---
The sky was raining fire.
No one in the lower boroughs even looked up.
The people here had learned that celestial calamities brought only death… or worse.
But Kai Everlon was looking.
Standing atop a crumbling building, the wind whipping his black hair, his gray eyes reflecting a fiery streak across the sky like an open wound in a god's body.
"A new shard…" he muttered.
In this world, the fall of a star didn't mean a wish…
It meant someone would become powerful…
And someone else would die for it.
---
🌠 The Fall
The red light pierced the clouds, then veered suddenly… as if searching.
It didn't fall in a noblemen's training ground.
It didn't fall in a temple.
It didn't fall near a palace or a magic tower.
It went straight for the slums.
For… Kai.
"No…" he whispered, feeling something press against his chest.
He ran.
He leaped between rooftops, slid down stony ledges, landed in alleyways, the light getting closer… closer…
People began to scream.
Some ran toward the impact site, desperate for power.
Some fled in terror from the explosion.
Kai was the only one who ran against it.
Not out of greed.
But because his heart… ached.
---
💥 The Impact
The shrapnel fell outside the city, on a desolate, rocky plain.
The explosion wasn't fiery… it was silent.
A ring of transparent light widened, passing through Kai without burning him… but it held the world still for a second.
The air.
The sound.
Even his heartbeat…
Then everything came back at once.
He knelt on the ground, gasping, clutching his chest.
And there… in the glowing hole before him…
There was no splinter.
There was no stone.
There was nothing.
Only… light.
A small, pulsating light, like a heart made of a star.
---
✨ The Call
"…at last."
The voice didn't come from outside.
From within.
Kai recoiled, breathing heavily.
"Who's there?!"
The light slowly drew closer, rising from the hole, then… pierced his chest.
There was no wound.
But the pain—
Like a sun exploding inside his veins.
He screamed, collapsing to the ground, his body trembling, his vision blurring, memories not his own flashing before his eyes:
⚔️ Giant creatures battle among the stars
🌌 A cosmic explosion tears through space
💔 A voice says: "I split... so that I wouldn't perish"
Then...
Darkness.
---
🩸 Waking Up
Kai opened his eyes with the dawn.
The sky was calm.
The plain was silent.
Not a trace of shrapnel.
"A dream...?" he murmured, then tried to sit up—
He fell to his knees, gasping.
His heart... was beating differently.
Slower.
Heavier.
And stronger.
Suddenly, words appeared before his eyes, as if etched in the air:
---
[First Star Core Activated]
User: Kai Everlon
Status: Unstable
Remaining Lifespan: 19 years, 3 months, 12 days
---
His eyes widened.
"What is this…?"
---
[Unique Ability: Shard Absorption]
You can consume the power of shards instead of merging with them.
⚠ Each use consumes a lifetime.
---
"Impossible…" he whispered.
In this world, people sacrifice limbs to obtain a shard.
He… had obtained something that defied the laws.
Something… that would consume his life.
---
🐺 First Test
A monster's roar shattered the silence.
From among the rocks emerged a shapeshifting wolf, twice the size of normal, its eyes glowing with the faint energy of a shard.
Drawn to the explosion.
And now he had found prey.
Kai tried to stand… but his body was exhausted.
"Not the right time…" he smiled bitterly.
The wolf leaped toward him.
Just as its claws were about to tear him apart—
Light spontaneously erupted from Kai's chest.
The world slowed down.
He saw…
A thin line of energy inside the beast's body.
A weak point.
He unconsciously reached out… and the light shot out like a starburst.
Against him!
The wolf fell before it could reach him.
Silence.
His breath was heavy.
His head was spinning.
And the words appeared again:
---
[Iron Splinter Trace Absorbed]
Weakness Perception (Temporary)
Remaining Age: 19 years, 3 months, 5 days
---
He froze.
"…One week less?"
His hands began to tremble.
Strength… in exchange for his life.
A life… in exchange for every battle.
He gazed toward the distant sunrise, and the city that didn't know a new monster had been born outside its borders.
He wasn't a hero.
He wasn't chosen to save the world.
He was… a walking bomb.
And yet—
He smiled.
"If I have to pay with my life…
At least I get to choose why."
Then he began to walk toward the city…
Unaware that his fall hadn't been an accident.
And that many eyes, from lofty palaces…
And from deeper shadows…
felt the starlight reborn.
End of Chapter One