"Huff… huff…"
Each breath tore through Lucia's throat like glass. Her lungs burned, her legs trembled with every uneven step, and her robe clung to her skin—soaked with sweat, river water, and the forest's foul breath.
She crested the final ridge of the hill, limbs screaming for mercy—and froze.
There it stood.
The ruins of Valene Fortress, framed in the pale birth of dawn. Crumbling towers and weathered battlements loomed like the bones of a god, draped in ivy and time. What remained of its grandeur clung stubbornly to the earth, regal even in decay.
For a moment, her exhaustion vanished.
Lucia forgot the ache in her knees, the river's wrath still drying in her hair, the blood on her hands. She stared in breathless awe. The fortress was a relic from an age when men believed they could touch the heavens—and maybe they had. Back then, empires weren't born of scarcity and desperation. They were carved from ambition and fire.
Faurians could barely build stone ovens that didn't collapse in winter. This… this was architecture—sacred geometry whispered into stone.
Elicia.
The name echoed through her. The empire that conquered death, or so the legends claimed. Its culture had enchanted her for years, long before the Church tried to feed her hagiographies she couldn't believe in. She'd spent her stolen afternoons memorizing ancient Elician script, not hymns. Learning the language of noble houses, the meanings behind flowers sewn into royal tapestries. She hadn't prayed—but she had studied. Devoutly.
And now, here she was.
Lucia stumbled forward, her feet numb beneath her, drawn to the fortress's wide staircase like iron to a lodestone.
This was it.
Her one chance to prove—to herself, to the Church, to him—that she wasn't hollow inside. That she could be more than just the Patriarch's daughter with a polite smile and no miracles to her name.
That she could matter.
But with every step up the stone staircase, her muscles screamed. Her vision blurred. She lurched forward near the top—and crashed onto the final step, her knee scraping hard against the rough wall.
"Damn you…" she hissed, wincing as blood trickled down her shin.
Gritting her teeth, she pulled herself up. Her limbs wobbled like broken marionette strings. She staggered forward, brushing off the dust from her robes, her breath ragged and uneven.
Above her, the wind howled. The red flag of Elicia, torn and defiant, snapped violently in the wind—its rich crimson indistinguishable from the sunrise. The scent of morning dew mingled with old stone and ash. It felt like standing in a myth, long after the gods had left.
Unseen beneath her robe, the pendant Cynthia had given her shuddered faintly against her skin.
Lucia scratched at her collar, frowning. "What now…?"
She was too exhausted to question it. She wandered through the broken defenses, past shattered columns and faded murals. Every breath she took was laced with the dust of history.
What was she even supposed to be looking for?
Cynthia's voice echoed in her memory: "a vision of sorts"
A vision. That was all. No map. No instructions. Just a half-whispered hope disguised as prophecy.
Lucia let out a shaky laugh. "Great. I nearly died crossing a river because of a vision."
Sleep deprivation. That had to be it. Cynthia hadn't lied—she just… hallucinated. And now here Lucia was, stumbling around the bones of a dead empire waiting for divine inspiration to slap her in the face.
She clenched her fists.
"What am I doing here?" she whispered.
Why would the Saint King ever choose me?
She wasn't pious. She wasn't radiant. She wasn't even sure she believed. She would've traded her soul to hear just one voice—one human voice—tell her she was enough. That she mattered.
Her doubts twisted in her chest like thorns. Then—
Something.
Her eyes locked onto a section of the defense wall overlooking the valley. She didn't know why. Couldn't look away. Her feet moved without thought, as if yanked by an invisible thread.
The wind stilled.
Lucia limped forward, every nerve screaming—but she couldn't stop. Her heart pounded like war drums in her ears. With each step, the pendant grew warmer, vibrating now, a faint hum rising from her chest like a held breath.
Then—she reached the edge.
And everything changed.
The pendant tore itself free from beneath her robes. It levitated, weightless, glowing with a light so fierce it washed out the world. Her hair rose with it, caught in a wind that came from nowhere. Her arms trembled as blood mixed with sweat and dripped from her chin.
She opened her mouth to scream—
—but the air had been stolen from her lungs.
The light grew brighter. White-gold. Starborn. Divine. It poured over her, through her, into her, illuminating the hollows she'd spent her life hiding.
Her body gave out.
Lucia crashed to the stone floor, her bones striking ancient stone with a sickening thud. The light didn't stop. Her mind shattered like glass under the pressure. She couldn't think. Couldn't feel. Just spiraled downward into a vast, infinite void.
The world went black.
No thought. No body. Just the echo of dripping water somewhere far away.
Then—
"MA'AM?! C–Can you hear me?!"
The voice was strange. Distant. Boyish.
Lucia felt herself floating, as if her soul had been unmoored. She drifted in darkness, her body far behind.
The voice came again, clearer this time.
"HELLO—CAN YOU HEAR ME?!"
Her vision began to return in shards. Leaves. Stone. Light. Pain.
But nothing made sense. Not yet.
Her fingers twitched.