Thousands of years ago, ten mages stood at the apex of existence — not merely the apex of the world, but of reality itself.
In their arrogance, they reached for something beyond their grasp: the Source, the layer beneath all elements, the foundation of creation. They failed. And in failing, they shattered the heavens.
What was once one world became countless fragments — the Shards. Each one a self-contained world, each one believing it was the only world. The people in each Shard forgot the others existed. The sky grew light again. Men forgot what it had felt like to be pressed down upon.
That was three thousand years ago. Now, the world is in the business of remembering.
Aaron was never supposed to be anyone. A boy reborn from a different world into a mountain village with no bloodline, no noble backing, and no future worth speaking of — until the day a cave swallowed him whole and spat him back out as the successor to the greatest mage who ever lived.
But Sirath Vael, the Void Sage, didn't choose Aaron for his talent. He chose him for something deeper. Something Aaron himself doesn't yet understand.
The path to the top is not a straight line. It fractures. It splinters. It leads to places that shouldn't exist. And the higher Aaron climbs, the more he suspects that "the top" isn't a destination at all.
It's a door.