The void around her was infinite, unblemished and vast beyond even the scope of perception. A horizon plain of light shimmered beneath her and above her, suspended in eerie silence, was a burning miniature sun, almost as large as a mansion. It blazed with a deep azure glow, rippling waves of radiant energy out in all directions. And beneath that deadly beauty sat Narisva Starisnova, still as death in a lotus position.
Her body was drenched in sweat. Her skin was flushed and shimmering faintly from the saturation of her own power. She had been meditating without rest for days. Her breathing was shallow but sharp even while her limbs trembled from the brutal strain.
But eventually she moved. Her fingers twitched, her jaw clenched and then her eyes opened sharply with a choked gasp.
It sounded like someone drowning in air.
She toppled over, her sweaty palms slapping the star-soaked floor beneath her. Her body shook with each breath, her face nearly kissing the cool ground. Sweat dripped in slow trails from her forehead and she didn't even try to wipe it away. She had pushed far, far past her limit.
"You have passed the First Sacred Trial, Narisva Starisnova. You poured Spatial Energy into one miniature sun for six hours."
There was a pause. Then, in a tone laced with faint sarcasm:
"Even though six hours ended three days ago."
Narisva, still on her knees and gasping, let out a breathless chuckle. Her voice was cracked. Her starry eyes met nothingness until the shimmering outline of her tormentor appeared.
"I wanted to see how far I could go. Five days, huh? That's how long it takes for me to push one heavenly body to its limit. That is all I needed to know."
The air trembled as the Celestial stepped forth from the darkness.
The space bent as he appeared before her, a man-shaped entity of pure astral tapestry. His skin shimmered like galaxies in motion. His robes were stitched from a sky that didn't belong to this world, billowing even though there was no wind. The only thing truly human about him were his eyes with no pupils or irises. They were just pure, radiant white. He raised a hand to the sun above her and with a flex of his fingers, he compressed it into a blue orb the size of his palm.
"You've grown. A miniature sun like this, if wielded correctly, could end gods."
Narisva remained silent, slowly sitting upright, her legs folding beneath her. She watched him for a long moment before speaking again, this time in a quiet, unguarded voice.
"Thank you."
The Celestial froze.
It was a simple word but it was something he had never expected from her, not after everything. And hearing it now rattled the very foundations of this dimension. He tilted his head.
"You thank me? After everything?"
"Why not? You helped me become this."
"You should hate me."
"I did."
"Then why—"
"Because I meant what I said. Do you remember? When I was eighteen. I made a deal with you."
Her eyes shimmered faintly as she looked at past him, through him, s if remembering a lifetime ago.
"I gave you my soul in exchange for your power so I could kill the Starisnovas. All of them."
The Celestial's body pulsed with a ripple of dimensional interference, stars on his skin dimming slightly.
"You haven't spoken of that day in over a decade."
"I didn't need to. I knew what I did. And so did you."
Narisva's hand drifted to the space just beneath her ribs, to a place where her soul had been scarred long ago.
"You wanted more from me. You wanted control and use my body. You thought I was just another vessel for your divinity."
The Celestial flinched subtly.
"But I tricked you. I used my father's weapon and caged you inside it. And when I had your power, I did what needed to be done. I slaughtered every one of them who betrayed him. I tortured the ones who turned my mother mad and stood there while she..."
Her voice broke for just a breath. She didn't look away.
"She killed herself because no one helped her. And my father… they killed him, then smiled at me during the funeral."
She wiped her mouth with the back of her trembling hand, expression neutral again.
"I don't regret what I did. And I don't regret using you."
The Celestial stared at her in stunned silence. But she wasn't done.
"You stayed sealed for years and then I almost died on that battle with the Frozen God. Darling. saved me. He poured his soul and his near infinite Soul Energy into mine to keep you trapped without destroying me in the process. He didn't even hesitate."
The Celestial's mouth opened slightly. His hands twitched.
"You know how rare it is for someone to hold Soul Energy like that and still be sane. And instead of killing you, he preserved you inside me and kept you alive... but harmless. For my sake."
The Celestial looked like he had just been punched in every galaxy he was made of.
"You... remember everything, don't you? Even then, even when your soul was crumbling, you saw it."
"I remember all of it. And that's why I'm thanking you now."
"Why?"
"Because if I hadn't gone through all of that, I wouldn't have become strong enough to live the life I have now."
Her voice dropped into something quiet.
"I love him, you know. He doesn't know what to do with me most days. But I know he sees me, even when I'm not sure I exist properly."
The Celestial didn't speak.
"I'll never forgive you for what you did to me but I will thank you. Because you made me hate enough to survive."
"You had the chance to consume my soul," he said slowly, watching her. "You could have broken my barrier while I was weakened when that Vastarael trapped me."
"I was going to. Right before I realized Vastarael was dead, I felt your essence slip out. I knew I could rip it out and devour it. It would have fueled me."
There was no apology in her voice. The Celestial narrowed his eyes.
"Then why didn't you?"
She turned to face him finally. Her smile was sharp, but faint, like it hadn't been used in a long time.
"Because you've got a goal and a pretty stupidly ambitious one, I won't lie. You want to kill the one who wiped out the last Celestials, right?"
"Yes."
"Then I guess I decided I'm not going to burn your soul into fuel just yet. I like your stubbornness. But why go that far? You do know how huge that goal is, right? That's not even a grudge anymore. It's a planetary-level revenge."
He didn't flinch.
"When Celestials die, we don't reincarnate. We don't get another life. Our souls aren't recycled. They don't fade into memory or dreams like mortals and immortals do. We become a byproduct of cosmic grief."
He looked up.
"Some become stars. Others… if the death is too violent and the Celestial dies in agony, we don't become light. We become black holes."
Narisva's eyes softened.
"You're saying that when they killed your people…"
"They made black holes across the universe. They are graveyards no one can fix."
He paused again.
"Your world it only exists because he saved you. That man. Vastarael. In the Epoch Cycle, you were already halfway gone. You were going to implode Spheraphase into nothing. He ripped you back. Do you know how hard that is? To stop a being who's become their own singularity?"
Her throat tightened. A soft tremor ran through her jaw.
"You owe him your existence," the Celestial said plainly. "That's the only reason I'm here to help you get stronger. He saved both of us. This is my gratitude."
And for the first time, Narisva didn't hide the warmth in her voice.
"I know."
He tilted his head slightly.
"You love him, don't you?"
She met his gaze.
"I do."
Her shoulders slumped a little as she exhaled, her fingers running through her hair.
"I've only been gone five days but it feels like a year. I don't even like being around people that long. And yet here I am, missing him. That's strange, right?"
The Celestial stared at her for a long moment. Then, he smiled. Narisva stepped closer to him and held up her hand. In it was a shard of floating, glowing matter.
"I got the first of the seven pieces from the Space Primordial after passing the first trial."
Her other hand opened. A portal began to form, swirling starry energy folding open like a flower in reverse.
"And now all I need is him. Don't worry. I'll bring him here very soon. You two are going talk. He might punch you, though."
The Celestial smirked. "I deserve it."
Narisva looked back at him as the portal's glow began to intensify. She called softly, pausing mid-step.
"Hey. You said I've changed when I come here five days ago."
"I did."
"Well, it's because of him. That man… he looked me in the eye when I was at my worst and said I wasn't broken."
She stared through the portal now, as if she could already see Vastarael waiting on the other side.
"He doesn't just fight to survive. He fights for meaning. And I'm not going pretend I'm not obsessed with that. So yeah. I'll see you soon. Thanks for helping me get through the First Sacred Trial."
Narisva vanished in a burst of space-warping light. The Celestial was left standing there in silence, alone again beneath the horizon of space.
"She really changed."
And for the first time in millennia, he let himself laugh.
"That man really changed her."