The air in the royal palace of Fiore grew heavy, almost suffocating. An archaic and dense energy saturated the underground chamber, where shadows danced to the rhythm of a power that was awakening.
Ancient runes began to glow on the polished stone floor, lines of light intertwining like gears of fate.
At the center of the magic circle, Layla Heartfilia remained standing, her expression tense, her golden eyes fixed on the spell she was about to complete. Sweat beaded on her forehead, and her hands trembled slightly from the strain of sustaining magic of such magnitude.
"Now…," she murmured, as the twelve golden keys floating around her began to vibrate and shine with a blinding light, emitting a high-pitched hum that resonated in the bones.
Beside her, Thomas E. Fiore, the king of Fiore, watched with a furrowed brow, his arms crossed in a gesture of contained worry. His daughter, Princess Hisui, still a child, clutched Arcadios's, her guardian's, hand tightly, unable to look away from the growing brilliance. The little girl's eyes reflected both awe and an instinctive fear.
The magic of time then roared, a thunderous sound that seemed to tear the very fabric of reality.
Space cracked like a struck mirror, and columns of bluish light descended from the top of the circle, illuminating every corner of the chamber with ghostly flashes.
The spell, designed with a clear purpose—to bring the Dragon Slayers from the past into the future, wrenching them from four hundred years ago—reached its climax. Several beams of light shot into the sky, one after another, like shooting stars tracing their path to the present.
Even as children, those flashes contained a fierce, untamed magical presence. Layla clenched her teeth; although the matrix remained stable, deep within her being, in that intimate bond with the magical current, she felt a shift, a subtle crack like glass about to break.
Suddenly, the magic that moments before had been under control began to pulse erratically, the light lines distorting.
"Layla?" asked Thomas, taking a step forward, alert. "This wasn't planned. What's happening?"
And then, without warning, a new crack opened in the air, different from all the others. It wasn't an orderly portal, but a gigantic wound in reality itself, stretching from the floor to the high vaulted ceiling. It wasn't a cold blue or silver like the previous ones, but a blazing gold, as if primordial fire had taken the form of pure light. From that searing breach, a small body was expelled.
A dull thud echoed in the hall as the child impacted the stone floor and rolled a few meters before lying still. He appeared to be about seven years old, with hair as black as the newly fallen night contrasting with his pale skin. His breathing was weak, almost imperceptible.
But what froze the blood of all present wasn't his sudden appearance, but the phenomenon surrounding him. Golden, ethereal flames danced around his small body, a fire that emitted light but no heat, that didn't consume or damage the floor, but seemed to wrap him in a protective embrace. The light pulsed to the slow rhythm of his heart, beating as if something within him responded innately and powerfully to the unleashed magic.
"That…," Arcadios swallowed with difficulty, partially unsheathing his sword before positioning himself firmly in front of Princess Hisui. "It wasn't in the records," he concluded, his narrowed eyes scrutinizing the newcomer.
Layla fell to her knees, exhausted. The main spell faded, the magic circle went out one by one, and the golden keys lost their luster, falling softly to the ground with a metallic clink.
"I didn't bring him…," she said with a trembling, breathless voice. "The magic… dragged him here. It's an uncalculated variable." The effort of invoking such an ancient and costly magic left her body weak and her mind clouded.
Fascinated and terrified at the same time, Hisui gently freed herself from Arcadios's hand and took a step forward. Her large eyes, filled with innocent curiosity, didn't leave the unconscious boy. "So who is he…?" she asked with childlike curiosity.
"Daughter, don't get too close," warned Thomas, with a mixture of authority and paternal concern. "We don't know yet if he's dangerous."
"It's okay, Dad. I don't know why, but… I feel he's safe," argued Hisui, watching as the mysterious golden flames surrounding the boy began to calm down, their intensity diminishing until they went out completely, as if they had never existed, leaving not even a burn mark.
With caution, Thomas approached the unconscious youth, while Arcadios helped Layla to her feet, holding her arm firmly. The Spirit Mage walked with slow, somewhat unsteady steps to where the boy lay.
"What exactly did you mean when you said you didn't bring him?" interrogated Thomas, kneeling beside the little one to examine his pulse, which was stable but strangely faint.
"Exactly that, Your Majesty. My spell was aimed at a specific group, sealed in the annals of time. This boy… was drawn by the resonance, as if an external force had hooked him onto the current of my magic. Perhaps… perhaps it's destiny intervening," explained Layla, bringing a hand to her chest, where she still felt the echo of the runaway power.
"Is that even possible?" Hisui asked again, looking alternately at Layla and the white-haired boy.
"Yes, Princess. Magic, especially that which manipulates time and space, is deeply mysterious and holds secrets we still don't understand," answered Layla before stifling another cough, a reminder of the price her body was paying.
"It will be best to keep him under close surveillance until he wakes up and we can get answers," decreed the king, his voice adopting the tone of one making a state decision. "Layla, I'm sorry to ask you in your condition, but I need you to stay in the castle a while longer. Your knowledge may be crucial to understanding this."
"Alright," accepted Layla with a resigned sigh, knowing that the consequences of that day were far from over.
---
Far away from the continent of Fiore, in a place bathed in perpetual moonlight, a woman of supernatural beauty with platinum blonde hair flowing like a river of silver interrupted her contemplation. Selene, one of the Five Dragon Gods, held a delicate sake cup between her fingers. Her eyes, deep as stellar lakes, rose toward the invisible firmament beyond her dimension.
"A spatiotemporal distortion so powerful… capable of crossing multiple dimensional layers," she mused to herself, her voice a melodic whisper blending with the night breeze. The residual energy, faint but undoubtedly anomalous, had brushed against her consciousness.
"Interesting…," she let the word fall before making a brief pause, an almost imperceptible arch rising on her perfect lips. "It seems the coming years will become truly fascinating."
---
In the vast Empire of Alvarez, in a meditation chamber plunged into a gloom broken only by black candles, a man in a dark robe with eyes as black as the abyss opened his eyelids abruptly. Zeref, the Black Wizard, felt the tremor in the very fabric of reality, a shockwave from an event he knew all too well.
"So they have arrived," murmured his voice, cold and devoid of emotion, directed at the surrounding darkness. Then, a slight curiosity imbued his words. "And it seems something else, something… different, has arrived with them. Interesting." Without another word, he closed his eyes, sinking back into his meditation, though now with a new factor being calculated in the infinite equation of his existence.
---
Meanwhile, in the Spirit Realm, where joy and festivity were eternal, the King of the Spirits watched the bustle with a broad smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. He knew of the sacrifice that Layla Heartfilia, the current contractor of the Twelve Golden Zodiac Spirits, had just made. The price for wrenching souls from the past was her own life; at most, she had a couple of years left. It was a regrettable loss for the magical world.
His smile faded for a moment, replaced by a thoughtful expression. He too had felt the distortion, the breach that had opened not only in time but between planes of existence foreign even to his realm. Something had passed through that crack, something that didn't belong to the natural flow of any known world.
"I wonder if this is destiny weaving its web in a way even we cannot glimpse," murmured the spiritual sovereign, taking a sip of a glowing drink. For now, all that remained was to wait, observe, and see what changes, what storms or what new lights, that mysterious child would bring to the world in the years to come.