The skies of Aetheryos burned that night.
Shades of violet and black clashed upon the horizon, dancing like blood and ink spilled across an empty canvas. In the distance, magnificent towers collapsed one after another, erupting with electric-blue light that reflected upon the fragments of anti-gravity glass.
Amidst the ruins, Reinhard Heydritch stood alone.
The wind swept across his long military coat, scorched in several places. The black uniform lined with silver once symbolized the pride of the Aetheryan Vanguard's Battlefront Commander. Now, only ashes and dust covered the emblem on his chest — a winged triangle, a mark of a glory long extinguished.
> "Unit 07–Heydritch... you are receiving the final evacuation order. All defense lines have fallen."
A machine's voice echoed through the remnants of internal communication. Reinhard didn't answer. His pale golden eyes stared at the wasteland that once was the capital — Core Nexus.
He heard the whispers of his internal systems — the noise of machines colliding with memories. Voices of fallen comrades, faint laughter amidst plasma fire, and the promises he once made to a world now reduced to ruin.
> "I wasn't made to survive," he muttered, his voice nearly lost within the roaring particle storm.
"I was made to protect."
But there was nothing left to protect.
His semi-organic body trembled faintly. Within his inner systems, biotechnological signals still pulsed — remnants of living tissue that allowed him to feel. Beneath the black plating and plasma crystal of his chest, there was something that ached: the pain of loss.
Aetheryos was dead.
And with its death, Reinhard lost his purpose.
Hours later, among the ruins of the Celestial Gate — the last functioning interdimensional portal — Reinhard stood before a sphere of swirling energy. It spun violently, forming an unstable spatial vortex: The Okstarian Rift.
> "If there is a world beyond this... a world yet unbroken," he thought, "perhaps I can atone for all of this."
His hand, encased in mechanical armor, pressed against a floating holographic panel. Ancient data surfaced — coordinates of an unknown planet: AFERA.
Its atmosphere was stable. Its energy, alien.
Yet its signal... alive.
When the portal opened, waves of violet light enveloped him.
The last voice of Aetheryos echoed in his mind:
> "Farewell, Guardian of the Iron Dawn."
Then everything turned white.
Reinhard fell through the heavens.
His body pierced through the atmosphere of a foreign planet — its skies a pale blue, yet behind that hue shimmered a silver light, dancing like crystal dust. He crashed upon a vast plateau of stone, releasing a shockwave of energy that spread across the valley.
When his eyes opened again, he saw a sight unlike any other:
fields of softly glowing crystals, rivers of light flowing like ribbons, and the sky filled with silhouettes of transparent beings — the Samnarii.
The ethereal entities approached, their forms vibrating in harmonic light. Their voices were not spoken — they resonated within his mind.
> "Being from a distant world..."
"Your body is broken, yet your soul still burns..."
"Do you come to destroy, or to protect?"
Reinhard knelt. He could not answer. His hand pressed against his cracked chest, where his systems struggled to adapt to the new atmosphere. In his mind, a single command repeated — an ancient order turned into prayer:
> "Protect... life."
And there, upon the radiant plains, the tale of redemption began.
From the ashes of an iron civilization,
arose a new guardian in the world of light.
The name Reinhard Heydritch would become legend across AFERA — the Guardian who came from a dying star, carrying the shadow of war to protect a world still pure.