For hours, the Skyfolk wandered the Grand Amphitheater of Aurelia Sanctum, dazed and aimless. Twenty-four thousand souls, standing beneath gilded arches and beneath floating petals of light, spoke in murmurs and whispers. Their voices, soft and uncertain, drifted through the sanctum like fragile threads on the wind.
They touched their wings over and over again—still disbelieving.
Some tried folding them against their backs, as if to hide what they had become. Others spread them wide, trembling, their feathers catching the ambient glow of the hovering cities. There was no instruction, no guidebook. Only bewilderment.
The strange robes they wore clung lightly to their skin, flowing as if woven from moonlight. They didn't wrinkle, didn't tear, and they changed color with thought—blues of melancholy, golds of confusion, silvers of surrender. The air carried no temperature, neither warm nor cold, but it pressed softly against their bare feet as if the land itself were alive, cradling them like newborns.
The sky stretched above them—a boundless tapestry where the twin suns had set beyond the horizon, replaced by a cosmic sea of stars. Three moons glided silently overhead, aligned in perfect harmony. Their reflections shimmered in the mirror-oceans that floated in the distance, hovering impossibly over the vast cloud sea below.
And yet, despite the breathtaking beauty, their hearts quaked.
They whispered of families left behind. Of homes reduced to ash. Of Earth—obliterated, annihilated without mercy.
"I remember the sky burning."
"The oceans boiled… and the ground—"
"Everything was gone. Everything."
They clung to fragments of memory like lifelines, eyes darting between the divine architecture surrounding them, trying to anchor themselves to something familiar. But nothing was.
They had no maps for this place.
No gods to guide them.
No idea how or why they had been chosen.
Beneath the whispers, a heavier silence brewed—a cold terror unspoken:
Were they truly the only ones?
And if so, what now?
As confusion thickened, a figure stepped forward—not with command, but with calm. He moved through the crowd, his wings folded tightly behind him, his eyes steady while others wept or raged.
Caerthalos.
He did not know why he alone remembered the final moments of Earth in such piercing detail. The collapse of the sky. The stars were crashing down. The pain of annihilation—a sensation like being split apart at the soul. Yet here he stood, intact, whole, while his mind shimmered with clarity no one else seemed to possess.
He had not asked for this clarity.
He had not chosen it.
But it was his burden now.
He knelt beside a crying woman, resting a hand on her trembling shoulder. "Breathe," he whispered. His voice cut through her panic, not with sharpness but with stillness. "Look around you. We're here. We're alive."
Her lips quivered. "But why?"
Caerthalos didn't answer right away. His gaze lifted to the floating glyphs spinning lazily in the air above Aurelia Sanctum. Symbols older than language pulsed faintly, as if reacting to his nearness.
The amphitheater itself hummed, resonating softly, as though the stones beneath their feet acknowledged him.
"I don't know yet," he said honestly. "But we're together. That's where we start."
Others gathered near him, drawn by the steady rhythm of his words. He did not speak as a leader, not yet—but already, people leaned toward him instinctively, their frantic breaths slowing, their eyes narrowing in on his calm.
Above them, the glyphs brightened.
And then came the voice.
Not like before—not the grand celestial decree that had declared them the First Ascendants. This was different.
It whispered only one word.
His name.
"Caerthalos."
The sound was not heard with ears, but felt in the marrow of his bones. It echoed in his soul, a reverberation so intimate it threatened to unravel him.
He staggered, his wings twitching behind him. His heart thundered, but he held his ground.
The other Skyfolk fell silent. All eyes turned to him.
"What was that?" someone whispered.
Caerthalos's lips parted, but no answer came. His name lingered in the air, woven into the very mana that swirled around the amphitheater.
The obelisks lining Aurelia Sanctum pulsed brighter. Glyphs traced glowing spirals toward the heavens, and a soft wind circled them all—lifting feathers into the air, scattering them like tiny stars.
Within his chest, Caerthalos felt it.
A tether. A calling.
Something was binding him—not in chains, but on purpose.
He was no longer just a witness to this new existence. He was meant to guide it.
When the moons reached their zenith, Caerthalos led the Skyfolk through the city. They explored slowly, their wings brushing against golden walls and crystalline bridges. The floating islands drifted quietly around them, as if waiting.
Mana streamed through everything—the streets, the towers, the rivers in the sky. It was not just magic. It was life itself, humming beneath their fingertips.
In time, they learned they could harness it.
Caerthalos taught them to fly.
Not by instinct alone, but by feeling the current of mana beneath their wings. He showed them how to balance in the air, how to glide without fear. His calm demeanor eased their trembling. Day by day, they shed the terror of collapse and embraced the sky.
They learned to summon gentle flows of light from their hands. They discovered they could communicate not just with each other, but with the structures themselves—libraries that whispered knowledge when approached, gardens that bloomed wider at their presence, fountains that changed patterns with thought.
But amid these small miracles, Caerthalos knew this was only the beginning.
The vision came without warning.
Standing alone at the Sea of Glass, he peered into its mirrored surface, where the reflections did not show his face but the universe itself—a swirling cosmos of light and shadow, of birth and annihilation.
Stars rose and fell in depth. He watched galaxies unfold like scrolls, then collapse into singularities, only to be reborn again.
And then he heard it—the same voice, but clearer now.
"Balance is fragile. Chaos will always seek to return. You, Oath-Bound, must stand between worlds—not to rule, but to guard. Not to conquer, but to witness."
A cold understanding pierced him.
This was why his memory remained sharper. Why his name had changed.
It was not for privilege.
It was a burden.
When he returned to the others, his wings heavy with realization, the Skyfolk greeted him not with celebration, but with doubt. They knew. They heard what Caerthalos heard.
"Why you?" someone demanded. "Who gave you the right?"
"We didn't choose you!" another shouted.
Caerthalos raised his hands. "Nor did I choose myself."
"We should decide together!" a woman argued. "We came here as equals."
His gaze did not flinch. "And we will remain equals. I don't seek power."
"Then why lead?" a voice pressed.
He paused.
"For the same reason I breathe," he answered softly. "Because someone has to."
A hush followed. The air shifted, thick with meaning.
"I saw what was coming," he continued, his voice steady but not cold. "There will be storms beyond anything we can imagine. Not just here—but across realms, across ages. We can't prevent all suffering. But we can keep the balance. We can guard what has been created."
They listened—not because they were forced to, but because something inside them whispered the same truth.
Leadership, Caerthalos realized, was not about authority. It was about accepting weight.
At dawn, the First Flight began.
Thousands gathered at the edge of the highest spire, the EclipseriftBastion, the Gate of Caelorum, where the sky burned with twin horizons of light.
Their wings opened together.
The flight was not just ascent—it was transformation. They shed the last fragments of Earth's grief, of their old identities. As they rose into the sky, they felt the burden of mortality melt away—not forgotten, but placed gently behind them.
At the summit, where the atmosphere thinned into stars, Caerthalos spoke the vow that would define eternity:
"I vow to guard the balance of realms. To intervene not for dominion, but for harmony. To lead not as ruler, but as the Oath-Bound sentinel of all life's fragile breath."
As his words echoed into the cosmos, the glyphs of Celestia Caelorum blazed.
The sky itself responded.
Golden currents of mana spiraled around his body, binding his soul to the realm. Glyphs etched themselves into his skin—not as chains, but as promises.
From that moment, he was no longer just Caerthalos.
He became the EmpyreanImperator, the first of the watchers, the immortal sentinel of balance.
And thus, the Empyrean Sovereignty was born—not as a kingdom of conquest, but as a sacred covenant.
The Skyfolk accepted this path. They would not reign over mortals below. They would not interfere in trivial wars or petty disputes. They would observe, protect, and intervene only when the balance of existence itself trembled.
They became witnesses of the new world—not conquerors, but guardians.
As the stars spun slowly overhead and the twin suns rose again, the Skyfolk folded their wings against the dawn, their hearts heavy but resolute.
They were no longer remnants of a fallen Earth.
They were the First Ascendants.
And Caerthalos, the Oath-Bound, now stood eternal—eyes lifted to the infinite sky, ready to bear witness to every history yet to come.