The wind had stopped moving.
Even the air seemed afraid to breathe.
After the eclipse faded, Lunareth was quieter than death itself. The streets glimmered faintly with what looked like "dust from shattered stars", drifting down and vanishing before it could touch the ground. I stood beneath it half trembling, half frozen staring at my reflection in a cracked shop window.
My eyes weren't their usual color anymore.
They pulsed faintly… violet and blue.
Like the moon that had just vanished.
For a moment, I thought I was dreaming. But dreams don't hurt like this.
Something inside me was burning. It wasn't fire not heat, not pain. It was pressure. Like the whole sky had been crammed into my chest and was trying to claw its way out.
I fell to my knees. My fingers dug into the stone, leaving faint cracks.
"W-what… is this…?"
Then I heard it.
A whisper no, thousands of whispersflooding my head all at once. They weren't human. They weren't even words. They were echoes. Old, foreign, beautiful in a terrifying way.
"The pact has been awakened…"
The voice came from nowhere.
And everywhere.
The ground trembled. A faint blue light spread beneath me in a circle, forming intricate patterns I'd never seen before. Symbols. Runes. Like the markings of an ancient seal.
And in that moment, the hunger that had haunted me for years… vanished.
The emptiness that lived inside me since my mother's death… went silent.
I could "feel everything" every stone under my hand, every heartbeat in the dark, every breath of the city itself.
It wasn't power.
It was "awareness".
Then I realized this wasn't just mana.
There was something deeper. Denser. Alive.
"Lnx Energy."
"The Law of Shadow."
The words carved themselves into my mind. I didn't know what they meant, but my instincts screamed that this was not normal mana or aether. This was something older something that "existed before the gods themselves".
My body shivered uncontrollably. The blue-violet glow around me flickered, then exploded outward in a wave that shattered windows and sent a stray dog tumbling into the air.
When the light dimmed, I could barely move. My body felt drained, but not broken. I stared at my hands. The faint traces of light still crawled under my skin like living veins.
"What… did I become?" I whispered.
A chill passed down my spine.
Someone was watching.
I turned, slowly.
At the end of the alley stood a figure, half-hidden by mist. Tall, draped in tattered black. His eyes gleamed faintly red beneath a shadowed hood. He didn't move. Didn't speak. Just watched me with an almost… knowing calm.
My breath hitched. "Who are you?"
No reply.
Then his voice slid through the silence calm, deep, and unsettlingly human.
"So… you're the other one."
The other one?
He stepped forward, and the light caught his face. He looked no older than me sixteen, maybe seventeen but his aura felt ancient. The air around him bent slightly, like space itself didn't want to touch him.
He smiled faintly.
Not cruelly, but knowingly.
Like he had been waiting for this moment for a long time.
"The meteor didn't choose one. It chose two."
Before I could react, he raised his hand. A red-black circle flared in the air. My instincts screamed. Without thinking, I pushed my hand forward and a wall of blue-violet energy erupted between us, stopping his attack midair.
The impact shook the street. Dust swirled. My ears rang.
For a heartbeat, neither of us moved.
He lowered his hand, studying me with quiet interest.
"Interesting… You can already use "Lnx." I had to bleed for days before I could even hear its voice."
His tone wasn't mocking it was curious. Almost… respectful.
That made it worse.
"Stay away from me," I warned. My voice was shaking, but my heart wasn't. Something inside me had changed.
He chuckled softly.
"Stay away? You don't even understand what you are yet,"Brother of the Eclipse".
I didn't get to answer. A gust of wind roared through the alley, and by the time I opened my eyes, he was gone. Only the faint scent of burning air remained.
I stood there, heart pounding, unsure if I was alive, dreaming, or something in between.
The moonlight had faded completely now.
But the city was awake again.
And in that quiet, I heard the whisper return gentle this time.
"Run, Adrien."
My mother's voice.
I turned toward the sound. Nothing. Just the reflection of a broken world staring back at me.
But for the first time, I smiled. Just barely.
Not out of joy, but defiance.
The night of the cursed dawn had begun.
And this time… I would walk through it.
"I am the eclipse that walks alone…"
The night was silent.
Not the kind of peaceful silence one finds in nature this one was sharp, like the pause before something breaks. The moon hung low, bathed in a violet glow that almost bled into the horizon. And beneath that bleeding light, I sat… motionless.
My hands trembled, not because of fear no, fear had already abandoned me. What coursed through my veins now was something else. Something older.
"You are chosen, Adrien…"
That voice again. The same one that whispered when the meteor fell the same one that spoke when the world went quiet.
I could still feel the pulse under my skin. My veins glowed faintly crimson, like embers beneath glass. Every breath I took sent ripples of power through my chest, making the air feel heavier. Mana. Aether. And now… something far darker. Something that didn't belong in this world.
"Lnx Energy The Law of Shadow."
That's what the voice called it.
It didn't flow like mana. It "shifted." Like the world itself bent slightly whenever it moved. The air dimmed around me as if refusing to reflect light. Even the crickets outside had stopped singing.
I looked down at my reflection in the shattered glass before me.
My eyes once a dull shade of gray now carried faint streaks of dark violet, curling like smoke around the pupil.
"Is this… really me?"
I whispered to the emptiness.
The silence answered.
Outside, the streetlights flickered.
My old neighborhood quiet, lifeless, forgotten. The same place where everything began.
My parents' graves weren't far from here. The thought made something twist in my chest. I remembered my mother's voice, her soft humming, the way she'd smile when I clumsily tried to help her cook. I remembered my father's laugh the one that could cut through even the coldest night.
And now, all that warmth was gone, leaving behind only the faint echo of who I used to be.
"If you wish to survive… you must accept what you've become."
That voice again. But this time, it wasn't in my head.
I turned sharply.
A figure stood in the alley's mouth tall, wrapped in a black coat that swayed gently in the wind. I couldn't see his face, but I felt his gaze. Heavy. Calculating.
"Who are you?" I demanded, my tone sharper than I intended.
The figure tilted his head slightly, as though studying me.
Then he said something that froze the air.
"Another one… chosen by the eclipse."
His words struck me like lightning.
Another one?
I stepped forward, feeling the ground tremble slightly under my feet. "What do you mean by that?"
He chuckled a low, haunting sound that sent chills crawling down my spine.
"You think you're special? You think the heavens chose only you?"
The shadowed man raised his hand, and in an instant, the air split apart. Black tendrils of energy similar to mine, but colder spiraled outward like smoke. His aura distorted the surroundings; lamplights shattered, walls cracked, and the faint hum of energy made my teeth ache.
"You're just one piece of a dying prophecy," he whispered. "And I am the other."
Before I could react, he vanished and reappeared behind me. My instincts screamed. I twisted around, throwing my hand out.
Light burst from my palm no, not light. Aether. But as it collided with his shadowy strike, the colors bled together, forming a sharp, violet explosion that cracked the pavement.
The sound echoed through the empty streets like thunder.
I stumbled back, breathing heavily. "Who are you!?"
The man smirked beneath the hood. I could barely make out his pale grin.
"Name's irrelevant. But since you'll die soon anyway… call me "Rein." The First Chosen."
That word. "First."
My pulse spiked. The Lnx energy inside me reacted, flaring violently. My shadow stretched unnaturally across the walls, moving as if alive.
"I won't die here."
My voice was calm but beneath it, the air screamed.
Rein raised his hand again. "Then show me."
He lunged forward, faster than I could blink. Shadows gathered around his arm, condensing into a blade. I barely ducked as it tore through the wall behind me like paper.
I thrust my hand out instinctively mana surged, forming a pale-blue barrier. His blade slammed against it, sparks flying in the night. The impact forced me to my knees, but I refused to let go.
"Come on, Kaen," I whispered to myself. "Think!"
Then, it happened.
The air around me fractured like broken glass and from the cracks, "shadows poured out". Not his. Mine. They slithered like serpents, wrapping around Rein's legs, his arms, and the very space he stood on.
For a brief moment, the Law of Shadow obeyed me.
Rein looked down in surprise. "You can already command it?"
"Guess I'm a fast learner."
My voice came out lower, colder. Not entirely human.
I clenched my fist and the shadows constricted. The air groaned, and Rein was thrown backward, smashing into a concrete wall with enough force to leave a crater.
Dust settled.
My heartbeat thundered in my ears. I could barely feel my own body.
Then, from within the dust, I heard him laugh.
"Impressive…"
He stepped forward, unscathed, his grin wider than before. "You really might survive this after all."
Before I could move, he disappeared again this time, his presence completely vanishing.
Only his final words lingered in the wind.
"But remember, Adrien… the eclipse never shines on two suns."
And just like that, he was gone.
The night grew silent once more.
I collapsed to my knees, gasping, my hands trembling violently. My veins still glowed faint crimson, pulsing slower now, as if the power itself was calming.
"The eclipse… never shines on two suns."
The words echoed in my head like a curse.
Another chosen one. Another wielder of this energy.
If he's the first, then what am I? The second? The rival? The successor?
The wind blew softly, carrying dust and the faint smell of blood. I could feel something shift in the world a boundary cracking, like a door opening somewhere far away.
And I knew then…
This was only the beginning.
"The night of crimson veins marked the start of my war."
"Not against the world, but against fate itself."
And somewhere in the distance, the moon dimmed its light fading behind a growing shadow.