The storm cracked open the sky like ancient parchment, peeling away layers of the dying realm. Fragments of light, celestial and bleeding, rained down upon the wasteland of Korr'Mel. The wind carried no sound, only tension, as if the world itself was holding its breath.
Then he appeared.
A figure stepped through the remnants of a fractured gateway. Cloaked in obsidian black, hood raised, face masked in smooth silver etched with unfamiliar runes. Twin blades rested at his sides, their edges pulsing faintly with a rhythm not unlike a heartbeat. Magic clung to him, not in chaos, but in silence. Composed. Condensed.
Aetherion had fallen.
Yet this one remained.
His boots crunched softly over white ash as he moved forward. The sky above twisted unnaturally, spirals of energy rippling as if reality itself was unsure whether to resist him or yield. He paused at the edge of a ruined temple, half-sunk in sand and shadow, and raised a hand.
Golden glyphs flared to life beneath his feet. Runes, not merely decorative but alive. Bound to something ancient.
He extended his palm to the air, and in that moment, the air shimmered like heat on glass. A faint ripple. A dimensional wound. He could feel it, a fracture in the Veil. Somewhere beyond it, the threads of magic were unraveling again.
He didn't speak.
He never did.
But the world responded. The ruined shrine before him began to shift. Stones floated, rising with slow reverence, arranging themselves around him like a throne that would never be sat upon. The glyphs responded, whispering in languages long lost.
The Veil has thinned.
A flicker of memory passed through him, blades clashing in divine halls, a crown shattered under a thousand wings, and the blinding light of betrayal.
He turned, his eyes, hidden behind the mask, locking onto the empty plains.
He wasn't alone.
From the ridge, someone watched him. A silhouette cloaked in emeralds and dusk, eyes glowing faintly with arcane focus.
But he made no move. Neither did the stranger.
Not yet.
The wind rose again, this time carrying with it the faint sound of whispered names.
Names he no longer answered to.
He was simply, the Veilwalker.
And the realm had just taken its first breath in a story that was only beginning.
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