Nicholai stepped out of the room. “You are a strong one Nicholai, you might just be the one to break this curse.” The deep voice said. “Are you ready for the third one or do you require a few minutes to gather yourself? It has been grueling so far.” Nicholai sat in a chair, “just one moment please, I need to rest a moment.” He replied.

After some time passed, Nicholai stood up and walked towards the final door, the one with the withered tree. As he grabbed the handle he went dizzy and lost his balance. “Oh dear, you cannot even get through this door, maybe you are not the one.” Said the deep voice. He stood up with every bit of willpower he had left, twisted the handle and stepped into the room.

The door closed behind him again, locking him in. The entity was here again. She led him to the edge of a great, silent precipice. Spanning the void was a bridge made of shimmering glass, Nicholai could not step onto it. He was anchored.

Thick, heavy iron chains manifested, bolting from the stone floor and coiling around his limbs. These were not the chains of his sins, those had been handled in the previous trials. These were the chains of his identity. “This is the third trial,” the entity said, its voice now as thin and sharp as a razor. “To cross you must leave behind the anchors of the past. Not just the bad things, Nicholai, but the things you cling to for safety. Your grudges gave you strength, your fears gave you caution. Your attachments gave you a sense of who you were. To be free, you must become nothing.”

The first chain tightened around his right arm, glowing with a dull, angry red. It was the chain of grudge. Nicholai felt the familiar, hot surge of indignation he held against every person who had ever doubted him. It was the fuel he had used to work late nights, the spite that had made him successful. “This anger made me a warrior,” Nicholai grunted, straining against the metal. “It made you a prisoner.” The entity countered.

Nicholai looked into the abyss and realised that as long as he hated those people, they owned a piece of his soul. He took a deep breath and consciously unfurled his fist. “I don’t need my enemies to define my worth.” He whispered. The red glow died, the iron shattered into dust. His right arm felt light, almost weightless.

The second one was wrapped around his chest, cold and suffocating. “This is the chain of fear.” explained the entity. He looked at it and noticed it was his attachment to his reputation. His desperation to be seen as perfect and unbreakable. He saw the faces of his family, friends and colleagues. Their imagined judgements were weighing him down. He realised he was terrified of what he would be if he wasn’t the great Nicholai in their eyes.

Nicholai looked down, tears in his eyes. He sobbed “I am afraid of being a nobody, but I would rather be a nobody and be free than be a king in a cage.” As he accepted the possibility of his own insignificance, the pressure on his lungs vanished. The chain had loosened and fallen to the floor. He kicked it into the darkness below the bridge.

The final chain was a golden one. It was wound around his heart, the one of attachment. This was the hardest. I wasn’t hatred or fear, but the longing for a past that was gone. It was the what ifs, the attachment to the version of his life he thought he was supposed to have. It was his grip on his own story.

The entity spoke, “you must let go of the man you were to become, the man you are meant to be.” Nicholai looked behind him, the ghosts of his family and his memories were there. They were beautiful in the fading light, but they were anchors. He reached into his own heart and metaphorically cut the chord. He stopped trying to fix the past or hold the future. He let himself exist only in the here and now.

With a sound like a great bell ringing, the golden chain dissolved into sparks. The weight that had sat on Nicholais soul for how whole life was gone. He felt like a leaf on the wind, untethered, vast and terrifyingly light. He stepped onto the glass bridge and it held. He wasn’t walking as a son, a professional, a victim or a victor. He was walking as a soul.

He reached the other side, where a blinding white light awaited. The shifting smoke and starlight of the entity began to pull inward, condensing into a singular, solid form. The chaotic shadows bled away, replaced by a soft, ethereal glow that coalesced into the figure of a woman. She was radiant, her skin seemingly women from moonlight and her hair flowed like a river of silk. She wore a simple white robe that moved as if stirred by a breeze that only she could feel. Her face was strikingly beautiful, but it was her smile that struck Nicholai most. It was a look of profound, motherly pride and ancient recognition.

Nicholai blinked, shielded his eyes for a moment and then looked in wonder. “Why did you look like a monster like a shadow before?” He asked. The Woman stepped closer, her bare feet making no sound on the shimmering floor. Her voice was no longer a resonant vibration, it was melodic and clear. “I am the reflection of your own soul's readiness. Nicholai.” She said, her smile deepening. “When you entered these halls you were a man defined by chaos, secrets and the jagged edges of your own fear.

You could not see beauty because you did not believe you possessed any. To your eyes then, the truth looked like a phantom and your conscience looked like a judge.” She reached out, gently touching his cheek with a hand that felt like a warm summer breeze. “I appeared as a shifting void because that is what your inner world was, a p[lace of hidden things and filtered light. You saw me through the lens of your own guilt. But as you faced the reflection, felt the remorse and chose the release, you didn’t just change yourself, you changed how to perceive the universe.

He spoke to the lady one last time. “Who am I now?” He asked. “You are the space between the breath and the word. You are the silence that remains when the ego finally stops screaming. You are simply Nicholai, unburdened, undefined and finally whole.” With a final nod, she dissolved into the dawn, leaving Nicholai standing in the world that was no longer a trial, but a beginning. He turned and walked towards the door.

He stood next to it for a while just looking into the world that helped him feel a lightness he had not seen for a long time. He just stood there breathing calmly into the void. He turned round, grabbed the handle, opened the door and walked through it.

The deep voice boomed.”How did you even pass all these, nobody has ever got past the first one!” Nicholai just stood and said “Oh, I had a friend.” and smiled. “Well, we are not done yet, Nicholai. You still need to get out of here! The deep voice said with a laugh that worried Nicholai.