God's Tree

The landscape twisted around them.

Up was no longer up. The air shifted temperature every few steps. They moved forward, but each time Argolaith glanced behind them, the path had changed—no longer a winding bridge of obsidian, but a stairwell of stars descending into black fog. free𝑤ebnovel.com

The Gate wasn't just bending reality.

It was rearranging memory.

Argolaith stayed in the center of the group, his senses stretched thin, the cube in his storage ring pulsing in slow, measured beats. He hadn't called it out. Not yet.

It was watching, just as he was.

They approached a fork in the floating terrain.

To the left, a staircase that twisted through an orchard of trees with eyeless faces on their trunks, each tree weeping ink.

To the right, a corridor of mirror-shards, flickering with glimpses of impossible futures.

The ruined temple lay beyond both.

"Right," Ren said. "Clean footing. More predictable."

Caelene glanced toward the orchard. "And less alive."

Argolaith narrowed his eyes.

Both paths led forward—but only one felt quiet.

And that was the problem.

Still, they turned right.

The mirrored path wasn't long, but it was dizzying.

Each shard reflected fragments of the group. Myra's reflection whispered things she didn't say. Zephion's showed his familiar turned to stone. Varen's arm appeared wounded in one reflection, then missing in another.

Argolaith's own reflection?

It didn't move.

It just watched him walk by.

And then it smiled.

He didn't.

That's when the screaming started.

Kier, who had been watching the rear, shouted.

"STOP!"

They turned.

Behind them stood another Kier.

Identical in build, gear, and expression—except his eyes were solid black and his smile was… wrong. Too wide. Too certain.

The real Kier stood in the center of the group, his shield raised.

"Don't let it speak," Sorien warned. "If it mimics your voice—"

"—then it'll become harder to tell who's real."

They all turned. The echo Kier had spoken—perfectly copying Sorien's voice.

Then Varen attacked.

He moved like lightning, his halberd sweeping through the air and cleaving through the echo in one devastating strike.

The copy didn't block.

It didn't flinch.

It just smiled until the blade tore through it.

The moment it fell—

It dissolved into smoke.

But the smoke didn't dissipate.

It twisted upward, and from it rose another form—this one shaped like Calla, runes dancing across her sleeves.

"It's copying us faster now," Argolaith muttered.

Myra gritted her teeth. "It's not just illusions. It's learning."

The group formed into a tighter circle. Ren barked quick directions, Caelene flicked her fingers to cast warding lines around their feet.

Argolaith reached into his coat.

The cube formed in the air beside him, now the size of a small shield.

"We don't need to fight these." His voice cut through the tension.

The others looked at him.

"We need to outrun them."

Caelene arched an eyebrow. "Outrun ourselves?"

"They'll keep replicating until we believe in the wrong one. Then they'll replace us."

He stepped forward.

The cube floated ahead of him now, humming with dark pressure.

One of the copies—this time Ren's—stepped from a nearby mirror shard and raised its weapon.

Argolaith's cube pulsed once.

The air warped.

And the echo shattered—ripped apart into motes of magic, drained and compressed into raw mana that funneled into the cube and then into Argolaith's veins.

He didn't flinch.

Didn't blink.

The others stared.

The real Ren muttered, "…he just unmade it."

"That wasn't a spell," Calla whispered. "That was… consumption."

Argolaith exhaled slowly.

"Keep moving. Don't fight your reflections. Don't speak to them."

He turned back toward the path, his cube rotating silently beside him.

Caelene hesitated a beat before following, her voice quieter this time.

"…You're not just a variable," she said under her breath. "You're a fracture."

Argolaith didn't respond.

But the cube pulsed again.

And ahead, the temple glowed—closer now.

Waiting.

The group moved in silence now.

Even the occasional banter between Varen and Sorien had faded. Every footstep was measured, every breath calculated. The warped world around them bent and flexed like it was waiting—watching.

The floating temple ahead pulsed in the air like a heartbeat made of fractured stone and failing stars.

But they wouldn't reach it yet.

Not before the Gate tried again.

They stopped at a sheltered pocket of twisted terrain—a shallow basin surrounded by hovering rocks and inert mana-glass trees. Though the sky still bled like a bruised storm above them, it was as safe a place as any to regroup.

"We rest here," Ren said, his voice low. "Ten minutes. Check your gear."

Varen sank down, muttering to himself while checking the coils on his halberd.

Velka lay down with her eyes half-open, already slipping into a light dream-state.

Myra paced.

Argolaith didn't sit.

He stood near the edge of the basin, his cube hovering beside him, turning slowly. Its shape was slightly changed now—more like a ringed sphere than a cube, its surface shifting as if it were adapting again.

He noticed something.

A flicker.

Too fast. Too small.

But wrong.

He turned, scanning the group.

All twelve were there.

But…

Something was off.

Caelene sat on a raised ledge near the center, her arms crossed, her silver cloak fluttering softly in the windless air.

Argolaith watched her carefully.

Then slowly approached.

"You're quiet."

She glanced at him. "Thinking."

It was the right tone. The right cadence.

But it didn't match her rhythm.

She'd been cold, sharp, layered in precision. But this Caelene's voice was a little too smooth. Too neutral.

He didn't show any reaction.

Just nodded.

"You said earlier I was a fracture."

"Yes."

Still too even.

He took a small step closer.

"Say it again."

She blinked once. "You're a fracture."

No shift in tone. No emphasis.

That's when he knew.

She'd never repeat herself exactly.

He turned away calmly and walked back toward the group.

"Ren," he called softly. "How many times have you checked our count?"

Ren didn't hesitate. "Thirteen. I do it every two minutes."

"Do it again."

Ren scanned the basin, his eyes flashing with perceptive magic.

Then he froze.

"Fourteen."

Weapons were drawn immediately.

Sorien spun, casting mirror-veil around the camp.

"Which one?"

Argolaith didn't look at Caelene.

He looked at the real one, who was walking back from a recon pass on the far side of the basin.

Her cloak was torn on the edge.

The one on the rock ledge?

Untouched.

Ren reacted instantly. "MOVE!"

The group scattered as a blast of silver fire erupted from the imposter Caelene, who now stood with both arms raised, mouth open wider than humanly possible. Her skin cracked, glowing with raw stolen mana.

"She's going nova!" Kier shouted, throwing a barrier up.

But Argolaith stepped forward.

His cube spiraled, spinning fast, faster—

Then it launched like a spear.

It didn't strike.

It absorbed.

The moment it touched the mimic, the energy collapsed inward, and the imposter shrieked in a voice that sounded like glass breaking underwater.

Then she was gone.

Vaporized.

And the cube grew stronger.

Argolaith recalled it slowly, his eyes glowing faintly with the mana surge it gave back.

The real Caelene stopped at the edge of the group, expression stunned, cloak torn and blade drawn.

"…How long?" she asked.

Argolaith looked at her.

"She responded too politely."

A few of the others chuckled despite themselves, but the laughter didn't last.

Because now they knew.

The reflections weren't just mimicking.

They were learning who to copy…

…who to replace.

And maybe next time, they wouldn't be caught.