( Annotation for Readers )
- The sole purpose of this Prologue is so that you can understand the basic groundwork of this world: the laws of Gift, the Rite of Dawn, and the distinction between the nobility and orphaned children. It isn't quite the story of Lith ( MC ), but it most certainly is the world he has to exist in. If you'd like you can just skip or read the Chapter One if you wish, but having read this part will provide you with a key to navigate your way through the rest of the story.
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"In the beginning, there was only light—and from that light, came mercy, and judgment alike."
They still whisper that in Arathia, though the gods who spoke it have long gone silent. Once, their radiance flowed through every mountain, seas, and soul—rivers of creation called Divine Veins. But light faded. And when it did, men built their own order, not by crown but by the Gift. Fragments of godhood carved into mortal flesh. Each year, when the fifteenth dawn arrives, every child kneels before the Obelisk of Light. There, the heavens watch. The stone breathes. And within that breath, fate is written.
Hierarchy of Gifts:
"The light shines only where it is earned."
And this, the hierarchy was born:
▫️Divine Gifts: Miracles are called gifts of the divine. To awake an individual puts him above nations. This very path is followed by saints and saintesses who are considered to have been selected by heaven. These are the healers who will remake cities from ash and cleave mountains as warriors and prophets who shape destiny. Gifts of the Divine are as fearful as they are revered, for with such power, salvation and calamity can be born.
▫️High Gifts— cleaving ranks with their lightning blades, forming firestorms to roast their enemies, winds that tear gates from their hinges. These endow great generals, awful warlords, and champions. Their names are inscribed, victors recorded in empires.
▫️ Common Gifts — the little spreads of grace. A spark of fire in a forge, the hands to cultivate more fields, the vision to chase after stars. Some say they are low: they are the substructure of empire. Most soldiers, artisans, and townsfolk awaken these, and through they do not shake the world, they hold it together.
▫️ Failed Gifts — the cursed fragments. Too weak to fight, too strange to serve. A withered flame, a fleeting glow, a touch of warmth that heals but cannot harm. They are mocked, despised, and even abandoned. Few rise with such gifts; most are trampled beneath those more blessed.
And then there are the Giftless. No spark at all. To be Giftless is to be invisible—omitted from songs and records, a name never written. No Luminara ever lights for them; its pages remain blank, as if the very gods turned their blind eyes away.
For the Rite of Dawn is not mercy—it is judgment. In marble halls lit by gold and hymn, nobles watch from jeweled balconies while orphans kneel in shadows. The Obelisk shines, their fates unveiled in radiance and ruin alike. A single glow can mean salvation... Or exile. And so the world divides.
The Divine become scripture.
The High command armies.
The Common toil unseen.
The Failed are mocked and broken.
And the Giftless—they vanish, as though erased from the pages of creation.
Yet the light of Arathia wanes still. The gods no longer answer prayers. The Divine Veins rot. Healing has become a privilege sold by the Church of Saint Luminara—miracles in gold and faith alike. And resurrection...has been named heresy. Still, some whisper of the old days—when dragon's breathed besides gods, and miracles were free. Most call them myths. But deep in the shadow of the Cathedral, where an orphanage crumbles in silence, one boy kneels in prayer. He does not ask for glory, nor for power. Only for warmth. His light, when it comes, is faint—barely enough to be seen. The priests calls it worthless. The others turns away. And yet...some lights refuse to die. For every mercy can become divine. And in a world that worships power, a failed gift may yet defy the will of death itself.