The wind carried whispers again.
Not voices—not quite but something in the air had changed. It blew from the east with a weight to it, thick and still, as if the sky had inhaled and refused to exhale. Farmers in the lowlands spoke of strange lights over their fields. Miners beneath Mount Grell heard echoes in tunnels that no longer matched their steps in the salt-blasted ports of Nerith, fish surfaced dead—eyes wide, mouths frozen mid-scream and always, the same refrain murmured on the edges of sleep. "It returns."
The Void had begun to spread again not with armies, also not with fire,
It spread in absence.
Maps began losing detail along their edges, borders faded, Whole villages became hard to recall. One archivist at the capital palace scratched out the word Thessan from an old census report, only to find it missing in every other document, even those he'd never touched.
He slit his throat that evening, whispering, "We've started skipping."
Aurin dreamt of gods that night.
He stood atop a shattered city, the stars above unfamiliar and cruel. Blood ran through the streets like ink. From the sky descended beings made of smoke and silver, wrapped in veils of light and sorrow. Their faces were masks—shifting, hollow, full of echoing silence.
One reached out to him and said—not with words, but certainty:
"You must begin now. The chapter waits. The world unravels in your delay."
He tried to speak, to ask who they were, but his mouth produced only narration.
"Aurin, golden-eyed hero of prophecy, nodded solemnly at the gods' command."
His dream-self bowed without intention. The sword Sunpiercer gleamed at his side, though he didn't remember drawing it.
When he woke, he was already dressed.
The King's summons came by raven. It had black-feathered, crimson-eyed, bearing the sigil of House Elaran pressed into wax: a sun eclipsed.
"Your path begins," the message read. "Come before the first shadow touches the capital."
The journey from the Windspine Monastery to Elaranth took three days on foot but Aurin arrived in one.
He walked through villages where time seemed fragmented like Children repeated the same games. Clouds in the sky didn't move. In one hamlet, he passed the same old man on three separate streets, wearing three different expressions.
No one noticed, not even the old man.
But Aurin felt the shiver of something tightening around the seams of the world.
At the capital gates, trumpets blared as if waiting for his arrival. Banners rose from behind walls as if by command. People emerged from buildings as if they'd been told to wait for their cue.
"The Chosen One arrives!" they cried, their voices too perfect in unison.
"Blessed be the golden eyes!" sang the bards, and a song began that he vaguely remembered hearing in a previous dream.
Aurin's eyes narrowed, just for a moment.
Then he entered the palace.
The Hall of Knighthood was carved from emerald glass and blackstone, veined with starlight ore from the depths of Mount Vael. Its ceiling glimmered like a trapped aurora, and pillars twisted with runes of forgotten tongues. The ceremony was old—older than the current king, older even than the city itself but this time, the words felt rehearsed.
"Rise, Aurin, son of fate," said King Elaran, placing a blade gently on each shoulder. "Bearer of prophecy, bane of the Void, light of the realm."
The crown shimmered in the torchlight. His voice rang across the hall without echo, as if the acoustics had been adjusted just for this moment.
"Arise, Ser Aurin of the Eclipse."
The chamber erupted in applause. But only for three beats. Then stopped perfectly but also simultaneously.
Aurin stood slowly, the sword Sunpiercer sheathed at his side, and nodded once.
He turned toward the crowd—generals, mages, nobles—and saw no faces he recognized. None except one.
A figure stood by a column, he was not clapping, not smiling.
A man in a long dark coat, carrying a book under one arm.
Aurin blinked and That man was gone.
He whispered to no one in particular, "He's here again."
In the royal gardens, during the feast, a scribe approached Aurin with a package.
"No sender listed," the scribe said. "But the library seal is genuine."
Aurin opened it beneath a silver-leafed tree that did not sway in the wind.
Inside was a book bound in dark green leather, laced with silver thread. The title gleamed faintly, shifting under the light:
The Eastern Aberrations: A Guide to Creatures That Defy Description
Aurin frowned.
This book was forbidden—its copies locked within the Fifth Vault, beneath layers of magical warding and bureaucracy. Only the royal archivists and a few sanctioned warlocks had access to it and no one would dare send it, No one should even possess it.
He opened to the first page and read a line written not in ink, but something that seemed etched into the paper:
"If you see its name, don't speak it aloud. Names can be heard."
And beneath it:
"—L."
Aurin turned the page quickly, eyes scanning for more.
Loren.
It had to be him again.
He found Loren later that night, by the palace's outer wall, beneath a solitary lantern that hadn't been lit in years. The man stood with his hands behind his back, staring up at the stars—not the same stars Aurin had grown up with, but ones that now seemed subtly altered. There was no constellation matching the Blade of Vael, though Aurin remembered it clearly.
"You shouldn't be here," Aurin said.
"I'm not," Loren replied.
"You gave me a restricted book."
"I didn't," he said. "You received it and There's a difference."
Aurin stepped closer. "Why?"
"You're going east soon, so I figured you might want to see what's being left out."
"Left out of what?"
Loren looked at him then, really looked—eyes sharp, tired, but clear not fanatical, not mad just… disappointed.
"You ever wonder," Loren asked, "why everything fits so neatly? Why your sword was waiting for you? Why your dreams tell you where to go? Why songs are written before you've done anything worth singing about?"
Aurin stiffened.
"I'm chosen," he said, automatically.
"Are you?" Loren asked. "Or are you just well-placed?"
A silence settled between them, disturbed only by the unnatural stillness of the night. Even the wind had ceased.
Loren stepped forward and handed Aurin something—another book, thinner this time with no title.
"Take this," he said. "Read it when the stars feel wrong."
Aurin reached out, first he hesitated.
Loren's fingers lingered a moment too long during the handoff.
That's when Aurin felt it.
The faintest pull—not physical, not magical, but something deeper.
Like gravity but made of intention.
As if the action of receiving the book had already been written before he chose to do it.
He pulled his hand back quickly. "Odd," he muttered. "I don't recall asking for this."
Loren only smiled. "Exactly."
And then, just like before, he was gone. No footsteps, no door, just absence. Like a word deleted mid-sentence.
The next morning, the King announced Aurin's official departure.
A grand ceremony unfolded in the east courtyard. Trumpets blared again, though Aurin suspected it was the same song as before. Horses were prepared. Scribes documented his armor in great detail. Children waved miniature flags sewn overnight by palace tailors.
Aurin stood still through it all. He didn't smile also didn't speak. He just waited.
When the time came, he mounted his horse and turned eastward, where the wastes stretched beyond known maps. Behind him, the gates of the capital closed—slowly, dramatically.
"Thus begins the quest," a court herald cried.
"Thus rides the hero of Ashvale!"
"Thus ends Chapter Three," whispered a voice.
Aurin looked up suddenly but there was no one. There was no source nor speaker just the wind, beginning to move again.
In the tower of the royal archives, the Head Archivist reviewed the inventory for the week.
One book, 'The Eastern Aberrations' is missing.
He sent a report to the palace guard, who assured him no one had breached the vault.
The Head Archivist swore under his breath, dipped his pen into ink, and filed a correction report.
Then he paused.
In the margin of the report, someone had written in a narrow hand:
"It wasn't taken just returned to the story."
He dropped the page and looked around. Because of this he did not sleep for three days.
Far across the continent, the Void pulsed.
It was not a place, nor a creature, but a correction. A narrative immune system. A return-to-form.
And it had felt something shift, a divergence and a ripple.
The boy had touched the off-script and the librarian had interfered again. And so the Void changed direction now it's no longer expanding randomly. Now, it follows the thread.
Somewhere, in a space between chapters, Loren sat at a desk made of stone and candlelight, reading an invisible script.
He turned the page and paused then smiled.
"You're starting to notice, Aurin. Good."
To be continued…