For thirteen hours, he did not move.
Not a breath misplaced. Not a muscle stirred.
Only the wind combed through his hair, and the salt of the sea kissed his skin. Thirteen visions he called forth- each drawn with no small measure of authority. Each a thread of the great weaving of time, studied and woven into memory.
And at the end of the last one, Achilles- no, The Ninth Adrastia Emperor King, rose.
He stretched slowly, the movement like the turning of a page written in the language of ancients. His back straightened. His arms folded behind him, the bones of his shoulders cracking once with satisfying finality. He looked ahead.
And his eyes… burned.
They burned with certainty. With the rare light of a man who had seen the future not once, but over a dozen times. A man who had walked every possible path. Fallen in some. Triumphed in others. And now, stood only on the one that led to victory. Multiple times over!
He inhaled.
