Two centuries ago, the world shattered. The earth tore apart, continents split wide open—and from those gaping chasms the Moltens surged forth.
They weren't demons, or any other sort of creature. They were a living, seething tide of fire, molten forms that devoured steel and reduced entire cities to blackened ash. Armies met them with sword and spear, only to watch their blades melt away. The soldiers fell, yet the Moltens simply reformed and pressed on.
When the war finally ended, the silence was absolute. Too few souls remained to carry on the fight.
Fewer than half of humanity survived that endless night. And in the aftermath of our near-extinction… something happened.
It began with a single soldier, backed into a corner. In his final, desperate moment, an ancient spark awakened within him. A spear materialized in his hand. He thrusted forward, and for the first time, a Molten fell dead.
Then another soul awoke. And another.
They called it these powers, weapons, were called the Ancestral Remnants. Fragments of gods, long dead, buried deep in the soul. Each awakening manifested differently: one warrior cleaved mountains with a summoned blade; another lifted rocks with his mind and threw them like pebbles. It was evolution's final gift, a desperate adaptation in a dying world.
From that rebirth, civilization rose anew. The Sentinel Order took shape, a council of awakened leaders, that guided humanity. At first, nations united under their watchful eyes. Eventually, the Sentinels themselves became the last and only authority, standing over every corner of the world.
With their power, humanity drove the Moltens back. Great walled cities, cut from enchanted stone and steel. They rose like fortresses against the moltens. Civilization bloomed once more.
Yet every victory demanded a sacrifice.
Those without the Remnant faded away. Some claimed the world had shifted, no longer kind to ordinary flesh. Others whispered that the awakened had willed the old bloodlines into extinction.
Now, in the year 2225, only the awakened walk this scarred earth.
Everyone is born common—ordinary. But when midnight strikes on one's eighteenth birthday, the Ancestral Remnant bursts forth.
Everyone… except me.
Because I'm still seventeen.
My name is Abaddon Alabaster.
I have never cried before.
Not when my grandparents died. Not when my dog was crushed beneath a transport drone. Not when I watched families break apart in seconds.
I knew the definition of sadness. The hollow ache in the chest, the weight that steals one's breath. Tears were meant to flow freely. Yet they never came. For me.
I observed emotions like paintings on a screen.
The altruistic hero struggling with acceptance of oneself.
The fragile soul crushed by societal prejudices.
The orphan yearning for warmth from a family member.
Their pain was raw… had more life than I had. Their joy, their anguish, their anger. All things I lacked.
Isn't it ironic? That mere words and images could feel more human than I ever did.
That is the truth of our complexity.
Not a single color, but a canvas that was splattered by buckets of contradictions. A palette of clashing colors, smeared, yet put together so seamlessly. They existed in endless paradox.
But stories simplified them. They pinned them down. They gave them names, roles, purposes. They took the spectrum and painted with only one color of varying shades, yet even that monochrome, was more alive than I ever felt.
And I longed for that color.
Not to be a hero. Not to chase epic adventures. But simply to feel. To know, beyond doubt, that I too was a painting, or at least a brushstroke.
So I read.
Night after night, beneath the pulsating neon of Afnan, the greatest of the new cities, I lost myself in tales of heartbreak and hope. I imagined a life as the tragic king, the hero descending into hell, the child betrayed by his mother. I devoured their suffering, praying that one day I would taste something genuine.
Then came my eighteenth birthday.
I sat on the edge of my bed, eyes glued to the clock as midnight approached. Outside, Afnan shimmered behind its walls; beyond, the Moltens brooded and Sentinels patrolled.
Yet none of that mattered to me.
My trembling fingers clutched an old, treasured book—the very one I'd read until every word was branded into my mind. A story of a child that seeked for people to call his family.
What would my Remnant be?
Some summon weapons, others commanded raw elements. A Remnant, they said, is the mirror of one's soul. A reflection of your ideals, your emotions, your goals, and motivation.
Yet I possessed no soul worth reflecting. No purpose. No real emotion.
What could emerge from this hollow husk?
As the clock struck midnight, I became eighteen.
The air around me thickened. A pressure seeped beneath my skin, into every bone. Something vast, ancient, indescribable whispered to me.
And then it happened.
The book in my hands ignited, a fire that could not harm me. The words bled off the pages, twisting and sinking into my flesh.
A tidal wave of emotion crashed over me.
Abandonment. Loneliness. Desperation.
Flashes of memories, none my own, but his.
A boy standing in the rain, watching his father's silhouette fade, knowing he'd never return.
An empty, silent home.
A promise.
"Find people you can call family."
My chest tightened. My breath caught. Something wet and foreign dripped onto my hand.
I looked down.
Tears.
My fingers brushed my cheek. My vision blurred. My throat burned. A raw, ragged sob tore free.
"Am I… truly crying?"
For the first time, I felt alive.
And it hurt.