Ten thousand years.
That was how long the Hollow Crypt of Silence had remained untouched—an obsidian prison beneath the world's deepest root, forgotten even by time itself. No air stirred within its ancient halls, no light dared breach its sanctum. It was a place of stillness so profound that even the concept of sound had long since eroded into myth.
Until now.
A breath.
A single exhale, subtle as morning mist, yet powerful enough to send tremors through the crust of a world that had long moved on.
The coffin at the center of the crypt—black stone veined with crimson aether—shuddered. Its surface, marked by runes older than gods, cracked with a hiss of searing air.
Crack...
A spiderweb of fractures raced across the lid. Then, in the deathly quiet that followed, a hand emerged from within—pale, elegant, cold. The fingers flexed, and every rune on the walls dimmed in response. The crypt groaned as the seals that had bound it for millennia finally gave way, unraveling with a mournful howl.
Then came the eyes.
Silver-gray. Unblinking. Timeless.
Eyes that had seen galaxies fall, gods weep, and empires crumble to ash. Eyes that had once ruled not just worlds, but the laws that governed them.
Zeirion Althar had awakened.
He sat upright in the coffin, long hair cascading over bare shoulders like rivers of midnight shadow. His expression was unreadable—stoic, cold, refined. He did not gasp, nor did he speak. He simply was, and that alone caused reality to adjust around him.
From beyond the crypt, faint light seeped through the cracks of the ancient seal. He rose, bare feet touching the stone floor with silent weight. The room darkened, as if fearing to offend its former master.
With each step toward the sealed exit, the heavy door—formed from celestial ore and bound by the breath of extinct titans—began to tremble.
Then it shattered without a touch.
A tidal wave of raw presence spilled into the upper realms, felt only by those sensitive enough to notice... and brave enough to remember.
The stars above flickered.
The gods stirred in their sleep.
And far away, atop a mountain of sacred winds, a woman opened her eyes.
Meanwhile, in the Blooming Realm...
The world had changed.
Mountains had been moved. Rivers reversed. Empires born and swallowed again. Yet the spirit of the realm—its soul—felt fractured.
Zeirion stepped into the starlit air, the wind cool against his skin. He wore no armor, no crown. Only a long cloak of black silk, stitched with the ashes of the ancient phoenix whose final breath had once tempered his blade.
The land before him was unfamiliar. New cities sparkled in the distance, sprawling monuments to ambition and pride. Massive floating sects loomed in the sky—Sects of Eternal Blades, Storm Heavens, and Divine Titans—all loud in title, but hollow in legacy.
He walked unnoticed along a worn path, passing by a group of cultivators squabbling over a slain beast.
"—I killed it!" one of them barked.
"You only grazed it! I split its skull!"
"Shut up, both of you!" the eldest snarled. "The sect leader gets the core. You want to be whipped again?"
Zeirion passed them by.
The cultivators felt something. A shift in the air. A presence colder than death itself brushing their bones.
They turned, eyes narrowing at the cloaked stranger.
"Who the hell are—"
He glanced at them.
Silence.
They froze—literally. Their bodies encased in a film of ice so fine it caught moonlight like glass. One breath, and the air shattered. They collapsed, unconscious but unharmed.
Zeirion kept walking.
Far Across the Realms...
Aralya stood barefoot in a garden of stars.
She was as beautiful as legend claimed—perhaps more. Silver hair flowed like moonlight, her skin kissed by divinity, her violet eyes deep enough to drown creation. Around her bloomed flowers of impossible hues, petals whispering secrets to the sky.
She felt it.
Not just a ripple.
A resonance.
The echo of a soul she had once sworn to wait for.
She smiled, a warmth blooming behind her ribs.
"You're awake," she whispered into the wind. "Zei…"
The stars above answered.