---
Far from the mist-choked valley where Aether's Sanctum grew, the world moved with a rhythm forged by old blood and older power.
In the marble towers of **Solaire**, the shining capital of the Radiant Throne, bells rang at noon to mark the Grand Convocation. A rare event—called only when fate trembled beneath a monarch's feet.
Inside the **Sun-Hallowed Hall**, nine thrones stood in a crescent. Only four were filled.
On the central dais, beneath a canopy of gold-leafed feathers, sat **Queen Elvanna Virelle**, the Pale Flame of Solaire. Her robes shimmered like sunlight on snow, her face veiled in silk so no common gaze could tarnish it. In her hand: the **scepter of Solar Binding**, pulsing faintly.
"The reports," she began, her voice thin but sharp, "are consistent."
A knight bowed low. "Yes, Your Grace. A region once uninhabitable now flourishes. Magic warps there. Beasts avoid it. Travelers return altered… if they return at all."
"And the one they call 'Aether'?"
"He… builds."
The court stilled.
Not conquers.
Not destroys.
**Builds.**
This troubled them more than any army.
---
Across the continent, within a city sunken beneath the Black Reaches, the **Grand Oracle of Vassareth** stirred in her trance. Her eyes bled ink. Her hands clawed at the mosaics etched into the walls of her crypt-temple.
"Something sings," she whispered. "A song older than gods. A hymn that bleeds from the cracks of the world."
Acolytes knelt, murmuring prayers to silence it.
But the hymn would not be silenced.
---
In the deserts of **Xhel'Azir**, where sand swallowed kingdoms whole, the *Third Sand-Tyrant* gazed into his obsidian mirror. It showed him things no man should see—*rivers of shadow, empires forged from whispers, altars built without gods.*
He watched as a Sanctum rose in the west, nameless yet inevitable.
"I've seen this before," he said.
"But this time," the mirror answered, "the architect remembers what he is."
---
Back in the Radiant Throne, Queen Elvanna dismissed her nobles and withdrew to her personal sanctum—an orchard of ghostly trees that only bloomed for royal blood. Her steps were soundless across the glass grass.
She was not just a queen.
She was a vessel.
A mouthpiece for something older than royalty.
And tonight, that *thing* spoke.
> "He builds without permission."
Elvanna fell to her knees.
> "He draws the forgotten."
Her fingers dug into the soil, blood blooming where thorns pierced.
> "He walks with the hunger of fallen stars."
She dared ask, "Then... do we send an army?"
The whisper came like a sword dragged across stone.
> "No."
> "Send the Dream-Eaters."
---
Meanwhile, in a forgotten keep nestled within the collapsed kingdom of **Thorne-Mere**, a girl with no name sharpened her blade. She had no country, no banners, no god. Only a dream that returned each night: **a city made of silence, ruled by a man with empty eyes.**
She didn't know who he was.
But she knew she'd follow him.
Even if it killed her.
---
The world moved.
Aether had thought himself hidden, beyond the reach of politics and prophecy.
He was wrong.
The continent was waking.
Kings who once ruled by ancient oaths now found those oaths unraveling. Churches whose relics never failed saw miracles stutter. Spies returned from the Sanctum's valley either silent… or *mad*.
And in the eastern archives of the **Old Moon Empire**, a banned text was unearthed by trembling hands.
Its title had no language.
Its pages, however, spoke of a place that would rise beyond gods and thrones.
The final line burned itself into the eyes of every reader:
> "And from the hollow shall rise a crownless king, bearing a hymn the world forgot."
---
Back in Noctis Sanctum, Aether stood alone in the inner vault.
The **Obsidian Throne** remained empty, untouched. Not because he feared it—but because *he knew* it was not yet time.
Yet the Sanctum pulsed louder now.
The Archivist brought word of strange tremors in the magical ley-lines.
The Oracle whispered riddles of queens bound in chains of sunlight.
Tollin spoke of relics whispering at night.
And Mirelle had grown quieter, her sword pulsing like a heartbeat in battle even when there was no battle to fight.
The world was reacting.
It *had* to.
Because something was changing—not just in Aether, but **around** him.
As if reality itself was bending to make room.
He looked up toward the sky, where no stars could be seen beyond the mist.
And still, he felt it.
> The Hymn had begun.
And the world had finally started to listen.
---
**To be countinue....