Alatar stood silent as Barachas's words rumbled through him. Chains. Keys. Choices. He could almost feel the weight of iron pressing against his own skin, though no such shackles bound him.
Yet instead of yielding, his spirit bristled.
Chains are still chains, he thought. Even gilded, even chosen. Even if I am the one who fashions them.
The thought festered in him like a spark pressed against dry tinder.
He lifted his gaze, eyes glinting with the cold fire of the blue light within him, and spoke — not with defiance, but with the quiet steadiness of one beginning to measure himself against the titans of the starryverse.
Alatar: "If I wear chains, I am not free. If I choose them, I am not free. What is freedom if it must be wrapped in the language of bonds? No, Barachas. I will not be lord of chains, nor their servant. If they weigh upon me, I will break them, and if they return, I will break them again."
The air trembled faintly as though the temple itself leaned into his words.
Alatar: "You speak of silence that devours when chains fall. If such silence comes, then I will give it my voice. If void follows, then I will fill it. The world you describe bends under shackles, under rules, under weights. But I—" he paused, the conviction surprising even himself, "—I would sooner burn the chains, the silence, and the world itself, than bow beneath them."
His chest rose and fell with controlled breaths. For the first time since his awakening, his voice carried not naïve wonder but a regal clarity, the beginning of what Barachas himself had once embodied.
The titan's gaze lingered on him, stone-carved face unreadable.
Alatar: "Perhaps I cannot escape the blood in me, or the bindings of what I am meant to be. But if they are cages, I will rend them open. And if they are keys, I will wield them without asking permission. I do not want to choose chains. I want to choose the breaking."
His words fell heavy, echoing through the temple until silence followed — not the silence of suppression, but the silence of acknowledgment, of something stirring.
The weight of Alatar's words still rang in the chamber, like a bell that would not stop reverberating in the marrow of the stone. His own voice had surprised him — not its sound, but the truth in it. For the first time, he had spoken not as one searching for answers, but as one declaring his law.
His thoughts sharpened:
I do not wish to learn how to wear chains with grace. I do not wish to polish them into crowns. No. My blood is mine, my path is mine. If shackles exist, I will walk beyond them. I do not want to be free in their language — I want to be untouchable by their weight. Something above shackles, above bindings, above even fate.
Barachas's sunken eyes, veined with the dull grey of endless years, studied him. Then, from deep within the titan's cavernous chest, came a sound. Not mockery. Not warning. But a low, thunderous laugh — the laugh of stone breaking under pressure, of a mountain remembering it once was fire.
Barachas: "Good… good. That is resolve. It is not wisdom — no, not yet. But it is the seed of sovereignty. I have seen gods who made peace with their shackles, and I have seen kings who died polishing their chains into ornaments. You will not be one of them. I see it now. Dangerous, yes… but magnificent."
The air seemed to thicken, as though the temple itself acknowledged Alatar's words and the titan's response.
Alatar's gaze did not falter. He looked at the massive coils of living chains that wrapped around Barachas's body, pulsing with ancient seals. They were not simply metal. Each length bore inscriptions in tongues older than worlds — glyphs that shimmered faintly with power, binding not just his body but his very essence. The altar beneath him thrummed with containment, a prison fashioned not to kill but to diminish, to humiliate, to remind him of defeat.
Alatar's hand flexed. He felt the faint sting where he had cut his palm before, where blood had awakened the titan. His blood. His choice.
He stepped closer, his voice steady.
Alatar: "Then let me prove it. Not with words, but with action. If I am to stand above shackles, then let me begin here — with yours."
Barachas tilted his head, expression unreadable, though his silence carried a strange gravity, as if granting permission.
Alatar raised his palm once more and pressed it to one of the chains. Instantly, the glyphs flared, drinking his essence, testing him, demanding submission. The temple shuddered, a deep groan reverberating through its walls as though reality itself protested.
But Alatar did not flinch. He let his blood answer, not with surrender but with defiance. He willed the chain to break, not as a supplicant but as one issuing judgment.
The first link cracked. A sound like thunder roared through the sanctum. Then another, and another. Sparks of azure and crimson danced through the chamber as the bindings unraveled, collapsing not into dust but into faint trails of mist that drifted back into the altar, absorbed into the stone.
Barachas exhaled. The breath was heavy, ancient, and filled with something between relief and sorrow.
The titan shifted, sitting upright for the first time in countless ages. His colossal form loomed even larger now, though he did not rise fully. Chains no longer bound him, yet he did not move to leave.
Barachas: "You… you would free me. Not for command, not for debt, but because it suits your resolve. Bold, Alatar. Bold beyond measure. Know this — you have done what no other dared. These chains were not meant to be broken by mortal hands. Yet your blood, your will, your defiance… they answered. You have set me free, though I remain."
He tapped the altar with a claw the size of a boulder.
Barachas: "This temple is tied to me, and I to it. Until its heart breaks, I remain within. But the weight is gone. You have lifted what eternity could not. That act alone marks you."
Alatar stared up at him, breath steady, his pulse calm though his spirit burned with fire. Inside, he marked the moment.
I will not wear chains. I will not polish them into crowns. I will be something else — something greater. Today, I have broken another's bonds. Tomorrow, I will break my own.
And as he thought it, the temple's vast silence shifted again — no longer oppressive, but resonant, as though the very stones had acknowledged the birth of a new vow.