The sun rose over the horizon, painting the sky in hues of soft violet and molten gold. The air felt different today—crisper, lighter, almost effervescent. The oppressive heaviness that had plagued the world during its "fever" was gone, replaced by a clean, vibrant energy that hummed just beneath the surface of perception.
For the vast majority of the population, the "Upheaval" caused by the Architect was already fading from a terrifying event into breakfast table conversation—something to discuss between bites of toast, safely relegated to the past.
In the bustling capital, a shopkeeper unlocked his door and paused on the threshold. Following an instinct he didn't quite understand, he took a deep breath and let the mana circulation pattern flow through him.
Warmth trickled through his chest, pleasant and soothing. The chronic ache in his lower back—his companion for the better part of a decade—eased to nothing.
"Huh," he grunted, opening his eyes. He flipped his sign to "OPEN" and grabbed his broom. "Nice trick."
Then he swept the dust off his porch, already thinking about the day's inventory.
Across the city, in quiet residential districts and sprawling farmlands, the scene repeated itself with minor variations. The world had fundamentally changed, yes. The potential to cultivate power was now accessible to anyone willing to dedicate their life to it.
But most people simply didn't care.
They were content.
They looked at the path of power—the grinding discipline, the mortal danger, the bone-deep uncertainty—and they politely declined. They wanted their tea warm, their beds soft, and their days blessedly predictable. They practiced the circulation method because it felt healthy, like a morning stretch or a brisk walk, but they had no ambition to become living legends.
They wanted peace.
The world felt chaotic enough already. For the mundane majority, the Architect's work was finished. The age of excitement was over, they believed, and a golden age of comfortable mediocrity had begun.
They had no idea that the man in question felt very differently about "comfortable mediocrity."
In the predawn silence, while the world embraced its collective contentment, the synchronization bar in the Architect's vision ticked over from 99% to 100%.
[Synchronization Complete.]
[World Mind Node: Ready for Activation.]
A smile touched his lips—cold, satisfied, and utterly without mercy.
The sun hung directly overhead, a blazing coin nailed to the center of an achingly blue sky. High noon—the hour of universal lethargy.
In the fields, farmers had retreated to the shade of ancient oaks to eat bread and cheese, wiping sweat from sunburned brows. In Diagon Alley, shops shuttered for the midday break, proprietors enjoying well-earned rest. Even the wind seemed to slow, respecting the world's collective desire for a moment of peaceful silence.
The world was taking a nap, lulled by warmth and the comfortable hum of newly stabilized mana.
Then, reality blinked.
It didn't happen in the sky. It didn't manifest on any screen or scrying glass. It happened inside the mind.
Simultaneously—across every continent, every ocean, and every hidden corner of the world—an overwhelming presence forced itself into the optical nerves of every sapient magical being.
Deep in a volcanic trench beneath the Carpathian Mountains, an Ancient Red Dragon who had slumbered for three centuries snapped its massive eyelids open. It didn't see the dark basalt walls of its hoard-cave. It saw an absolute void.
In the primordial depths of the Great Forest, a Silver-Backed Wolf, newly awakened to sapience by the rising mana density, stopped mid-hunt. Its ears flattened against its skull as the vision seized control.
Hidden in that same forest, concealed by ancient wards and deliberate obscurity, stood the World Tree—a colossus of living wood that touched the clouds. Atop its highest branch, a woman of impossible, ageless beauty felt her perpetual smile freeze as her vision went black. The elves, thought extinct by the outside world, were not immune to what came next.
And in the bustling square of the Black Market in Knockturn Alley, Rita Skeeter—infamous reporter and author of the caustic "Daily Truth" pamphlets—sat on a wrought-iron bench, enjoying an iced lemon tea.
The glass tumbler slipped from her fingers.
Smash.
Crystal shattered on ancient cobblestones, but she didn't hear it. She didn't feel the splash of cold liquid soaking through her expensive shoes. She toppled sideways off the bench, landing hard on the stones, her mouth falling open in shock, eyes wide and utterly unseeing.
She wasn't looking at the plaza anymore.
Like everyone else—from the Minister of Magic in his gilded office to the beggar huddled in the alley's darkest corner—she was staring into a pitch-black expanse projected directly onto her consciousness.
Out of that infinite darkness, a figure stepped forward.
He was shrouded in absolute black, a silhouette carved from the void itself. No skin was visible, no hair, no distinguishing features—save for one horrifying detail.
Where his eyes should have been, two vertical slits burned with cold, reptilian intensity.
Blue. Impossibly, luminously blue.
They were ancient. Predatory. Filled with a terrible intelligence that seemed to weigh and measure the soul of every single viewer simultaneously.
He simply stood there, occupying the center of the world's collective vision, commanding absolute attention through sheer presence alone.
Then, a voice echoed.
It bypassed the ears entirely, resonating directly against the inside of every skull—clear, undeniable, and somehow translated instantly into the native tongue of each listener. Whether they spoke the Queen's English, ancient Elvish, or the volcanic growl of Dragonspeak, the meaning was identical.
"I am the Architect."
The silence that followed was louder than thunder. The peaceful noon had not just been interrupted—it had been annihilated.
For the magical community of Britain, those four words were a spark landing in a powder keg.
Rita, still sprawled on the cobblestones, felt every drop of blood drain from her face. Glass shards from her shattered tumbler bit into her palm, drawing thin lines of crimson, but she didn't even flinch.
"It's him," someone whispered nearby, voice trembling. "Sweet Merlin, it's—"
"IT'S HIM!" a witch screamed, the cry tearing through the plaza like a curse.
Panic detonated. The peaceful afternoon transformed into a stampede. People clawed at their own eyes, desperately trying to scrub the image of the blue-eyed figure from their vision, but the silhouette remained fixed—unblinking, inescapable, absolute.
But outside the borders of human civilization, the reaction took a very different form.
Deep in the sulfurous heart of the volcanic trench, the Ancient Red Dragon roared—a sound that fractured the stone walls of its millennia-old lair and sent avalanches cascading down the mountainside above.
The Dragon thrashed, its massive spiked tail sweeping through mountains of accumulated gold coins, scattering centuries of plunder.
"GET OUT OF MY HEAD, LITTLE WORM!" the Dragon bellowed in the ancient tongue, breathing a torrent of white-hot fire at empty air.
The Silver-Backed Wolf threw back its head and howled, a sound filled with confusion and primal rage.
The woman atop the World Tree simply closed her eyes, her smile never wavering, though her knuckles whitened against the bark.
The chaotic symphony of screams, roars, whimpers, and curses did not faze the figure in black.
Then he spoke again, his voice overriding their internal monologues, dampening the rising hysteria with a crushing wave of cold authority.
"For centuries, you have been living on a corpse."
"The mana density of this planet has been in terminal decline. It has been hemorrhaging into the void, thinning with every generation, leaving you progressively weaker and more stagnant."
He paused, letting the statement sink into millions of minds simultaneously.
"I assume some of you noticed the rot. Surely, not all of you are so pathetically oblivious that you failed to see the world withering around you."
Among the human population, every Tier 3 magician stiffened. They had noticed. For the past fifty years, spells had grown weaker, ambient mana thinner, enchantments less stable. They had thought they were imagining it—or worse, that they were simply growing old and feeble.
In the volcanic trench, the Ancient Dragon went very still. The reason for its endless slumber suddenly crystallized with terrible clarity. It hadn't been laziness. It had been starvation.
The Architect's voice returned, sharper now, edged with something that might have been contempt.
"The mana circulation method I disseminated across this globe was designed to stitch the wound—to seal the leak that has been bleeding magic from your world since before your great-grandparents drew breath."
He raised one black-gloved hand, fingers splaying outward in a gesture both elegant and vaguely threatening.
"But you are not ready." The words carried absolute certainty. "You have forgotten how to swim. If I leave you as you are now, this new surge of power will not save you—it will drown you."
In the vision, the darkness behind him suddenly shifted. It wasn't empty void anymore. The blackness split and reformed into three distinct, colossal pillars of light that towered over the mental landscape of every viewer, impossibly vast and radiant.
He pointed to the first pillar—a swirling vortex of silver mist, filled with millions of overlapping, whispering voices.
"The Forum."
"Isolation is the death of progress. A breakthrough achieved in the frozen North will now be heard in the scorching South within heartbeats. Magical creatures will bargain with humans. Dragons will debate with scholars. Ideas will no longer die in the minds that birthed them—they will spread like wildfire across tinder-dry wood."
He pointed to the second pillar—a towering edifice of golden geometric blocks, infinite and perfectly ordered, stretching into an impossible distance.
"The Archive."
"Ignorance is no longer an excuse. Record your techniques. Upload your histories. Study the methods of masters you will never meet in flesh. If you seek to grow stronger, the path is now illuminated. If you wish to teach, your classroom now spans continents. Knowledge hoarded is knowledge wasted—and I will not tolerate waste."
Finally, he pointed to the third pillar—gleaming scales of justice wrought from pulsing emerald energy, perfectly balanced.
"The Exchange."
"Resources are distributed unevenly. Talent is squandered by circumstance. Here, value meets need with absolute efficiency. Alchemy ingredients, enchanted weapons, rare materials, forbidden secrets—all can be bought. All can be sold. Transactions are instantaneous. Neutrality is absolute. No politics. No prejudice. Only supply and demand."
The Architect lowered his hand deliberately. The three pillars blazed behind him like the foundations of a new civilization—a triumvirate of tools that could elevate the world or tear it apart.
"I offer you the tools of gods," he said quietly, and somehow that quiet was more terrifying than any shout. "How you choose to use them... is your test."
The vision began to fade, darkness encroaching from the edges like ink spreading through water. But just before the connection severed entirely, the Architect leaned forward.
His blue reptilian eyes filled the entire field of view—inescapable, all-seeing, utterly inhuman.
"The World Mind is online. Access has been granted."
His lips curved into something that might have been a smile.
"Don't disappoint me."
SNAP.
The projection vanished like a soap bubble bursting.
Rita gasped, sucking in a lungful of real air that tasted of cobblestones and spilled tea. The plaza around her was eerily silent. The screaming had stopped. Thousands of people were blinking rapidly, looking around with expressions of profound disorientation.
Then, a new sound began rippling through the crowd.
It was soft. Digital. A gentle ping that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere simultaneously.
In the corner of Rita's vision—and in the vision of the Dragon, the Wolf, the elves, and every other sapient being across the globe—a small, translucent icon pulsed with gentle invitation.
It was a simple, elegant rune that somehow conveyed infinite complexity.
[Connect?]
Rita stared at it, her journalist's instincts screaming at her.
Around her, people were already reaching out—some with trembling fingers, others with greedy eagerness.
She took a shuddering breath.
And pressed [Yes].
While the rest of the world frantically explored the Forum—posting variations of "Hello?" and "Is this real?" in a dozen languages—Alister stood in the quiet sanctuary of his study.
His new home was modest by his standards. Elegant, certainly, but not ostentatious. The study itself was lined with dark wood shelves, most still empty, waiting to be filled with knowledge worth keeping.
He adjusted his cuffs with mechanical precision. The public rollout was entirely automated. It required exactly zero percent of his attention.
"System," he murmured, addressing the empty air. "Filter the user database. Target criteria: Mana Core Tier 2 and above. Prioritize highest demonstrated intellect and magical aptitude."
[Scanning World Population...]
[847 Individuals Found.]
Alister's lips curved slightly. "Create a private channel. Invite the qualifying individuals I selected. Force the connection—make it impossible to decline or ignore."
[Creating Private Channel: "The Apex"]
[Sending Mandatory Invitations...]
Across the world, in towers and hovels, forests and caves, specific individuals froze mid-action.
The public Forum interface vanished from their vision instantly, replaced by a sleek window of burnished gold that radiated an aura of undeniable authority.
There was no "Decline" button. No option to ignore or dismiss.
The message was simple and absolute:
[You have been added to "The Apex".]
The chat space was pristine white, empty for precisely one heartbeat. Then, the first message materialized in elegant, shimmering script that somehow conveyed the writer's tone perfectly.
[Albus Dumbledore]: How... interesting.
Almost immediately, a second name appeared beneath it in darker, sharper lettering.
[Gellert Grindelwald]: Oh, Albus. It's been far too long.
The tension crackling between those two lines alone was enough to make the metaphysical space feel smaller, more dangerous. Two ancient rivals, arguably the most powerful mages of the previous era, reunited in the most bizarre manner imaginable.
A third name appeared, the text trembling slightly with barely suppressed anxiety.
[Horace Slughorn]: Is this... have we passed on? Is this the afterlife?
[Severus Snape]: Don't be absurd, Horace. This is clearly a mental projection utilizing the World Mind infrastructure. Were you not paying attention to the Architect's explanation?
[Nicolas Flamel]: Fascinating. The magical signature on this construct... it's drawing power directly from the planetary mana itself. The theoretical framework required to achieve this is... extraordinary.
[Newt Scamander]: My creatures saw him too. The man with the blue eyes. Even the Obscurials reacted. They were terrified.
[Minerva McGonagall]: Mr. Scamander, where precisely are you keeping Obscurials?
[Newt Scamander]: That's... rather beside the point at the moment, Minerva.
Alister watched the text scroll past in real-time, leaning casually against his mahogany desk, a glass of wine in one hand.
His smile widened fractionally.
Then his name appeared in the chat—rendered in absolute black that seemed to drink in the surrounding light, overriding the gold completely.
Every other conversation ceased instantly. The chat went deathly still.
Architect: You represent the finest minds currently breathing on this planet. The individuals most capable of understanding what comes next.
In his study, Alister swirled his wine thoughtfully, watching reactions appear in real-time.
Architect: But make no mistake—I did not gather you for pleasant conversation or mutual admiration. You are here because you noticed the mana depletion when others remained oblivious. You are here because you possess the capacity to comprehend the magnitude of what I have done... and what must be done next.
[Gellert Grindelwald]: And what comes next, Herr Architect? Another war? A culling? A glorious revolution?
[Albus Dumbledore]: Gellert, perhaps we should listen before making assumptions.
[Gellert Grindelwald]: Oh, Albus. Still so cautious. Still so afraid of what must be done.
Architect: Your old grievances bore me.
The text appeared in letters three times the normal size, silencing both legendary wizards instantly.
Architect: What comes next is simple. Evolution... or extinction. The choice, as always, is yours.
Architect: But choose quickly. The world is changing faster than you realize.
Architect: And I have very little patience for those who cannot keep pace.
Alister set down his wine glass with a soft clink, watching their responses with the detached interest
(END OF CHAPTER)
"Can't wait to see what Alister does next?
You don't have to wait! I am currently 10 chapters ahead on Patreon.
Link: patreon.com/xxSUPxx
Or you can buy me a coffee at:
buymeacoffee.com/xxSUPxx
special thanks to all my EPIC members and,
MYTH: Asaf Montgomery
MYTH: Dutchviking
MYTH: Robert Hernandez
MYTH: Kevin Boutte jr.
MYTH: Philip Sl*tz