No door opens.
It unfolds.
Like a page being torn from a book no one is meant to read.
And Elóranth steps inside.
The air? Too quiet.
The floor? Made of shattered time.
Each level of the Tower holds a version of her.
Not illusions.
Not fakes.
But real echoes of her soul,
trapped in timelines that never crowned her.
Some kneel.
Some scream.
Some beg to be freed.
One smiles and lunges with a blade.
"You think you're the strongest?" this version hisses.
"I'm the one who burned the empire to dust."
They fight.
Not with fists, but with memory.
Every scar becomes a weapon.
Every regret, a flame.
And Elóranth wins not by striking back,
but by forgiving her.
The echo dissolves.
A floor vanishes.
Another level.
A younger Elóranth.
One who never awakened her power.
Who still cries when lightning cracks.
"Don't kill me," she whimpers.
"Without me, you lose your heart."
Elóranth doesn't lift a weapon.
She kneels.
Embraces her.
And whispers
"Thank you for surviving."
That one fades like morning mist.
By the seventh floor, she's weak.
Trembling.
But the worst comes last.
The final version of herself isn't angry.
Isn't afraid.
She's perfect.
Smiling.
Crowned.
Loved by the world.
Never made a mistake.
A version who never needed the Queen of Silence.
"If they could choose," this Elóranth says,
"They'd pick me."
"They didn't," Elóranth replies.
"Because I'm real.
I bleed. I crawl. I change."
And then she burns the perfect self
Not out of hatred.
But so the world never forgets that queens are forged in fire, not fantasy.
The Tower shatters.
Elóranth falls through silver light.
But she doesn't land alone.
She lands in the arms of Vireon.
Alive.
And in her mind?
The Queen is crying.
"You killed every version but me," the Queen whispers.
"No," Elóranth answers.
"I saved you.
Because you're the only one who taught me to be unbreakable."