The morning was gray. Ash drifted faintly in the wind, carried from the pyres of the Emperor's funeral in the capital far beyond. In Talesvold's Edge, the ash fell like another layer of dust over roofs and broken cobblestones. No one looked to the sky. They were too busy surviving.
Alpha walked the crooked streets, silent as always. His ears did the work his mouth never would.
The city spoke in murmurs. Not to him, but around him.
And in those murmurs, he began to piece together the first rules of the world he had been cast into.
A City in Mourning
The death of the Emperor was not only a wound to the Empire's throne, but to its customs. Across every province, the decree had already spread:
"Wear the Shade, for the Shade takes him."
It was tradition. A cultural rite so old that no one remembered its first beginning. For seven days after an Emperor's death, every citizen was required to carry something black upon their person—hat, scarf, ribbon, bracelet, even a strip of cloth tied around the wrist. The Shade marked one's respect for the fallen ruler, and to ignore it was seen as an insult not only to the dead, but to the gods who walked between life and death.
In the slums, Alpha saw men with blackened rags wrapped around their arms. Women twisted bits of soot-stained rope into makeshift bracelets. Even children smeared ash on their sleeves. The poor could not afford silk veils or lacquered beads like the merchants in the high districts, but all carried something.
The freed slaves, however, were spat at when they tried to do the same. Alpha had tied a strip of burned cloth around his wrist, found discarded near a chimney. A guard sneered at him in the marketplace.
"You? Wearing the Shade? The Emperor chained your kind, boy. You mourn him why?"
Alpha said nothing. He lowered his eyes, and the guard shoved him aside.
But he did not take the cloth off. Not because he felt grief for the Emperor. Not because he believed in gods. But because he understood: in a world where he had no place, he could at least blend.
The Whispers of a New Emperor began
At night, the taverns swelled with talk. The Emperor was dead, but the Empire itself could not stay headless for long.
"They'll crown another within the month."
"His bloodline will choose who sits next."
"No, it will be the council. The generals. The priests."
No one knew, but all whispered. In every voice, the fear was the same: what kind of ruler would rise next?
Some spoke of a strong hand, a ruler who would rebuild the armies, restore order, and crush rebellion. Others hoped for a gentler crown, someone who would end the cruelty of the chains.
But most feared the truth—that the next Emperor would be worse.
The slums had their own rumors. Names, spoken low and without certainty. Alpha did not chase them. He only listened to the tone. Bitter,Tense, Uneasy. The Shade was not just for the dead—it was also for the fear of what was coming.
The Rules of the Freed
The freed slaves of Talvia were not given homes, nor food, nor purpose. They were discarded. The overseers called it "mercy," but here, in the streets of Talesvold's Edge, it was another form of punishment.
He learned quickly:
first ,freed slaves were not citizens. They held no rights.
second ,the Empire would not feed them, nor protect them.
third , the only law that touched them was the law of the lash, if they stole too loudly or killed too openly.
The city was a sieve. The weak slipped through cracks, disappearing in alleys, their bodies left to rot or be devoured by the mongrels that prowled at night.
The strong—if they survived hunger and knives—sought something greater.
And every whispered voice pointed to the same place.
The Labyrinths
No one agreed on where they came from.
Some said they were the scars of gods, gouged into the earth when divinity fell.
Others whispered they were prisons, cages made to bind something darker than gods.
And still others believed they were doors—bridges to dreams, shaped by the soul of the one who dared enter.
But all agreed on this: the Labyrinths were alive.
They shifted, reshaped, tested. They were not stone halls or ruined castles, though they often took such forms. They were reflections, warped and cruel.
The rules were not written on walls, but Alpha pieced them together from drunken boasts, desperate whispers, and the scrawled warnings painted on alley stones.
The Laws of the Labyrinths, as he understood them,
first , they open where they will.' A fissure in the earth, a ruined gate, a black mist in the woods. No scholar, no priest, no king has ever controlled their birth.'
second , they answer to the soul.'The Labyrinth is not the same for every man. For the thief, corridors may drip with gold, baiting him deeper. For the murderer, halls may echo with screams. For the broken, shadows may whisper of hope.'
third, one enters alone.' Companions may walk beside you, but within the Labyrinth, you are separated. Each faces their own trial, woven from their own essence.'
forth ,to awaken, you must survive.' Only by reaching the core—by tearing through the reflection, resisting its chains—does a soul awaken to its Liberance.'
fifth ,the Labyrinth remembers.' Failures do not vanish. Blood spilled echoes in the stones. Sometimes, survivors claim to see the dead still wandering within.'
....
Among the Labyrinths, one name repeated more than any other.
Viren.
The Undead Labyrinth.
In taverns, drunks spat the word like a curse. In markets, merchants muttered it when slaves begged too close to their stalls.
"Better you try Viren than starve in my gutter."
Some laughed when they said it. Others whispered it with pale faces, as if the name itself carried rot.
Viren, they said, was a place of bones. A city of the dead, endless and shifting. Streets lined with skeletons that never fell still, towers filled with whispers of those who had once entered and never returned.
It was not the first Labyrinth, nor the largest. But it was the most feared.
Because Viren reshaped itself not into wealth, nor into glory, nor into trials of courage.
It reshaped itself into death.
Alpha listened. For days, he walked, silent and watchful, collecting fragments of truth. He ate little—scraps from gutters, stolen crusts from blind beggars. Hunger followed him, but another hunger was growing, deeper and sharper.
He had no family. No past. No future. His freedom was emptiness.
But if the Labyrinths reshaped themselves to match the soul… then what would a Labyrinth born of him look like?
Would it be silence? Would it be chains? Would it be nothing at all?
The thought did not frighten him. It pulled at him, steady as the tide.
And when he heard the mercenaries laugh—
"Better the brat throw himself into Viren. At least then he'll have a grave worth whispering about."
—he did not laugh with them.
He rose from his corner, his strip of black cloth still tied to his wrist. A mark of mourning, yes, but also of something else.
Of silence.
Of waiting.
He left the tavern without a word.
The choice was made.