The days that followed blurred into shadow and unrest.
The world, once luminous with dreamlight, began to pale — as if every dawn hesitated to arrive.
Sleep spread like a fever; whole villages fell silent, their people caught in endless dreaming.
But they were not the gentle dreams Arenne had gifted.
They were mirrors — cruel and warped — where every joy became a wound, and every love turned to ash.
Lysander saw the change as he journeyed north through the valley of Mirathen:
fields overgrown with frost though the season was spring,
birds frozen mid-song,
children murmuring in their sleep of a Queen with eyes like moons turned backward.
He could feel her influence everywhere.
The False Queen was not simply awakening — she was feeding.
Faith is her harvest now, Arenne whispered. Every mortal who succumbs to despair strengthens her shape.
"And the Oracle?" he asked. "You said they might remember how this began."
Yes. The Oracle of Ash. She witnessed my birth, when the world was still raw and full of light. If anyone knows how to separate divinity from its shadow, it will be her.
They traveled for seven nights across plains that once belonged to the first kingdoms — lands where temples had long been reduced to bone and stone.
Each night, Lysander dreamed of Arenne — not as the radiant Queen, but as a woman walking barefoot through a field of stars, her silver hair drifting like smoke, her expression weary yet tender.
She never spoke in these dreams, only turned to look at him — eyes full of both apology and love.
And every time, when he reached for her, she would dissolve into the night.
When he awoke, her voice would linger faintly in his thoughts:
Not all who live forever wish to be remembered.
On the eighth night, they reached the Vale of Ash, where the sky was a dull crimson and the ground glowed faintly from veins of buried ember.
It was said that gods had burned here once — those who refused to sleep when Arenne remade the heavens.
In the center of the vale stood the remains of a colossal statue, split at the waist, half buried in the ground.
Its face was serene, its eyes closed — and in its shadow stood a small, cloaked figure holding a staff of white bone.
When Lysander approached, the figure spoke without turning.
"You carry her voice."
The words were not question, but truth.
It's her, Arenne breathed within him. The Oracle remembers.
Lysander bowed his head. "Then you know why I've come."
The Oracle turned — a woman impossibly old, yet untouched by decay, her skin marked with glowing runes that shifted like smoke.
"I know. You seek to save the Queen from herself."
She smiled sadly, eyes like molten silver.
"But tell me, mortal — do you believe that love can outlast divinity?"
Lysander hesitated. "I don't know. But I believe love is what makes divinity bearable."
The Oracle's laughter was soft, like the crumble of ancient parchment.
"Then you understand more than she did when eternity first crowned her."
She raised her staff, and the air around them shimmered.
From the ashes rose visions — fragments of the past, glowing faintly in the crimson mist.
Lysander saw it all:
Arenne's first incarnation, rising from the celestial sea — radiant, vast, and unfeeling.
The creation of her first kingdom, born not from compassion but order.
The adoration that had turned to fear.
The loneliness that had hollowed her heart until she fell, and the world with her.
And within the same light, the birth of the False Queen — her reflection cast by the despair of mortals who begged for silence.
"They were never two," the Oracle whispered. "They are the inhale and the exhale of the same breath."
"Then how do I separate them?" Lysander asked.
"You do not. You balance them."
She lifted her hand, and a single ember drifted into his chest — sinking into his heart like a small, living flame.
"This is memory — the purest kind. When the time comes, you must show her what she forgot: that eternity is not stillness, but change."
The Oracle's eyes softened.
"But beware, vessel. The False Queen is not evil. She is the wound that love left behind. If you kill her, you will kill what makes the Eternal Queen human."
Lysander bowed, his voice steady though his hands trembled.
"Then I'll remind her that love can be pain — and still be worth living for."
The Oracle smiled faintly, almost proudly.
"Then go, child of dream. The world waits to remember."
As Lysander turned to leave, the ashes stirred behind him — forming faint wings, vast and luminous, that glowed once before fading into the wind.
And for the briefest moment, he heard a voice — not Arenne's, not the Oracle's, but something older, softer, maternal:
Every god is born to learn what it means to be mortal.
As he descended the vale, Arenne's voice returned — warm again, touched with emotion.
You carry a piece of me now — not my power, but my remembrance.
He smiled faintly. "Then let's go remind the world of what you were meant to be."
Far away, in the ruined city of Velhar, the False Queen stood upon her darkened throne.
The mirror-light around her pulsed like a dying heartbeat.
In her hands, she held a feather of pure obsidian — and when she dropped it, the world shuddered.
All across the kingdom, mortals fell into sleep once more.
And within every dream, her voice whispered like the hush before death:
Sleep, my children. Love has ended. I am all that remains.