In all my years—through ages of magic, war, and forgotten empires—I have seen many wonders, but none quite like the Clockwork Oracle of Eldrath.

A machine built by hands long turned to dust, powered by gears of unknown metal, and speaking in whispers of fate that no man or god could deny.

It did not predict the future.

It created it.

And those who sought its wisdom?

They were never quite the same afterward.

The Door That Shouldn’t Exist

There are places in this world that do not wish to be found.

Some are hidden behind oceans too deep to sail,
Some lie buried beneath the ruins of forgotten empires,
And some—like Eldrath’s Last Chamber—are simply not meant to exist at all.

And yet…

One day, I found myself standing before its door.

It was no ordinary door.

It was carved from a single slab of obsidian, covered in etchings that moved like flowing ink, pulsing with a faint golden light.

It was alive, in a way that no door should be.

And worse?

It was waiting for me.

The City That Vanished

Eldrath was once a thriving kingdom, a place where magic and invention walked hand in hand.

It was a city of clockwork wonders—streets lined with self-moving carriages, towers filled with floating lanterns, and machines that could write books without a scribe.

But one day…

It vanished.

Not destroyed.
Not abandoned.

Simply gone.

The land where Eldrath once stood became a wasteland of shifting sands, and no one remembered how, why, or when it disappeared.

Until now.

Because this door—this impossible door—stood exactly where Eldrath should have been.

And when I reached out, brushing my fingers against the stone…

It opened.

Not outward.
Not inward.

But as if the air itself had split apart.

And beyond it?

A city that should not exist.

The Machine That Knew My Name

I stepped through into Eldrath, and for the first time in a thousand years, the city breathed again.

The streets were empty, but the air hummed with distant whispers.

The buildings, untouched by time, loomed like silent guardians of a past that refused to be forgotten.

And at the heart of it all…

The Clockwork Oracle awaited.

It was massive, built into the core of a great temple, its body a mix of metal, stone, and something that shimmered like liquid time itself.

Its face was a single, glowing disc, an eye that turned toward me the moment I entered.

And then, in a voice that was neither human nor machine, it spoke my name.

“Merlin.”

The Prophecy That Wasn’t a Prophecy

I should have left.

But something in the way the Oracle spoke my name held me still.

“You have come,” it whispered, the gears of its body shifting with a sound like distant thunder.

“You seek answers. But know this—”

“I do not see the future.”

“I create it.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

The Oracle’s glowing eye pulsed, and suddenly—

The room around me changed.

I saw my own reflection, standing in a hundred different realities.

In one, I was a king.
In another, a shadow with no name.
In another still, I was gone entirely, as if I had never existed at all.

“Every choice you make, every path you walk… I forge the echoes of what could be.”

“I do not predict the future, Merlin. I decide it.”

A chill ran down my spine.

“Then what happens if I leave this place?”

The Oracle paused.

And then, for the first time, its voice faltered.

“Then the world will no longer be yours to shape.”

The Choice That Should Never Be Made

I have faced many difficult choices in my time.

• Choosing which king to serve in a war that should have never begun.
• Deciding whether to save a dying civilization or let history forget it.
• Walking away from a love that would have broken the world in two.

But this choice?

This was different.

Because the Oracle was not offering a prediction.

It was offering a throne.

If I stayed…

I would shape reality itself.

If I left…

The world would belong to another force entirely.

And that, traveler, is when I knew…

I was not the first to stand in this chamber.

I was not the first to be given this choice.

And I would not be the last.

The Ghosts of Those Who Chose Before

The Oracle’s single glowing eye stared into me—not through me, not at me, but into me—as though it could sift through every thought, every moment, every regret I had ever carried.

It had done this before.

To others.

And that was when I saw them.

Echoes of the past.

Faint, flickering shadows of those who had stood where I now stood—those who had been given the same choice before me.

A warrior clad in silver armor, kneeling before the machine, tears streaming down his face as he whispered, “I will bring her back. Whatever it takes.”

A scholar in robes of deep blue, his hands shaking as he reached for the Oracle’s core, muttering, “Knowledge beyond knowledge… I must know!”

A woman in darkened silk, her voice calm but her eyes hollow, saying, “Yes. I will rule.”

And then…

A figure I recognized too well.

A man with golden eyes, a sharp grin, and a presence that sent ice through my veins.

“Morgavain.”

I whispered his name before I could stop myself.

My old rival. A sorcerer of terrible ambition, long thought to be dead.

Had he stood here? Had he made this same choice?

The Oracle’s eye pulsed.

“You are not the first, Merlin. Nor will you be the last.”

“Where did they go?” I asked.

“Some became kings,” the Oracle murmured. “Some became gods.”

“And the others?”

The light in the chamber dimmed.

“Some never left.”

I turned slowly.

And then I saw them—figures trapped within the gears of the machine itself, frozen in time, their bodies woven into the metal, their faces twisted in silent horror.

They had not ruled reality.

They had become part of it.

The Oracle’s True Power

“You misunderstand, Merlin.”

The Oracle’s voice softened, the whirring of its gears slowing.

“I do not offer power. I offer… responsibility.”

“To shape the world,” I whispered.

“Yes.”

I ran a hand down my beard, stepping back. “And what if I refuse?”

The Oracle did not speak for a long moment. Then—

“Then you leave. And another takes your place.”

A pause.

“Perhaps someone unworthy. Perhaps someone dangerous.”

A trap.

Not a lie, but a truth so carefully constructed that rejecting it became impossible.

For if I left, the Oracle would not sleep. It would wait.

And one day, someone else would stand where I stood now.

Someone who might not walk away.

The City That Never Died

I turned my gaze to the city of Eldrath, stretching endlessly beyond the temple walls.

Empty.

Lifeless.

But not ruined.

Because the Oracle had kept it frozen in time, a city locked in an endless moment of almost-being, waiting for its next ruler.

And I?

I could wake it.

I could undo the centuries, restore its people, bring back everything lost.

If I just said yes.

But something didn’t feel right.

I knelt beside one of the still figures in the machine, tracing my fingers over what was left of a man’s face, his eyes wide, his lips frozen in an unfinished whisper.

And then, in the silence, I heard it.

A heartbeat.

Weak.

Distant.

But there.

They were alive.

Not dead.

Not gone.

Trapped.

Merlin’s Choice

“What happens if I destroy you?” I asked.

The Oracle did not react.

“That is an option.”

“Would it free them?”

A pause.

Then—

“Some. Not all.”

“What do you mean?”

“Some will return.”

“And the others?”

The Oracle’s eye dimmed.

“Some will fade. As if they had never existed.”

A terrible price.

But a choice had to be made.

I could leave things as they were, allowing the Oracle to continue its work, shaping fate for those who would seek it.

I could take its place, ensuring that no tyrant or fool ever controlled it again.

Or…

I could break the machine, shattering the balance of fate, unleashing whatever consequences came next.

And so, traveler, I ask you now:

What would you have done?

Because I, Merlin, had to decide.

And I knew…

There was no right answer.

Only the path I chose to walk.

A Machine That Cannot Be Destroyed

The Oracle waited.

It had no expression. No emotions. No pleading words.

It did not beg me to choose.

Because it did not need to.

The weight of the moment, the magnitude of what was before me, was enough.

Before I could act, before I could even settle on what my choice would be, I had to ask one final question.

“If I destroy you, Oracle, will you ever return?”

The machine was silent for a moment, as if calculating the answer.

Then, in a voice as ancient as the stars, it spoke.

“I was built to last beyond time. If I am shattered, another will take my place. Another will rise in a distant land, in an era yet to be born.”

My grip on my staff tightened.

“Then even if I destroy you, fate will find a way to rebuild you?”

“Not fate, Merlin. People.”

It was a truth I could not deny.

There would always be those who sought power over the future.

If not here, then elsewhere.

If not now, then in a thousand years.

The Oracle was not just a machine.

It was a concept.

A desire.

A need woven into the fabric of civilization itself.

If I destroyed it, all I would do was reset the cycle.

The world would forget for a time, but eventually, another Oracle would rise.

Because someone, somewhere, would always try to shape the future.

I exhaled. I had my answer.

Destruction was not an option.

Not if I truly wished to stop this machine forever.

But that left only two paths before me.

To leave… and let another take its place.

Or to stay… and ensure that no one could ever use it for their own selfish will again.

The Voices of the Trapped

A whisper broke through the silence.

I turned sharply.

The souls woven into the machine’s gears—the ones who had chosen before me—they were stirring.

Not awake, not alive…

But listening.

And then, I heard them.

“Let us go.”

“Free us.”

“We do not belong here.”

I pressed my palm against the cold surface of the Oracle. It pulsed beneath my touch, like the heartbeat of something unnatural.

“You said some will return if I break the machine,” I said.

“Yes.”

“But what if I stay?”

The Oracle’s eye flickered.

“Then their fates are yours to decide.”

A cold realization settled over me.

This was why the machine existed.

Every wielder before me had chosen power for themselves. They had sought to shape the world according to their own desires, using the machine to weave history in their favor.

But no one had ever chosen to undo its work.

That was why the souls remained trapped.

The Oracle was bound by the will of its wielder—and so far, every wielder had been too greedy or too fearful to set the lost free.

I had come here seeking knowledge.

I had found something far greater.

A chance to right what had been broken.

Merlin’s Choice

I did not hesitate.

“Then I will stay.”

The Oracle pulsed, its gears shuddering, its metal frame trembling, as if the very world had recoiled from my words.

“You accept this fate?”

“I do.”

And as soon as I spoke, the city of Eldrath came to life.

The lights in the towers flared once more.

The wind returned, whistling through the empty streets.

And the trapped souls?

They awoke.

One by one, the shadows in the gears stepped forward, their eyes clearing, their voices returning.

The warrior.
The scholar.
The queen.

And then, the one I feared most.

Morgavain.

The Return of Morgavain

His golden eyes snapped to mine, recognition flickering through them.

“Merlin,” he breathed, his voice hoarse, as if he had been silent for centuries.

For all I knew, he had been.

I raised my staff. “You have no place in this world, Morgavain. You made your choice long ago.”

He smiled—a slow, dangerous curve of the lips.

“And yet, here I stand.”

The Oracle pulsed.

“He is bound by your will now, Merlin. All who were taken may leave, or they may remain.”

The meaning was clear.

I had complete power over what happened next.

Every soul freed from the Oracle could return to the world… or be sent back into the machine forever.

Morgavain took a step toward me. Challenging.

Testing.

Would I be merciful? Would I let him walk free?

Or would I do what he would have done to me—and seal him away, a prisoner of fate for all eternity?

For a long moment, I was tempted.

But then I thought of the Oracle’s first lesson.

“I do not predict the future. I create it.”

I was not here to seek vengeance.

I was here to change the cycle.

“You are free to go,” I said at last. “But do not mistake my mercy for weakness.”

Morgavain’s eyes gleamed. He gave a slow bow, one that was mocking and yet genuine all at once.

“Until we meet again, old friend.”

And just like that…

He was gone.

The End of the Clockwork Oracle

With the souls freed, the city of Eldrath began to fade.

I could feel it—the reality of this place unraveling, unspooling into the void from which it had been preserved.

“What happens now?” I asked the Oracle.

“Now, the machine sleeps.”

“And if I leave?”

“Then another will come, and the cycle will begin again.”

That, I would not allow.

So I did what no one before me had done.

I did not rule the Oracle.

I did not wield its power.

I simply… unmade it.

I lifted my staff, whispered a spell as old as the first words ever spoken, and with a pulse of light—

The Oracle shattered.

The gears crumbled into dust, the energy dissipated into the void, and the city collapsed inward, vanishing in a final whisper of fate.

I stood alone in the wasteland.

Eldrath was gone.

And so was the last Clockwork Oracle.

For now.

Because somewhere, someday, someone would try to build it again.

But if they did…

I would be there.

To stop it.

Again.

And again.

For as long as time would allow me.