The temple was not built beneath the sea.
The sea had grown around it.
Like flesh around a forgotten wound.
As Astraeus crossed the broken entrance, the water around him shifted unnaturally — not with waves, but with recognition. The current slowed near his body, circling him in quiet spirals as though the ocean itself were studying the shape of his existence.
Behind him, Lian remained silent.
For the first time since entering the drowned city, he no longer looked like someone guiding a traveler.
He looked like someone returning to a grave.
The temple corridors stretched endlessly downward.
Walls of black stone pulsed faintly beneath layers of dark water, covered in ancient fractures that resembled veins beneath skin. Every surface reflected fragments of movement that did not belong to the present.
Shadows walking.
Doors opening.
Figures kneeling beside oceans that no longer existed.
Astraeus touched the wall lightly.
And the temple responded.
A memory exploded inside his mind.
A shoreline beneath a dead blue sky.
Children running through shallow water.
A distant tower collapsing into the sea.
Then—
A scream.
Not loud.
Not human.
His hand pulled away instantly.
The vision disappeared.
But the feeling remained inside his chest.
Lian finally spoke.
"The temple records everything."
His voice echoed strangely beneath the water.
"Not events."
A pause.
"Regrets."
The path widened ahead into a vast circular chamber.
And there—
at the center—
stood the door.
It towered over the sea floor like the remains of something worshipped long before civilization learned language. Black metal merged with stone and crystal, its surface shifting slowly like liquid trapped between realities.
Three glowing lines moved across the door continuously.
Not written.
Alive.
1. He who saw himself drown twice
2. He who left his shadow upon the water
3. He who heard his own voice… too late
Astraeus felt the Origin Seed react instantly.
A violent pulse struck through his chest.
The blue light inside the Seed flickered once—
then dimmed.
The chamber darkened with it.
Behind him, the water suddenly became still.
Too still.
No current.
No movement.
No sound.
Even the sea itself seemed to stop breathing.
Then Astraeus saw it.
His reflection.
Not on the door.
In the water beneath his feet.
But something was wrong.
The reflection did not move with him.
When he turned his head—
it turned two seconds later.
When he lifted his hand—
it followed afterward.
Slow.
Delayed.
Watching him.
Lian stepped backward immediately.
Fear crossed his face for the first time.
"Astraeus…"
His voice lowered.
"Do not let it speak."
But the reflection was already smiling.
And Astraeus realized something horrifying.
He had not smiled.
The reflection slowly raised its head.
Its eyes were darker than his own.
Older.
Filled with exhaustion that no human should carry.
Then it spoke.
"Do not open the door."
The voice was identical to his.
Not similar.
Not distorted.
His voice.
But older.
Like something speaking from the end of his own life.
Astraeus froze.
The chamber trembled softly.
The sea around the temple began pulling inward toward the door in silent spirals.
Lian moved forward suddenly.
"You don't understand what this place is."
His breathing had changed.
Uneven.
Shaking.
"The First Sin awakened the memory."
He stared directly at the door now.
"But this…"
The reflection beneath Astraeus slowly reached toward the surface of the water from below.
"…this awakens what memory tried to bury."
The Seed pulsed again.
Harder.
And for one terrible moment—
Astraeus heard another sound inside the chamber.
A heartbeat.
Not his own.
Something alive beyond the door.
Waiting.
The reflection whispered again.
"Walk away."
But Astraeus' body moved anyway.
Not controlled.
Not forced.
Drawn.
His hand slowly reached toward the surface of the ancient door.
The moment his fingers touched it—
the water cracked.
Not metaphorically.
Actually cracked.
Like glass splitting across reality itself.
Lines of fracture exploded through the sea in every direction.
The chamber screamed.
The ocean split open around them like a wounded memory tearing itself apart.
Lian collapsed to one knee instantly, clutching his chest as black veins spread beneath his skin.
Astraeus turned sharply.
"Lian!"
But Lian barely looked human anymore.
His eyes trembled with something deeper than pain.
Recognition.
"No…"
He stared at the altar beside the door.
"No… not again…"
The altar had awakened.
A single object rested upon it now.
A heart.
Broken cleanly through the center.
Still moving.
Still beating weakly beneath layers of dark seawater.
Astraeus felt cold spread through his entire body.
Because he recognized it.
Not the face.
Not the memory.
The feeling.
That unbearable emptiness surrounding it.
Lian slowly stood.
And when he spoke again—
his voice no longer belonged to the guide Astraeus had followed across the drowned world.
It belonged to someone ancient.
Someone guilty.
"This…"
He looked toward the altar with hollow eyes.
"…is the second sin."
The sea exploded.
Not outward.
Inward.
The water collapsed into fractures of floating memory, pieces of oceans suspended in midair like shattered mirrors reflecting different moments across time.
Astraeus staggered backward as visions flooded the chamber.
A city burning beneath the sea.
A child standing alone beside a black gate.
Lian screaming someone's name.
A shadow falling endlessly into blue light.
Then—
the Origin Seed vanished.
Gone.
Completely.
The light inside Astraeus' chest disappeared so suddenly he nearly collapsed.
Darkness consumed the chamber.
One second.
Two.
Three.
The silence became unbearable.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Then—
the Seed returned.
But it was no longer blue.
Astraeus stared at it in horror.
The light now carried a color he could not describe completely.
Not red.
Not black.
Something deeper.
The color of endings.
The color of the final moment before something disappears forever.
Even the temple reacted to it.
The walls trembled violently.
The sea retreated from Astraeus instinctively.
As if afraid.
Then the reflection beneath him changed again.
Another figure slowly appeared beside his mirrored self.
A girl.
Young.
Pale.
Half-hidden beneath the distortion of water.
Her face flickered like a memory struggling to survive.
But her eyes—
Astraeus recognized them instantly.
Though he did not know why.
The girl looked directly at him.
Not at the reflection.
At him.
And through the breaking sea, through the collapsing chamber, through the screams of memory surrounding the temple—
she whispered one word.
"Wait."
Then she vanished.
And the door began to open.