Chapter 0 – The Hollow Star Remembers
There is a silence that comes after killing a friend.
It is not peace.
It is not grief.
It is a silence that eats you.
They will say I was born to do this.
That I was a storm in waiting.
That my mind snapped, or my soul fractured, or that I never had one to begin with.
They are wrong.
I did not set out to become a monster.
I set out to rewrite the world before it rewrote us.
They forget that. Or pretend to.
It is easier to hate a god than understand a man.
I was seventeen when I watched the Council burn my village.
The sky turned red not from fire, but from conviction.
I remember every word they said.
"Order must be preserved."
That was the moment I understood:
The world is not broken.
It was built this way.
So I studied. I organized. I rebelled.
And they followed me.
Not because I promised hope.
But because I promised clarity.
"You are not free. You have never been free. But I will set you free…
or bury you in the ashes of a better world."
His name was Calen.
He stood at my side when we were still too young to know what it would cost.
He begged me not to cross the line.
"Don't become the tyrant you fight."
But you cannot unseat gods with kindness.
You cannot burn a kingdom and expect your hands to stay clean.
I didn't kill him out of rage.
I killed him because he was right
And I couldn't afford to be.
Now they call me mad. Demon. Usurper. God.
Let them.
Let them choke on their shallow labels while I carve something immortal from the bones of a dying empire.
The Rewrite is not prophecy.
It is not mercy.
It is not hope.
It is a reckoning.
And I am its architect.
[The Archive Entry Ends]
And somewhere in the dark,
a coin spins.
Once.
Twice.
Then vanishes before it can fall.
Chapter 0.5 – Velora's Silence
They remember him as a god.
I remember the silence after.
They sing about the Rebirth now.
How the Rewrite saved us.
How the Archive is sacred.
How Rael was mad.
They never ask why the coin still spins.
Or why we let it.
They forget the names.
Not just of cities and streets and laws.
Of people.
Of Tessa.
Of the girl who stopped laughing when her memories didn't match the morning.
They rewrote her out of mercy.
I kept her memory out of cruelty.
They say grief fades.
They lied.
It folds.
It sharpens.
It becomes something quieter than anger, heavier than sorrow.
It becomes me.
They say I was chosen to lead the Council.
That I held the line.
That I brought order.
They don't know the truth.
I don't lead.
I don't heal.
I don't protect.
I remember.
That's all I've ever done.
I see the Hollow Star in my sleep.
Eight points.
Always shifting.
Some nights it flickers in my tea.
Other nights it hides behind the eyes of someone calling me by the wrong name.
Sometimes I answer anyway.
The coin always returns.
I leave it behind.
It waits.
One side means mercy.
One side means fire.
It always lands.
But I never look.
There is a silence that follows men like Rael.
A silence so wide, even memory slips through it.
That silence lives in me now.
And some nights…
It speaks in his voice.