The staircase leading to Floor 18 was narrow, almost surgical in precision. Each step whispered verses from his own past—some he recognized, others felt borrowed, as if the Tower had begun scripting him into myths not yet lived.
When Veyne emerged onto the next floor, it was into chaos refined into ritual.
A grand cathedral stood at the center of a war-torn city. Pillars made of chained statues groaned with unseen pain. In the streets, robed figures paraded with severed tongues hung from their scepters. A choir of silenced voices echoed through the air—haunting, dissonant.
And above it all, hovering in a storm-wreathed sky: a throne of bone and glass, upon which sat a being wreathed in mirrored armor, face hidden behind a shifting mask that displayed all who had ever failed.
Revelation Dominion activated.
[Floor Type: Divine Influence Trial – False Ascension Zone]
[Objective: Refute the False Prophets. Survive the Feast.]
As he stepped forward, a procession approached.
Clerics with burned-out eyes.
Oracles who wept ink instead of tears.
A child dragging a crown of thorns too large for her head.
They spoke in unison:
"You are late to the feast, Veyne. Your seat grows cold."
"I didn't come to eat," he replied. "I came to end the banquet."
The crowd parted. At the cathedral gates, a massive table stretched out—hundreds of rotting nobles, warlords, and forgotten heroes sat eternally feasting. Their skin flaked off in sheets, their mouths stitched open to allow forced consumption.
One raised his goblet and croaked, "We are those who accepted the Tower's truth. We became prophecy."
Another: "Eat. Or be eaten."
The mirrored figure above raised its hand.
[The Herald of Reflection has noticed you.]
Reality shimmered.
The table turned. Veyne was now seated. A goblet in his hand. Before him: a plate of obsidian meat, steaming with his own regrets.
Revelation Instinct resisted the enchantment.
[Thorns of Self activated subconsciously.]
Spikes burst from the chair, fracturing the illusion.
He stood.
The guests screamed in anguish.
The Herald descended.
Its voice echoed not in sound, but certainty:
"You are prophecy unfulfilled. Let us write you properly."
It drew a sword made of broken futures and struck.
Veyne parried, barely. The force flung him backward through the cathedral doors.
Inside: a mural painted in blood and fire. It depicted Veyne on a throne, the Tower kneeling before him.
"Lies," he muttered.
The mural melted. From it burst his own image, garbed in divine robes, eyes blind, mouth open.
The False Veyne attacked.
He was fast. Every blow was prophetic—striking not where Veyne was, but where he would be.
Only by rejecting instinct did he survive. He moved against logic, against reflex. He let himself fall when his body screamed to rise. He stopped mid-blink to avoid a fatal cut.
He stabbed into the False Veyne's chest.
Instead of blood, prophecy spilled out.
And then he shall fall.
And rise again not as man, but god.
And all shall bow.
"Stop narrating me," he spat.
He unleashed Thorns of Self.
Memory-spears shattered the false image. The cathedral cracked. The feast table exploded in screams.
And from the sky, the Herald fell.
They clashed.
Steel against broken belief.
Each strike from the Herald erased a part of the world. A building disappeared. A name unremembered. A city undone.
But Veyne endured.
He wasn't prophecy.
He was resistance to it.
He dragged the Herald to the altar.
Stabbed his blade through its mask.
A thousand faces screamed at once.
Then silence.
The world reformed.
The feast ended.
The guests vanished.
Only the child with the thorn-crown remained. She approached and placed it gently at Veyne's feet.
"You did not feast," she whispered. "So you may now speak."
[Trial Complete – Divine Influence Refuted]
[New Passive Skill: Prophecybane – Immune to predictive magic. Causes all forced narrative effects to unravel over time.]
[Title Gained: Feastbreaker]
Veyne picked up the crown.
And crushed it in his fist.
He turned toward the next staircase, where the walls wrote nothing. Blank. Expectant.
He was finally off-script.