispered.
“This is the truth,” Ardalys answered, his voice young, clear, yet deep.
The Crossing of Time’s Branches
Emiren knew that the Garden did not allow simple coincidences. If the young Ardalys stood before him, it meant their time branches had crossed. Someone or something had forced him to meet the past version of his mentor.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
“This is a question I should be asking,” Ardalys replied, crossing his arms over his chest. “You… don’t belong here. Your shadow is too long; it wasn’t meant to be here yet.”
Emiren tried to focus. If this was truly the past Ardalys, then he had no knowledge of the War of the Creators, of his death. But could he change this? Should he?
The Voice of the Garden
The wind swept across the platform, and it seemed as if the Garden itself whispered into his mind: “Don’t break the branch if you don’t know where it will fall.”
It was a reminder. His trial was not to change the past, but to understand it.
“I’m searching for an answer,” he said carefully, choosing his words. “You think I shouldn’t be here. But you will come here someday. And you will have to choose.”
“Choose…” Ardalys pondered. “What if I have already made it?”
These words struck Emiren. He remembered how the older Ardalys had told him that a choice was not always a moment, but a process stretching across eons.
A Vision of the Past
Suddenly, the world around them began to change. The stone platform melted away, and they found themselves in a vast hall, illuminated by hundreds of floating lanterns. On the walls, golden symbols flickered and changed every second, like pulsing veins of time.
This was the archive of the Creators—the place where all the branches of history were stored.
“You didn’t come here just for answers, but for the truth,” Ardalys said, running his hand across the wall. It responded to him, and on the smooth surface, a vision appeared:
They saw themselves. But not here. Another world, another moment. Emiren stood among the ruins of the Eternal Garden, and before him lay Ardalys—old, exhausted, with a deep wound in his chest.
“You shouldn’t…” the old Ardalys whispered in the vision.
The young Ardalys looked at it, just as stunned as Emiren.
“What is this?” he asked quietly.
“This is the future,” Emiren replied.
A Choice Yet Unmade
The hall fell silent. The vision faded, but its echo lingered in the air.
“So, I die?” Ardalys asked.
“I don’t know. It’s one possible outcome. But now that you’ve seen it, you can make a different choice.”
Ardalys smiled.
“That’s the paradox, Emiren. If I change the choice, you will never come here. And this conversation will never happen.”
“But it already has.”
They both understood that they had just broken the law of time. Now that the young Ardalys knew about his potential death, he would act differently. But that could also mean he would do something worse.
The Garden Reacts
Suddenly, the space trembled. The symbols on the walls began to blur as though someone was erasing the very fabric of reality.
“We’ve broken the balance!” Ardalys shouted.
Emiren realized that their presence here had been noticed by the forces that stand above the Creators themselves. If they didn’t fix this, this time branch could vanish, swallowing them both.
“We have to leave!” he exclaimed, but Ardalys held his hand.
“No. We must fix this.”
Emiren didn’t know which frightened him more: the fact that the Garden would now erase them, or that Ardalys would act knowing his future.
And what will he choose?
The world shattered into pieces.