A Few Seconds Ago
The Cube slipped through the wormhole, its surface shimmering with faint pulses as it scanned the new realm. To human eyes, everything around it would have appeared instantaneous — a blink of light, a rush of chaos. But for the Cube, time unraveled like a slow-moving tide. It saw destructive energy spilling outward, expanding like a living storm, crawling with deliberate malice to devour the surroundings.
It drifted deeper, its senses stretching outward — until it froze.
There. Amid the ruin.
A man knelt on the floor, clutching a dying woman, his lips pressed desperately against hers. Blood stained the sterile tiles around them. Yet the Cube did not see romance or tragedy — it saw the man's soul. Singular. Irreplaceable. A resonance unlike any it had encountered since the birth of eternity. For eons it had searched, waiting for the spark of a master. To bind itself, it required a soul unique beyond all measure — a soul that fate could never replicate.
And here he was.
The Cube hesitated. Should it bind? Was this the destined one, or a mistake born of desperation? Milliseconds passed, but for the Cube those were centuries of thought. At last, it chose.
It surged forward, scanning the dying man one final time. His body was collapsing, bones and flesh already fraying under the advancing storm of destructive energy. There would be nothing left within moments. The Cube calculated with cold precision: the body could perish, but the soul could be carried. Once the bond was complete, it would wrench him from this doomed place and deliver him elsewhere.
With a flare of light, the Cube struck. A spear of brilliance lanced into the man's essence, piercing deeper than thought, deeper than memory. He did not resist — he could not. His body was too broken, his mind too fractured. The bond began to weave.
Then the voice of eternity resonated from the Cube itself, neither sound nor language, but the vibration of truth:
"[Bond complete. Body in collapse. Soul will be moved to another world.]"
Yet in that instant — something happened that should have been impossible.
The man's soul flickered weakly within the binding, too frail to struggle, too broken to defy. Against the Cube's ancient force, resistance was impossible. He should have been silent, carried away like countless fragments of life the Cube had observed across eternity.
And yet—something stirred.
From the faintest ember of his essence, a pulse rippled outward. Not strength, not power, but will. A will so sharp, so unyielding, it slipped past the Cube's dominance and echoed directly into the bond.
The thought was not spoken by voice or mind, but by the very pattern of his soul itself:
"I will not leave Rosy."
The Cube reeled. This was not resistance — the man was far too weak for that. It was something stranger, a flaw or gift written into his very being. His soul had spoken in a way no soul should, cutting through rules older than stars.
For the first time in eternity, the Cube felt surprise. Perhaps even reverence.
It spoke — not aloud, but as a vibration that shivered through the collapsing chamber, resonating in both flesh and spirit:
"[Her soul can be stored within me. But her body… that burden will fall to you. Do you accept this?]"
The words were not a question in the mortal sense, for the Cube did not bargain. Yet something in the man's will demanded recognition, and so the Cube allowed this crack in eternity's law.
The dying soul pulsed faintly in answer. Yes.
The Cube shifted, its attention turning toward the woman. Her body was nearly gone, breath and heartbeat dwindling into nothing. With delicate precision, it reached into the husk of her form and drew forth the last spark of her soul — fragile, trembling, but still alight. The Cube enfolded it within itself, a sanctuary of endless depth.
Only after securing Rosy's fading essence did the Cube turn back to the man. His body was moments from disintegration, nerves already unraveling under the storm. But his soul — its chosen master — pulsed steadily within the bond.
The Cube wrapped around it, enclosing his essence in the same eternal sanctuary where Rosy now rested. Two souls, bound together yet separate: one as master, one as entrusted. It was an arrangement the Cube had never allowed before, a defiance of its own ancient law. And yet, compelled by the man's singular will, it held them both.
The chamber around them convulsed, collapsing into ruin. Destructive energy devoured flesh and stone alike, erasing every trace of what once had been. But the Cube lingered no longer.
Light surged from its core, vibrations rippling outward until the very fabric of space-time convulsed. Reality shuddered, folding in on itself, and the Cube slipped into the fracture — not through a door, but into the raw stream of dimensions themselves. For an instant, the chamber and the universe around it ceased to exist, consumed in the wake of its passage.
Time and space trembled as the Cube tore through the dimensional current, carrying within it two fragile flames of life — the soul of its chosen master, and the entrusted essence of the woman he would not abandon. In that moment, all that remained of the collapsing chamber, of bodies and blood, was swallowed by the void. The Cube surged onward, slipping beyond the boundaries of reality itself, into the vast, uncharted flow of existence where destiny awaited.
After an Unknown Time
The Cube drifted. Through voids. Through dimensions. Through seas of stars and places where no stars could ever be. Time had no meaning.
It felt a call. Not sound, not thought — something older. A pull older than fate itself. The bond had awakened it, and now destiny demanded its path.
It passed realms vast as universes, yet strange and wrong. Here, there were no galaxies, no suns. Only endless tides of formless expanse. Chaos itself given a sea.
And in that sea floated fragments — bubbles of reality, each self-contained, each alive with its own rules. Some shimmered like molten glass, some boiled with lightning storms, others lay hollow and black, swallowing even thought itself.
The Cube learned their name as it drifted: Ebbs. Countless Ebbs, scattered like pearls across the Chaos Sea.
The call guided it closer. Toward one particular Ebb. From the outside, it looked no different from the others — a fragile sphere, glowing faintly in the endless dark. Yet the Cube felt the pull tighten.
This was the one.
It did not understand why. It did not need to. Fate was waiting inside.
The Cube dove.
Engora, Solias III Year 887
In the kingdom of Artia, within the small town of Veloria, a woman's cries of labor echoed through a modest chamber lit by warm lanterns.
Her hair was a burnished orange, her eyes a deep, warm brown. Her cheeks still carried the softness of youth, though motherhood had already marked her body with its quiet weight. At five and a half feet she stood below the kingdom's average, yet her form was graceful, her beauty curving between innocence and maturity.
That beauty was now strained with sweat and pain. She clutched at the bedding, body trembling as waves of agony wracked her. Beside her stood a Birth-Matron — one of Artia's respected attendants, skilled not only in midwifery but in the healing rites passed down through generations. With one hand she pressed herbs steeped in hot water, with the other she traced faint runes in the air — charms to guide new life safely into the world. Her voice hummed low incantations, a steady rhythm against the mother's cries.
Minutes stretched like hours. Then, with one final cry, the child came.
A son.
But silence followed. No wail, no breath. The chamber froze, thick with dread. The Birth-Matron lifted the boy, checked his chest, then pinched him gently. For a heartbeat, nothing. Then—life. A cry burst forth, sharp and desperate, filling the room. Relief swept through them like rain after drought.
The mother slumped back, weary, yet her lips curved into a faint, luminous smile. She gathered her son into her arms, pressing him close, whispering in a voice soft as spring rain:
"Shh… it's all right. Your mother is here. Don't cry."
Her warmth soothed him, and slowly the baby's cries faded. She tilted him outward, letting his tiny eyes meet hers. And in that instant, as though fate itself whispered the truth, she spoke the name:
"From this day forward, you shall be known as… Aeon."
The word was rare in Artia — a name carried from forgotten ages, said to mean eternity, unbroken, bound to ancient power. As though destiny itself had reached into this small chamber and placed its mark upon the child.
Aeon's POV
Drowsiness weighed on him like chains, yet awareness flickered at the edges. He had breath. He had a body. But… hadn't he died? The detonation—he remembered the blinding force, the tearing pain. This should have been the end. So why was he here?
He tried to open his eyes. It felt like lifting mountains. At last his lids cracked apart, but the world beyond was a blur — a haze of shifting colors too bright, too close. No forms, no edges, only vague vibrancy. His throat strained for words, but no sound came; he couldn't even control his own mouth.
Then he felt motion. He was being lifted, cradled. Voices surrounded him, speaking in a tongue he couldn't recognize. Captured? Did the enemy take me? Panic flared, weak but raw.
A sudden pinch shot through him — and he cried. Loud, helpless, unstoppable. The sound wasn't his choice; his body betrayed him. Yet the moment the wail left his lips, he understood. This wasn't captivity. This was rebirth.
Hands shifted him again, softer this time. A voice followed — warm, gentle, flowing over him like a memory of home. It had been twenty years since he last heard anything like it: his mother's voice from his past life. The ache in his chest eased. He quieted.
Through his barely opened eyes, he saw a flicker of orange above him. Hair? Strange. His blurred vision failed him, but the presence was unmistakably tender. She spoke again, words he couldn't understand — except one. One word rang clear, piercing through the fog:
"Aeon."
So that was his new name. His fate had been spoken into existence.
Sleep pulled at him once more, heavy and irresistible. But before darkness claimed him, he felt himself drawn close to warmth. Something soft pressed into his mouth, and a sweet liquid filled him. Milk. His tiny body stilled, satisfied. Comfort replaced confusion.
And beneath that comfort, in a place even his newborn mind could not reach, something ancient pulsed quietly within him — the Cube. Watching. Waiting. Silent as a second heartbeat.
And in that surrender, Aeon drifted back into sleep.