"Hey, Kaela. I just heard of a shipment of new combat beasts. Do you want to go see? Maybe we can steal one,"
The voice belonged to a boy no older than twelve. Starfield eyes sparkled beneath a mop of translucent hair, his tone bright with mischief.
Kaela sat cross-legged in the shadows of a run-down hangar, a stolen cultivation manual floating beside her, flickering like a dying firefly. She didn't open her eyes.
"Rany," she muttered, "we're not messing with the Vox Drane. They'd skin us alive."
"Not if we're quick. Come on! Spanner cracked their access grid. I want a combat beast. You need to stop meditating and start living."
Kaela sighed, annoyed—but never really angry at him.
"Fine. But if this goes sideways, I'm dragging your ghost back with me."
The memory faded like fog under sun.
She opened her eyes. The sterile chamber greeted her again—white walls, humming lights, pain. Her collar hummed, her wrists ached, her muscles screamed.
"Rany…" she whispered into the void. But he didn't answer. He never would.
***
Far across the stars—light years from Veyron and Ganrok—a different life unfolded.
Lady Seraphine stood barefoot in a high-altitude training dome atop the Helior Citadel. Around her: nothing but mountains of glass-metal, vertical forests clinging to architecture, and the endless pale-blue sky of Astra Leonis—the capital system of the Noble Star Arc.
Her sword gleamed with condensed starlight. Her body was wrapped in elegant black training garb, patterned with gold sigils that reacted to her pulse.
"Simulation Environment: Cradle Sector Delta. Threat Level 10. Begin."
The dome shimmered. Snow. Ice. A tundra cracked open by ancient tectonics. The ground hissed with cosmic winds. This simulation was no illusion—it was enhanced through deep-environmental magic and mechanized field projection.
Thunder rumbled.
The Cryverak emerged.
Dozens. Six meters tall, plated in jagged black and silver armor, eyes glowing in rows of three.
Seraphine didn't blink. She inhaled.
"Celestial Vein: Lunar Pulse."
A ring of pale light erupted from her feet, creating a pressure wave that shattered the ice.
The first Cryverak lunged.
She disappeared in a burst of radiance—then reappeared above it, sword poised downward.
"Starpierce Form."
She struck like a falling comet.
The beast's chest caved in from the impact, crystalline blood spraying in slow arcs. It screeched—then collapsed.
The others roared, swarming.
She didn't hesitate.
Seraphine moved like light—dashing, ducking, slashing. Her energy surged.
"Celestial Vein: Orbital Bloom!"
Dozens of radiant stars bloomed from her shoulders, rotating like planetary rings. They intercepted claws, shattered ice bolts, burned through limbs.
The Alpha approached. Bigger. Smarter.
It howled, its third eye glowing with ancient frost.
"Celestial Vein: Astral Reflection!"
A shield of starlight shimmered in front of her, absorbing the eye beam with an iridescent wave. She backflipped, letting the snow absorb the landing.
Then: she sprinted straight toward it.
"Final Form—Celestial Cascade!"
Her sword split into three light-ribbons as she sliced. The Alpha reeled. Wounded—but not slain.
It roared again and slammed its claws into the ground. Ice erupted. Spears launched from every direction.
Seraphine raised her palm.
"Voidbloom Shift."
The stars around her collapsed inward—then exploded outward with concussive force, vaporizing the spires.
She dashed beneath its jaw, blade glowing blue.
With one fluid motion, she leapt, flipped mid-air, and drove her sword down into its skull.
A burst of radiant frost.
The Alpha dropped.
Silence.
"Simulation Complete," the AI intoned. "Threat Level 10 Neutralized."
Steam rose from Seraphine's skin. She exhaled, slow and steady. Her hands trembled for just a moment.
Still not enough, she thought.
She turned—and there stood her mother's aide. A Syneth guard, sleek and silver-skinned, neural veins pulsing with light.
"Lady Seraphine. Your mother summons you."
She nodded.
Seraphine moved through the grand halls of House Aetherion's main estate, the polished obsidian floors reflecting the soft star-lanterns overhead. Her boots made no sound. Though her expression remained calm, the energy she had just expended still hummed beneath her skin.
The guards bowed as she passed—none daring to meet her gaze.
She entered the command chamber, a sleek, circular room pulsing with layered holographic displays: star charts, encrypted transmissions, energy readings, planetary analytics. Her mother stood in the center, tall and regal, adorned in flowing robes embroidered with fragments of starmetal thread.
The Matriarch of House Aetherion, one of the oldest and most feared noble lines in the galactic core.
"You called for me, Mother?" Seraphine asked, pausing just inside the threshold.
The Matriarch didn't look up. "You're late. Again."
Seraphine folded her hands behind her back. "I was training. The Cryverak Alpha nearly broke through."
A flick of her mother's hand dismissed one of the displays. "You rely too much on your blade. Precision will serve you longer than raw force ever could. Especially in the matter I'm assigning you."
Seraphine's eyes narrowed slightly. "A mission?"
Her mother stepped forward, a new map materializing in the air—an outer system near the edge of the Ivarian Belt. The planet's name flickered in encrypted script: Rhastan-IV.
"A mining colony. One of ours. Production has ceased. Communication is scattered. All signs suggest interference."
"Pirates?"
"Worse. Cultists."
Seraphine tensed.
Her mother leaned in, voice quieter now. "Astral Sovereigns."
A beat passed between them. Cold silence.
Seraphine's voice was low. "I thought they were wiped out."
"We all did," the Matriarch replied, her eyes sharp. "But the sovereigns never vanish completely. They just… wait. And now they're awakening."
She gestured to another hologram—a blurred image of a crater surrounded by ritual markings, strange sigils pulsing with faint cosmic energy. A mining team had clearly unearthed something.
"What do they want with Rhastan?"
"Faith. Blood. And possibly fragments of their so-called gods. That world has something buried beneath it—something the Sovereigns believe sacred. The GCA won't acknowledge its existence publicly. Which is why we must clean this quietly."
Seraphine stepped closer, examining the data. "Is this... what you feared would happen again?"
Her mother didn't answer right away. Then: "This is what I knew would happen again. Which is why I trained you to kill gods if necessary."
Her voice softened a fraction. "I am not sending a fleet. Only you. With a hand-picked team."
"To protect the family name."
"To protect the galaxy from our mistakes."
There it was—an admission. Their House had once dabbled in forbidden paths. Seraphine held the weight of that history like a blade sheathed in her spine.
Then, the Matriarch turned and retrieved something from her desk—a small black case. She opened it, revealing a single obsidian pendant etched with a moving constellation pattern.
"This was your grandmother's. It belonged to her during the last Astral Incursion. She survived. Barely. She would want you to have it."
Seraphine took the pendant carefully. It thrummed with a strange warmth. Not magic—something older.
"Is it… a seal?"
"A key. To something we buried. Pray you never need to use it."
Seraphine looked at her mother, the air thick with unspoken warnings.
"Any other instructions?"
"Yes." Her mother turned back to the star maps. "If you find proof of their resurgence—eliminate it. Burn the temples. Kill the high priests. Make sure nothing returns from that planet except your ship."
"And if I don't?"
Her mother looked her straight in the eye. "Then don't come back at all."
In her quarters, Seraphine armed herself.
Her armor was ceremonial yet deadly—woven from void-thread and star-metal. Her sword magnetically locked across her back, and a crescent-shaped relic core sat embedded at her hip—a gift from the old noble houses, tuned to her bloodline.
The voidrunner ship awaited her on the central platform.
"Coordinates locked," the pilot intoned. "Destination: Ivarian Belt, Rhastan- IV"
The crew saluted. Syneth specialists. Arcane tacticians. Orbital gunners.
Seraphine stood tall, her voice steady.
"Warp."
As the stars bent around them, she stared into the void, where whispers of the Astral Sovereign grew louder.
They would find answers.
They would bury this cult.
And she would not stop—not until every last god-fragment had been turned to ash.