The old man took a slow step forward, his pale eyes locking onto Nate's. "Co with ," he said, his voice no longer carrying that ancient, rigid tone. It was still deep, still heavy with wisdom, but now it was more… human. More familiar.
Nate hesitated for a mont, glancing at Alice—still frozen in place—before shifting his gaze back to the old man. He clenched his fists, his mind still spinning from everything he had just heard. He wasn't ready for more, but sothing told him he had no choice.
The old man raised a withered hand, and the air itself seed to ripple. A door—if it could even be called that—ford out of nothing. It wasn't a door made of wood or stone, nor was it one of those glowing portals he had seen before. This one was pure white light, a perfect rectangle floating in midair. It stretched endlessly, yet sohow, it remained contained within the space before them.
Beyond the doorway was… nothing. Just an empty expanse of glowing whiteness.
Nate swallowed, his throat suddenly dry. "What's on the other side?"
The old man simply turned and stepped through.
For a split second, Nate considered turning around, walking away from all of this, pretending none of it was real. But then he reminded himself—he had already fallen too deep. There was no turning back now. With a steadying breath, he stepped forward and crossed the threshold.
The sensation was imdiate and overwhelming.
The ground beneath his feet vanished. There was no weight, no resistance, no sense of direction. He was floating, suspended in an endless void. The air around him was thick yet weightless, and when he looked down, he nearly choked on his own breath.
Beneath him stretched an entire world.
He could see everything, as though he was looking through the eyes of a god. It wasn't just a single village or a small piece of land—it was the entire Earth, but not as he knew it.
The world below was ancient. Cities built from stone and wood sprawled across vast landscapes. Humans moved about, their clothes woven from natural fabrics, their lives devoid of the technology he had always taken for granted. There were no cars, no skyscrapers, no glowing billboards. It was a civilization untouched by modern advancents, living in what seed to be perfect harmony with nature.
Nate turned his hands over, noticing for the first ti that they were slightly translucent. He wasn't physically here—this was so kind of vision. A mory, maybe.
He turned to the old man floating beside him. "What is this?"
"The past," the old man said simply.
Nate looked back down. At first, everything seed peaceful. The humans went about their lives, farming, hunting, building. But then, sothing changed.
The animals.
At first, they were normal—wolves, bears, birds, even massive elephants roaming the wilds. But then… they started to change.
Nate's breath caught in his throat as he watched the transformation unfold in real-ti. The animals grew. Their bodies twisted and shifted, their muscles thickening, their eyes glowing with unnatural intelligence. A wolf doubled in size, its claws extending into razor-sharp talons. A bear rose onto its hind legs, its fur hardening into sothing resembling armor. Even the birds, once harmless, beca massive creatures with wingspans that could block out the sun.
They weren't just getting bigger. They were evolving—becoming sothing new, sothing terrifying.
And the humans?
They weren't ready.
Screams echoed from the ground below. Entire villages were wiped out in a single night. Armies tried to fight back, but their weapons—re spears and arrows—were useless against beasts that were faster, stronger, and impossibly intelligent. The earthlings were powerless.
Nate clenched his fists. He had always believed humans were the dominant species, but here—right in front of his eyes—he was witnessing the exact opposite. They were prey.
The old man's voice cut through his thoughts. "They had no choice."
Nate turned his head slightly. "What do you an?"
The old man's gaze remained fixed on the scene below. "In their desperation, they did sothing they were never ant to do. They reached beyond their world."
As he spoke, Nate saw it happening.
The remaining humans—priests, scholars, leaders—gathered in a massive circle, deep in a cavern lit by hundreds of flickering torches. They stood around an enormous stone tablet, carved with strange symbols that pulsed with dark energy.
They were performing a ritual.
A pit ford in Nate's stomach as he realized what they were about to do.
"They made contact," the old man continued, his voice heavy with aning. "With a civilization beyond their own."
A blinding flash erupted from the cavern, and a portal tore open in the fabric of reality. The sheer force of it sent the gathered humans staggering backward, their robes billowing in the windless void.
And then… he stepped through.
A man.
Or at least, he looked like a man.
He was tall, his posture regal, his expression unreadable. His clothing was unlike anything Nate had ever seen, woven from dark fabrics that shimred like liquid tal. His features were sharp, his skin pale, his dark hair flowing past his shoulders.
But it was his third eye that set him apart.
Right in the center of his forehead, above his other two eyes, was a third eye—glowing with a deep, swirling blue light.
Nate felt his stomach tighten as he took a slow breath.
The old man finally turned to look at him. "That man you see, the one who stepped through that portal—he is your ancestor."
Nate's breath hitched. His body tensed.
The old man continued. "The Koryathans were a mighty race. Powerful beyond asure. But their world was dying. They were on the brink of extinction." He turned his gaze back to the scene below. "So the earthlings made a deal."
Nate swallowed hard.
"The Koryathans would lend their strength. They would fight the beasts, reclaim the land, restore balance. And in return?" The old man paused, letting the weight of his words settle. "They would share the Earth."
The vision before them remained frozen in ti, the mont the deal was made hanging in the air like an unspoken warning.
Nate's heartbeat thundered in his chest.
Everything he thought he knew about history—about Earth, about humanity, about himself—was crumbling.
The old man lifted his hand once more, and the world beneath them shifted like a painting being wiped clean. The past unraveled and rewove itself, forming a new scene before Nate's eyes.
Now, the Earth was a battlefield.
The Koryathans stood at the forefront, facing monstrous creatures that had grown even more terrifying. The beasts had fully evolved—massive, grotesque things with armored hides, glowing eyes, and razor-sharp limbs that could tear through stone like paper. They moved with unnatural intelligence, their roars shaking the sky.
And yet, the Koryathans did not falter.
Nate watched, completely entranced, as the three-eyed beings fought with power beyond anything he had ever imagined. One Koryathan exhaled a column of fire from his mouth, engulfing a hulking beast in flas so intense that even the ground lted beneath it. Another raised his hands, and the very air crackled as lightning erupted from the sky, striking down waves of advancing creatures. Others manipulated the elents—so froze their enemies in jagged ice, so called upon the wind to form slicing gales, and others shattered the earth itself, sending shockwaves that tore through the battlefield.
They were like gods walking among mortals.
The humans, anwhile, stood back.
They watched in awe, in terror, in fascination. They did not lift a single weapon to help. They did not fight alongside their supposed allies. They simply observed as the Koryathans burned through their own strength, exhausting their abilities, depleting their resources—all for a planet that was not theirs.
And then, at last, the battle was over.
The beasts fell. Their enormous bodies lay motionless across the lands, so still smoldering from fire, others frozen in ice. Silence fell over the world.
The Koryathans had won.
But at a cost.
They were weak now—drained, vulnerable. Many had perished, their bodies reduced to dust from the sheer power they had unleashed. The few who remained could barely stand.
And that was when the humans turned on them.
Nate's breath caught in his throat as the scene below changed again. He saw a gathering—hundreds of humans in a grand eting hall, their faces serious, calculating. He saw their lips move, and though he could not hear them, he already knew what they were saying.
They were afraid.
Afraid of the Koryathans' power. Afraid that, if allowed to stay, these mighty beings might one day decide to rule instead of coexist.
And so they made a decision.
They would break their deal.
Nate's stomach twisted in disgust as he watched the humans enact their plan. They did not attack the Koryathans outright—not when they were still dangerous, even in their weakened state. Instead, they stole sothing.
A small, unassuming artifact.
The Seal of Arkhara.
The old man's voice cut through the heavy silence. "It was the heart of their civilization. A sacred relic that controlled the balance of their world's energy."
Nate watched as the humans, now in possession of the seal, perford a ritual of their own—one stolen from the very beings they had betrayed.
The ground beneath the Koryathans trembled. A swirling force surrounded them, an invisible pull dragging them toward the heavens. Their screams of rage and betrayal echoed through the skies as they were torn from the Earth, sent hurtling back to their dying howorld.
The humans had won, not with strength, but with deception.
And the Koryathans?
They were trapped.
The seal was too powerful to be destroyed, so the humans did the next best thing. They broke it into four pieces and hid them across the universe.
"Two pieces were hidden on Earth," the old man continued, his voice heavy with sorrow. "One was placed on this island, buried deep within its heart." His pale eyes flickered with sothing unreadable. "And the fourth… its location remains unknown to this day."
Nate felt his hands curl into fists. His mind was spinning, his emotions a tangled ss of shock, anger, and confusion.
The humans had erased this history. There was no ntion of it in the textbooks, no records of their battle, no acknowledgnt of the betrayal. The Earth had stolen its peace—stolen its very survival—from those who had sacrificed everything for it.
The old man exhaled slowly and then, with a final wave of his hand, the vision faded.
Nate blinked, disoriented, as he found himself back inside the icy palace. The cold air pressed against his skin, the mories of what he had just witnessed still burning in his mind.
The old man turned to face him, his gaze piercing.
"When the Koryathans were exiled," he said, "one among them escaped."
Nate's breath hitched. Discover more stories at My Virtual Library Empire
The old man's expression was unreadable as he spoke the final words.
"That one… was your father."
****
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