I rose from the bed and followed the mocking voice echoing through the corridor, sharp enough to cut through the lingering fog of sleep.
The moment I opened the door, a maid was already waiting.
She bowed instantly, movements smooth and rehearsed, as if her body knew the ritual better than her mind. "Good morning, My Eternal Lord, May I assist you with your preparations?"
For most people, she would have been called beautiful. Her features were gentle, her hair neatly tied, her expression carefully neutral. To me, she was simply there like the walls, like the ice, like the quiet that filled this palace no matter how many people lived inside it.
"Proceed," I said.
She stepped forward, careful not to meet my eyes for too long. She handed me a cloth, guided me through brushing, adjusted my clothing, smoothed folds that did not truly exist. Her fingers trembled once when they brushed my sleeve.
Fear.
I noticed it, acknowledged it, and felt nothing in response.
When she finished, she stepped back and bowed again, lower this time, as if worried she had missed something important.
"You may go," I said.
She practically fled.
I stepped into the corridor alone.
The palace stretched endlessly before me, carved entirely from eternal ice. The walls reflected pale light like frozen mirrors, and my footsteps echoed softly, swallowed by distance. The Frozenlight Palace was vast larger than most cities. Thirty-two square kilometers of halls, chambers, sanctums, and sealed domains. Including the outer yards and defensive rings, it covered more than fifty-six square kilometers of land.
Too large.
Too quiet.
This was the heart of the Nation of Preservation. From here, our rule extended across frozen seas, crystal plains, and time-slowed territories. Under our authority, the Moon Council governed administration or the court of stillness, the Six Angels commanded divine enforcement, and the Twelve Saint Families oversaw military and doctrine.
They were loyal.
Even for now.
Gods in our lineage did not burn brightly and vanish. Most ruled for over a thousand years, either passing their essence to a successor deemed worthy or ruling until their very end. Over the last ten thousand years, many gods had risen under this system.
And just as many had fallen.
By the time I reached the dining hall, I forced those thoughts aside.
The moment I stepped inside, a voice struck me like a thrown spoon.
"Finally! You're awake!"
I took my seat calmly.
Across from me, my older brother leaned back in his chair, boots crossed shamelessly atop the table, grinning as if the world were nothing more than a joke he hadn't finished telling.
"You're getting lazier," Raka said cheerfully. "Ever since you started ascending, you move like an ancient relic."
"If you've even ascended at all," I replied flatly.
Raka snorted. "There it is, Existential dread before breakfast and You really are becoming a god."
Across the table sat my parents.
My father, Neil Frozenlight, straight-backed and composed, his presence alone enough to silence a room. My mother, Elsa Frozenlight, elegant and sharp-eyed, her expression unreadable as ice before a storm.
We shared the same blood, Icy blue eyes, Pale blue hair closer to colour silver and Faces sculpted by cold divinity. Only my mother's hair had once been warmer in color, before Raka was born.
"North," my father said, setting his utensils down. His voice was calm, but there was weight beneath it. "Your ascension will complete within days."
I looked up.
"After the next full moon," he continued, "you will begin to lose one human emotion."
The room felt colder.
"It will repeat every century," he said. "That is the cost our bloodline pays for eternity."
I nodded. "I know."
"You know what happened to our ancestors," he added.
"Yes, Father."
The words came easily.
Too easily.
Since awakening the Essence of the Ice God, I had felt it something shifting inside me. Anger dulled. Sorrow thinned. Emotions no longer surged; they faded before reaching the surface. I still understood them. I simply did not feel them as I once had.
I had not spoken of it.
But they noticed.
Raka noticed first. He realized it the day I stopped reacting to his provocations. When insults that once annoyed me simply passed through as meaningless sound.
And then there were the nightmares.
Endless ones.
I remembered dying with my head torn from my body by a monstrous beast.
I remembered perishing in a war that swallowed the world whole.
Killed by conspiracies.
Killed by nations.
Killed by light that fell from the void itself.
Each death stripped something away.
Pain no longer startled me.
Fear no longer lingered.
By the time I gained true self-awareness, I was already broken in ways no one could see.
An abnormality.
And now… I was losing even that.
For the first time in my life, I felt fear not of death, but of emptiness. Fear of becoming something that could no longer care.
"Raka," my father said sharply, "eat quietly."
Raka raised both hands in surrender. "Yes, yes!! The future god needs silence to digest destiny."
Breakfast continued in relative quiet.
When we finished, my mother tapped her holographic watch. A translucent screen unfolded above her wrist, lines of data scrolling rapidly. She flicked it toward me.
I caught it.
"What is it?" I asked.
Her eyes were cold. Focused.
"An emergency," she said. "Near the Slumber Pit, Villagers have begun disappearing."
Raka straightened. "Disappearing how?"
"Unknown," she replied. "That is why it matters."
She turned her gaze fully toward me.
"North, you will go," she said. "With your brother and It is time you begin understanding your divine authority not as theory, but as responsibility."
She paused.
"We still do not fully understand how your divinity functions."
Without waiting for my response, she stood and walked away, heels clicking sharply against the ice.
Every god possessed authority.
Every authority manifested as abilities unique to the essence they ruled.
My ancestor Olwen Frozenlight could freeze time itself. He made time heavier across our nation so heavy that months outside passed like days within our borders.
Absurd, most would say.
Time was imaginary. Relative.
And yet… it had essence. It left marks. And because it existed, it could be commanded.
My affinity with the Ice God's essence was said to surpass even his.
And that frightened me.
It felt like handing an eighteen-year-old a thousand nuclear weapons and saying
Learn how to use them.
But do not destroy anything.
"I cannot leave like this," I said calmly. "Give me some time to prepare."
Raka stretched lazily. "Good. I need my armor anyway."
He left with his maid and butler trailing behind him.
I turned in the opposite direction.
Downward.
Toward the Information Bureau buried deep beneath the palace.
The ice above creaked softly as I descended.
Somewhere below, answers waited.
And I was not sure I wanted to find them.