SFX: THUD!]
Shade landed hard on his knees.
The impact should've shattered bone—
—but instead, the obsidian plain drank the force, rippling outward like black water.
[SFX: Wummm… ripple…]
Cold seeped through his trousers, numbing skin already prickling with fear.
He was alone.
Or so he thought—until the silence began to speak.
Useless.
Pathetic.
Why are you here?
His own voice.
Scraped raw by years of self-loathing, circling him like vultures.
The whispers grew louder—
until the plain cracked open beneath him, and memories spilled out like spilled mercury.
[SFX: CRRRAACK—! Shhhhhh!]
He saw himself—
Seven years old, sword too heavy, falling face-first into dust while his cousins laughed.
Twelve, hiding in the granary during drills, shame burning his ears.
Fifteen, his father's hand on his shoulder—gentle, crushing—whispering,
"We'll find your place, son. Somewhere."
Each memory took form as a shard of blue glass, hovering midair, edges honed razor-thin.
They spun faster.
[SFX: Whshhh—whshhh— ZING!]
Thin lines of blood bloomed across his forearms.
Shade flinched—
but the pain felt distant, as though his body belonged to someone else.
Then—
[SFX: THUM—thum—]
—the map beneath his skin pulsed once, glowing faint amber.
The shards froze mid-whirl.
A new voice cut through the air—low, ancient, iron-calm.
"Enough."
[SFX: SHH—KRSHHH!]
The shards exploded into dust.
The plain steadied.
The cuts vanished as though they'd never been.
He looked up.
Lady Maria stood ten paces away.
She was exactly as the legends painted her—
tall, armored in lacquered midnight blue, the crow-helm tucked beneath one arm.
Her hair—once black, now silver-white—fell in a thick braid, gleaming like frost under starlight.
But the stories had lied about one thing.
She was not dead.
Not entirely.
Her skin was pale as moonlit bone, veins glowing faintly beneath.
Her eyes—two voids ringed in silver flame.
Across her back rested a greatsword etched with shifting constellations that moved when unobserved.
She studied him the way a butcher studies meat.
"You crossed the Veil without invitation,"
she said, her voice centuries deep yet soft as snowfall.
"That is… rare."
Shade's tongue clung to the roof of his mouth.
He managed a croak.
"I didn't choose this."
"No one does."
Her head tilted slightly.
"Yet here you stand—bleeding on my threshold.
The Tower senses weakness. It hungers."
Shade followed her gaze.
The Astral Tower now loomed impossibly close—
miles folded into mere steps, as only dreams could twist space.
Its surface was made not of stone, but compressed starlight, swirling in slow motion.
At its base: a gate of black iron, bound with chains thicker than a man's body.
The chains twitched—
[SFX: GRRNNNK—CLANK—!]
grinding like teeth in their sleep.
Maria stepped forward.
The obsidian parted beneath her boots, revealing a path of pale fire.
"The map chose you," she continued.
"That is the first test. Most who receive it die within the hour, torn apart by their own reflection.
You still breathe."
Shade finally found his voice.
"What do you want from me?"
"Want?"
A humorless smile ghosted across her lips.
"I am the want. The Tower's final lock.
I sit. I wait. I cut down the unworthy."
She drew her greatsword—
[SFX: SHHHH—KLANG!]
Constellations flared alive across the blade, projecting a web of light that seared the sky.
Runes shimmered on the plain—runes that made his eyes ache to behold.
"But you," she said, "carry the brand of the First Hunter.
My brand."
She turned her left wrist—
and beneath her vambrace, a glowing spiral scar matched the mark beneath Shade's ribs.
"I don't understand," he whispered.
"You will."
She sheathed the sword. The runes died.
"This realm is a sieve. It catches what the waking world discards—fear, regret, potential unrealized.
Most souls dissolve. Some twist into horrors.
A few…"
Her gaze fixed on him.
"A few are forged."
Shade's knees trembled.
"I'm not a warrior. My clan—"
"Your clan is ash in the wind here."
The words were not cruel.
Just true.
"What matters is what you do with the next breath."
[SFX: RRRMMMMMBLE—!]
A deep tremor rolled through the plain.
Obsidian split open in a jagged scar, exhaling blue mist.
From the fissure rose a creature stitched from nightmare—
a stag's skull crowned with antlers of broken swords,
a body of smoked glass filled with writhing shadow.
It pawed the ground, scattering sparks.
[SFX: CRK—CRK—HHHHRRR!]
Maria did not even glance its way.
"The Tower's first guardian. It smells the brand."
Her voice turned cold.
"Kill it… or be unmade."
"I don't have a weapon!" Shade shouted.
"You have everything you need."
She stepped aside.
"Or you have nothing. Prove which."
The stag lunged.
[SFX: SKREEEEE—BOOOM!]
Shade's mind blanked.
Instinct—buried deep in blood and bone—took over.
He dove left, the antlers slicing air just inches from his throat.
[SFX: WHOOSH—!]
He rolled, fingers brushing against the ground—
—and closed around a shard of obsidian.
Warm. Vibrating. Alive.
The beast wheeled, shadows spilling from its ribs to form lashing tendrils.
[SFX: CRACK! WHIP! CRACK!]
Shade ducked, the air shattering above his head.
He lunged forward and drove the shard into the stag's foreleg.
[SFX: SHRRRK—KSHHH!]
Glass cracked. Black ichor hissed as it hit the ground.
Pain exploded in his side—one antler grazing deep.
He gasped, feeling blood soak his shirt—
—but the map beneath his ribs flared.
Cold light spidered through the wound, knitting it shut.
Not healing.
Postponing.
A loan, not a gift.
The stag reared back, screaming like tearing metal.
[SFX: SKREEEEEEEEEE!]
Shade saw his opening.
The hollow beneath the skull—where shadows pooled thickest.
He sprinted.
Leapt.
And drove the shard straight into it.
[SFX: THUMP—CRACK—BOOM!]
The creature imploded inward.
Shadows collapsed into a single marble of night that dropped at his feet with a soft clink.
Where it touched, white flowers bloomed from the obsidian—
and withered just as fast.
Silence returned.
Only his ragged breathing remained.
Maria approached.
She knelt, picked up the marble, and pressed it into Shade's palm.
It pulsed like a heartbeat.
"First blood," she said softly.
"The Tower tastes it now. It will send worse."
Shade stared at the orb, then at his half-healed wound.
"What am I becoming?"
"Whatever you decide."
She straightened, turning toward the gate.
"Beyond lies the Ascent—seven spirals, seven trials.
At the summit, the Door of Waking.
Open it, and you may return home—changed.
Fail…"
She looked back, eyes burning silver.
"And the Realm will feed on you forever."
She began to walk away.
"Wait!" Shade called, voice cracking.
"Will I see you again?"
Maria paused.
A faint smile ghosted her lips.
"I never left the Tower, boy.
But my echo walks where it must."
She pointed to the marble in his hand.
"Break that when there's no other choice.
It will summon me… for a price."
[SFX: Caw—CAW—!]
Then she dissolved into a storm of starlit crows, spiraling upward and vanishing into the Tower's glow.
Shade turned to the gate.
The chains now hung slack, a single gap just wide enough for him to slip through.
Beyond lay a staircase of transparent crystal, spiraling into darkness.
Each step etched with a different constellation.
He took one breath.
One step.
The marble in his hand grew heavier—
as if it carried every choice he had yet to make.
Behind him, the fissure sealed.
No retreat.
He tightened his grip on the obsidian shard, squared his shoulders—
and crossed the threshold.
[SFX: KLAK—KLAK—KLAK— footsteps fading into the dark.]
The first spiral began.