Chapter 0: The Era of Silence and the Box of Sins
Timeline:Unknown (Pre-History) to 12 Years Ago.
1. The Age of Myths (The Sealing)
Long before the Kingdom of Oakhaven built its first stone wall, the world was whole. It was a single, massive continent known as Pangea Aeterna. It was a land where Gods walked among men, and Demons dined in the halls of Kings.
But power has a price. The friction between the Divine and the Demonic threatened to tear the reality of the plane apart. The sky bled mana, and the oceans boiled.
To save the mortal race, the Seven Sages of the Beginning made a desperate pact. They didn't defeat the Gods and Demons; they evicted them.
Using the World Anchor, they fractured the continent.
The center remained—the Mortal Realm (where humanity lives now).
The outer lands were pushed into dimensional folds, hidden behind the Mists of Silence.
These hidden continents became the prisons for the mythical entities:
The Continent of Greed (The Golden Hells).
The Continent of Gluttony (The Starving Plains).
The Continent of Wrath (The Burning Lands).
And four others, lost to time.
To ensure these lands remained sealed, the Sages created the Pandora Mechanism. They concentrated the excess magic of the world into "Chests." As long as the Chests remained closed, the Seals held firm.
But the Sages knew human nature. They knew curiosity would doom them. So, they created a Warden. A single individual tasked with gathering, guarding, and suppressing these Chests.
They created The Bibliotheca of Infinity.
2. The Fall of the Vane Clan (20 Years Ago)
The Vane Clan were the descendants of the Third Sage. For centuries, they were the "Keepers," living in the shadows, guarding the secrets of the Seals. They were powerful, secretive, and feared by the Church of Light, who labeled them "Heretics."
Elara Vane was the princess of this hidden clan. She was beautiful, intelligent, and possessed the rare "Void Eyes"—eyes capable of seeing through illusions.
But the Vane Clan was betrayed.
The Inquisition of the Ivory Tower, led by a fanatic High Priest, located their hidden sanctuary. They didn't come to arrest; they came to exterminate. They believed the Keepers were summoning demons, not holding them back.
The sanctuary burned. Elara escaped, clutching nothing but the clothes on her back and the ancient teachings in her mind.
Alone and hunted, she did what she had to do to survive. She hid her name. She hid her magic. She entered the society of High Nobles in Oakhaven, using her beauty to catch the eye of a rising star: Duke Valerius Arken.
3. The Duke's Ambition (13 Years Ago)
Valerius Arken was a man of iron ambition. He didn't love Elara; he loved her potential. He suspected her bloodline. He wanted to breed a successor with the ancient power of the Vane Clan to surpass the Royal Family.
He took her as his Second Wife.
But when their son was born, the plan shattered.
The Royal Oracle was summoned to read the infant's fate. The Oracle looked at the baby boy—Ren—and screamed.
"I see nothing! No star! No path! No Mana! He is a Null Fate! A void in the tapestry of destiny!"
To Valerius, this was worse than a curse. A child with no mana and no destiny was useless. Worse, a "Null" drew attention. If the Church investigated the Null child and found his mother's Heretic blood, Valerius would lose his Dukedom.
Valerius made a cold calculation.
"The child is dead," Valerius announced to the court. "Died in childbirth."
That night, he threw Elara and the infant Ren out of the estate.
"Go to the Outer Rim," Valerius commanded, tossing a bag of copper coins at her feet. "If I ever see you or that mistake again, I will have the knights cut you down. Disappear."
Elara picked up her son. She didn't cry. She looked at Valerius with her grey Void Eyes and whispered:
"One day, the Void will stare back at you, Valerius. And you will blink first."
4. The Burden of Hame (3 Years Ago)
The Slums of the Outer Rim were a graveyard for the living. Elara raised Ren in a shack made of rotting wood. She washed clothes until her hands bled to buy him porridge. She taught him to read by candlelight, whispering the history of the world instead of bedtime stories.
But they were not alone.
Living in the alley behind their shack was a beggar known as Mad Old Hame. He was blind, missing an arm, and constantly muttered about "The voices in the books."
Hame was not a beggar. He was the current Keeper of the Bibliotheca.
He had spent 50 years holding the Archive in his mind. The mental strain was killing him. The Archive was vast, and the entities trapped inside (the Guardians, the Corruption, the Whispers) were constantly trying to break his will.
Hame was dying. He needed a successor. But the successor had to be specific:
They needed a mental fortress (high Intelligence).
They needed a reason to fight (Resolve).
They needed a bloodline compatible with the Void.
Hame watched the boy, Ren.
He watched Ren fight off stray dogs to protect his sick mother.
He watched Ren sit in the rain, reading scraps of newspaper with an intensity that burned.
He sensed the Vane blood in the boy's veins.
"The boy is the one," Hame whispered to the flies buzzing around him. "He is the Warden."
5. The Transfer (The Night Before Chapter 1)
Time:Three Days Before Elara's Death.
The rain was pouring. Elara was coughing blood. Her time was short.
Hame dragged himself into the shack. He was shivering, his skin grey.
"Elara," Hame rasped.
Elara looked up from her bed. She recognized the aura around him. Not a beggar, but a Mage.
"Who are you?" she whispered.
"A dying man looking for a shelf," Hame smiled, showing toothless gums. He pulled a small, black cube from his rags. It seemed to absorb the light in the room.
"This is the Bibliotheca," Hame said. "The Library of Infinity. It holds the Chests. It holds the Sins. It holds the Monsters."
He placed it in Elara's trembling hand.
"Give it to the boy," Hame commanded. "Not now. But when the end comes. He is a Null, Elara. That is his greatest strength. The Archive cannot corrupt him because he has no active mana for it to latch onto. He must unlock it slowly."
"Why him?" Elara wept. "He is just a boy. Why give him this burden?"
"Because," Hame coughed, blood spilling from his lips. "The Seals are breaking, Elara. The Hidden Continents are leaking. If there is no Warden... the world ends."
Hame touched Ren's sleeping forehead.
"He will suffer," Hame prophesied. "He will be hunted. But he will be the King of Silence."
Hame stood up. He walked out into the rain to die in the mud, finally free of the voices in his head.
Elara hid the Black Cube under the floorboards. She looked at her sleeping son.
"I'm sorry, Ren," she whispered. "I have no gold to leave you. Only a war."
[ PROLOGUE COMPLETE ]
Current Situation (Transition to Chapter 1):
Ren: 12 Years Old. Living in the slums. Intelligent but weak.
Elara: Dying of illness.
The Object: The Black Cube (The Archive) is hidden under the floor.
The Threat: The Duke knows Elara is dying and sends knights not to help, but to "clean up" the loose end (Ren).