"Y–Your Eminence…" he began, his form trembling.
Before he could finish, she raised a finger.
A soft flick, almost lazy. Yet the force hurled Aladrielos backward like a comet. He phased through the walls, the air itself screaming as his incorporeal body was flung out of the mansion, across the sky, and into the outer winds that surrounded the city.
The throng of people walking in the streets turned to look around when they felt the strong breeze pass them. A woman who's toga was blown slapped the nearest man next to her.
"Pervert" she shouted
"What did I do?" Said the man watching her stomping away.
Silence returned.
Ramona, lowered her hand and exhaled slowly. Her eyes softened as she looked down at the man resting on her lap. His black hair shimmered faintly under the lantern light, and his face, calm, yet strained.
Her fingers glided gently through his hair. "You've slept long enough, my Adam," she whispered. "Wake soon, please. Our creation is trembling without your balance."
The room pulsed with quiet light, the divine hum buzzed, as if Adam's body was reconfiguring itself. His body was vibrating slightly and blurring.
Then the air wavered, and Aladrielos appeared again, kneeling low. His light dimmed with reverence and fear.
"My Lady Ramona, please," he said, his voice cracking with desperation. "The 7 heavens are failing. The faith network is faltering. Michaelos cannot sustain it for long. We beg your aid to rouse Him. If the Father does not rise—"
Ramona's head turned, slowly. Her eyes gleamed like the heart of a storm. The wind in the room shifted, heavy with the scent of ozone.
"Quiet," she said softly, her voice something between a whisper and a shout.
The command carried such weight that the air itself seemed to hold still.
Aladrielos bowed his head until his form quivered against the marble floor.
Ramona looked back at the sleeping god, Adam, and brushed a thumb against his temple. Faint ripples of golden light spread where she touched him.
Her face turned gentle, she gave a feint smile and continued rubbing her thumb on his forehead.
"He cannot hear you," she murmured. "He is in the midst of integration. The authority he plundered from that… thing… is rewriting every strand of his existence." Her tone grew distant, troubled. "I miscalculated its strength."
A faint crackle of thunder echoed outside, though the skies were clear. The world itself trembled from that mighty thunderclap, the traffic of people outside even dodged for cover.
Then Aladrielos dared to lift his gaze slightly. "My Lady… how long until He—"
"Leave us," she interrupted, her voice calm again, but layered with quiet dread. "Pray that He conquers before the authority consumes Him. If He does not…"
Her eyes flicked toward the angel, twin whirlwinds flashing deep within them.
"…then everything tethered to Him,, the Heavens, will vanish into nothing, and the thing that slept in here yesterday will not be the thing that comes out of those doors."
Aladrielos bowed so deeply his form nearly scattered into dust. "As you command, my Lady."
He vanished, and the room fell into silence once more.
Ramona sighed, lowering her head until her forehead touched Adam's.
"You foolish man," she whispered with a broken smile.
Outside, thunder rolled over the horizon, distant, restrained, as though the heavens themselves were holding their breath, waiting for the signal to unleash their wrath.
Three days passed.
Three days of silence in the heavens.
Three days in which Adam lay motionless on Ramona's lap, his divinity flickering like a dying star.
Ramona had not moved from her place. The golden light from Adam's presence illuminated the room, soft and steady, keeping at bay the entropy that nipped at Ramona's sanity. She sat cross-legged, her hand resting against his chest, feeling the faint pulse of Adam's heart. Shallow, inconsistent, fading at times to near nothing.
Her hair, once beautifully styled, now hung loosely around her face. Her silver eyes stared unblinking at the man she refused to leave.
"Come back to me," she whispered. "You've wandered too far into the dark this time."
Lightning cracked far above the clouds, though there were no storms in the sky.
On the morning of the first day, the priests of Elren awoke to find the statue of the Faceless God cracked down its center. A fine fissure ran from the top of the head to the chest, and light leaked faintly through it not gold, but pale and sickly blue.
The statue of Ramona, beside it, remained untouched, pristine, serene and emotionless as ever.
Crowds gathered in the square. Mothers clutched their children. Merchants and soldiers alike fell to their knees.
"The Lord of Protection is wounded!" someone cried.
"Is this a sign?"
"Has the Lady forsaken Him?"
Panic spread like wildfire. Bells tolled across the city, in chaos, each tower sounding its alarm.
By the second day, the phenomenon worsened. Those who slept after dusk did not wake. At first, it was one or two, a child, a beggar, a priest but by dawn, dozens. Then hundreds.
They did not rot, nor breathe. Their bodies were warm, but their souls were unreachable. Their faces were peaceful, their chests unmoving.
"The Sleep of Death," the people whispered. "Just like the Purple Queen…"
Enoch pored over scriptures in the cathedral archives, his hands trembling. Candlelight flickered across his pale face as he whispered fragments of divine verses, searching for meaning.
"There is no precedent," he muttered. "No ritual, no prayer… not even in the Book of Judgement. The divine channels are silent. I can't even feel His presence anymore."
Alfonso stood beside him, arms folded, his expression grim.
"People are calling it a curse," he said. "If this continues, we'll have an uprising by week's end. Nobles are blaming the clergy. Clergy are blaming the nobles. I've doubled the guards around the cathedral, and the palace but…"
He exhaled sharply. "Dominic's arrest was already tearing us apart. Now this."
Enoch's eyes darted to the great stained windows, where the light of dawn poured through in fractured hues.
"The moment the statue breaks," he whispered, "the divine covenant breaks with it. The protection that blankets Elren, the barriers around the palace, the blessings, all of it is drawn from His essence."
"And if it fails?" Alfonso asked quietly.
Enoch swallowed hard. "Then i'm afraid we will remember what true darkness feels like."
Ramona's gaze drifted to the horizon outside Adam's chambers. Through the walls of the Smith estate, she could feel the panic, could hear their cries like faint echoes on the wind.
Still she did not move.
The divine authority within Adam had grown unstable once again. A core of raw, sickly blue trying to fuse with Adam's golden godly essence. She could feel the way his divinity strained against itself, the way the room grumbled every time his essence moved.
"Three days," she murmured, brushing a lock of his black hair aside.
"That's how long it took for the domain to descend to chaos. Please remake yourself again, Adam"
"They need you"
Her fingers glowed faintly as she whispered words into Adam's ears, it was a lullaby. Each note hummed through the air, feeling their chambers in warm purple light.
Outside, lightning flashed behind the clouds across the heavens. silent and formless, but bright.
Accross Elren, the bells continued to toll.
The faithful prayed at the base of the fractured statue, their tears staining the stone steps.
And unseen from them, a goddess of storms kept her vigil, waiting for the man who built the walls of this kingdom to open his eyes once more.