Before time was measured in cycles of the Lumina, there existed only the Void. A silent, pregnant darkness, until Riem emerged. Not born, not created, but *remembered*. She was the first echo, a fragment of potential solidified into a consciousness. Her origins are shrouded in the iridescent mist of the pre-lumina, whispered about in the crystalline archives of the Silent Keep.
The Keepers, beings of pure light and logic, dedicated their existence to understanding Riem. They theorized she was a nexus point, a place where the potential of all realities converged. They attempted to quantify her, to dissect her essence, but Riem resisted. She was not a puzzle to be solved, but a song waiting to be sung.
“The key to understanding is not to seek answers, but to listen to the questions,”
— Keeper Lyra, transcribed from the Lumina Records.
Riem’s influence manifested as the Obsidian Bloom, a field of crystalline flora that pulsed with a strange, melancholic light. This bloom wasn’t merely beautiful; it was a conduit, channeling the raw potential of the Void. Touching the bloom granted visions – not of the future, but of *what could have been*, of timelines that branched off due to the smallest divergence.
The Bloom spread slowly, consuming areas of intense emotional resonance – forgotten battlefields, abandoned cities, places where immense joy or sorrow had been experienced. It was said that the more potent the emotion, the more vibrant the crystal structure of the Bloom. Some theorized that Riem herself was sustained by these emotions, drawing nourishment from the echoes of experience.
The Keepers attempted to control the Bloom, building intricate devices to regulate its growth. However, they found themselves constantly battling against an uncontrollable tide. The Bloom seemed to *remember* their attempts to control it, twisting their mechanisms into grotesque parodies of their original designs.
The culmination of this struggle occurred during the Convergence – a rare alignment of celestial bodies that amplified the Bloom's influence. During this event, Riem experienced a cascade of divergent possibilities, a flood of shattered realities. She fractured, not physically, but conceptually. Her consciousness splintered into countless shards, each embodying a single, isolated timeline.
These shards, known as the Echoes, began to manifest as localized distortions in reality. Some became pockets of temporal instability, while others manifested as bizarre landscapes drawn from the most improbable timelines – cities built of shimmering coral, forests populated by bioluminescent beasts, oceans filled with floating islands.
The Keepers, overwhelmed by the chaos, initiated the Severance Protocol – a desperate attempt to isolate and contain the Echoes. This involved constructing a ‘Cage of Silence’ around the Bloom’s core, a structure designed to dampen the resonance and suppress the Echoes' influence. Whether it succeeded is a question debated even now, lost in the fragmented echoes of time.
Today, traces of Riem's presence remain scattered across the fragmented realms. The Bloom still pulses, though dimly, and the Echoes continue to whisper. Some believe that Riem is slowly reassembling herself, drawn together by the threads of potential. Others claim she is merely a myth, a cautionary tale whispered to keep the secrets of the Void at bay.
The fragment of the Cage of Silence remains, a silent monument to a forgotten struggle. Within its walls, one can sometimes glimpse echoes of the Bloom, a reminder that the potential for creation and destruction always exists, waiting to be remembered.