The tower appeared on the horizon like a stone finger pointing at a cloudy sky that seemed about to collapse over us. There were no visible doors, no regular windows—only small circular openings distributed in a spiral, as if the structure itself were breathing. And it truly was breathing — I could see slight vibrations on its surface, as if something pulsed within it, reminiscent of the sensation the first artifact had left in Liriel's hands.
"This is it," she said, tucking the grimoire under her arm. "The Inverted Lens is in this tower. And it doesn't like visitors."
"As if anything in this city did," Vespera muttered.
Rai'kanna stepped closer, studying the dark stone wall. "The tower rotates. Not fast enough to notice immediately, but enough to change everything inside if we hesitate."
Elara ran her hand along the surface. "This doesn't feel like ordinary stone."
"It isn't," Liriel replied. "It's a material called lucid-stone. Ancient. Very ancient."
Lyannis tilted her head. "Is it… alive?"
"In a way," Liriel answered. "And very intelligent."
The tower trembled slightly when we took the first step toward it, as if reacting to our presence. The flame inside me grew restless — not aggressive, but constantly alert.
"Takumi," Vespera called, "does your flame always act like this when we get close to these things?"
"It reacts to something within the city," I replied. "I don't know what."
"If I had to guess," Elara commented, "the city reacts back."
Rai'kanna beat her wings once. "Enough theory. The sun is setting. If this tower changes more at night, we can't wait."
"But how do we get in?" I asked.
The tower itself answered. The surface in front of us opened as if two massive plates were separating, revealing a circular door that hadn't existed before.
"It's an invitation," said Liriel.
"Or a trap," Vespera corrected.
"In either case," I said, "we need to go in."
We entered.
The interior was vast — more than it should have been. The floor had a soft sheen, like wet obsidian. Light seemed to bend along the walls, creating reflections that didn't belong there. A corridor stretched upward in a spiral, climbing the tower at a gentle angle.
The door behind us closed.
Rai'kanna took a deep breath. "From here on, stay alert. This won't be simple."
We climbed slowly.
At first, it seemed like a normal corridor, but little by little the details changed. Walls that had once been smooth now carried spiral patterns. Shadows began to stretch in directions different from ours. At one point, I heard my own footsteps coming from behind — even though I knew no one was there.
Lyannis stopped, frightened. "There's… there's something following us."
Elara turned. "It's not something. It's the tower. It echoes what it wants to show."
Vespera rolled her eyes. "Great. Now even the walls have personality."
Liriel examined one of the distorted reflections. "These echoes… are fragments of possibilities the tower has already recorded. But some of them aren't from the past."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
She pointed to a shadow that looked like me. But it wasn't my posture. Nor my gaze.
"Some are projections of what it expects to happen."
The flame inside me burned stronger. It didn't like that.
We kept climbing.
The change came on the third stretch of corridor. The passage, which had been spiraling upward, began to rotate around us as if we were inside a massive gear. The horizon tilted left, then right, without warning.
"Careful!" Rai'kanna grabbed Lyannis by the arm when she almost slipped.
"This is insane!" Vespera complained. "It's actually spinning!"
"No," said Liriel, focused. "We're the ones being spun."
The sensation was unsettling. The floor seemed to lose part of its support with each step. The walls twisted in small undulations. The tower was testing us. Learning about us.
"It changed again," Elara said, noticing the corridor now split into two directions.
"The initial structure indicated there was only one route," Liriel murmured. "That's bad."
"Which way?" I asked.
The flame in my chest trembled slightly when I looked at the path on the right.
"That one," I replied.
"The right one?" Rai'kanna raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure?"
"No. But the flame is."
"Then we follow it," Rai'kanna concluded, trusting without hesitation.
We entered the corridor on the right.
We quickly realized that something was absurdly wrong.
The corridor had no ceiling.
Or rather, it did… but it was underneath us.
Gravity was inverted in some sections, but not entirely. It was as if each step could turn our world upside down. The walls undulated as if they were breathing, and the sound of our footsteps distorted, growing sharper the farther we advanced.
Vespera touched a wall on impulse. She immediately recoiled.
"This… it moved!"
Elara analyzed it. "It feels like muscle. The tower is… alive."
Liriel commented without lifting her head from the grimoire. "It's part machine, part magical construction, part entity. This wasn't made to be understood. It was made to protect the Inverted Lens."
Lyannis pointed toward the end of the corridor. "There!"
A soft blue light pulsed behind a circular door that contrasted with the chaotic environment. The door looked stable, firm, as if it were the only point in the tower that remained unchanged.
We approached.
The door opened by itself, revealing a circular chamber completely different from the rest of the structure. The walls were clear, smooth, made of a translucent material that resembled glass. At the center, suspended by threads of light, was the Inverted Lens.
It was a crystalline disc the size of a palm, yet it seemed to contain something far greater within it — as if a folded universe were encapsulated there.
Liriel approached carefully. "It's sensitive. We can't touch it directly."
The flame inside me vibrated strongly. The lens reacted immediately to my heat, intensifying its glow.
Rai'kanna noticed. "Takumi, stay back. If it reacts too much—"
"No," Liriel said, surprised. "It's recognizing him. He's the key to removing it from here."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
Liriel explained quickly. "The tower alters its structure to prevent theft. But all its defenses were designed considering a specific type of energy. Your flame… didn't exist when this tower was created. It has no defense against that."
The lens glowed as if it had understood the statement.
I took a deep breath and stepped forward.
Each step made the room tremble slightly. The walls changed color, from blue to white, from white to gold. When I extended my hand, I felt no resistance — only familiar warmth, like touching the lukewarm water of a spring.
The Inverted Lens detached from the threads of light and settled gently into my hand.
At that exact moment, the tower changed.
The floor vibrated. The walls roared. The corridor behind us began to close like teeth.
"We have to get out NOW!" Vespera shouted.
Rai'kanna spread her wings. "Takumi, move!"
We ran through the unstable corridor, dodging walls that folded inward and a floor that tilted unpredictably. At one point, the ceiling became the floor and the floor became the ceiling, but the tower ejected us as if expelling something unwanted.
When we crossed the initial doorway, it closed behind us with a deep, metallic sound.
The tower stopped rotating.
And became… quiet.
Breathing slowly.
Rai'kanna looked at me. "Did you get it?"
I raised my hand.
The lens shimmered with inverted reflections — showing a city that existed… inside out.
Liriel examined the object with a gleam in her eyes. "It's the second artifact. And… it seems it didn't like being trapped there for so long."
Vespera craned her neck to look. "It's showing things… strange things."
Lyannis stepped closer. "Is that… the city?"
"Yes," I replied. "But not this city."
The flame inside me pulsed as if it had recognized something within the lens.
And that meant only one thing:
The Labyrinth City hid far more truths than we had imagined.