Chapter 1
Tick... tock... tick... tock...
The pendulum clock hanging in the living room marked the last seconds before midnight. The wood creaked softly under its own weight, and the regular sound of the pendulum was the only thing that broke the stillness.
Tick... tock...
Laziel Draeven lay on his back in his small bed, his eyes open as if waiting for something to happen. His room was dark, barely lit by the moonlight seeping through the crack in the window.
The dim lighting highlighted his young, peaceful face. He had dark brown hair, straight and slightly unruly, falling in strands to the middle of his forehead. His skin was fair, slightly pale from lack of sun, and what stood out most were his soft, bright, deep sky-blue eyes. They were the kind of eyes that conveyed calm, empathy... as if they could hear you without you saying anything.
At that moment, her pupils showed no fear, but rather a curious serenity, typical of someone who observes the world without understanding it but also without fearing it entirely.
Her mother was sleeping in the next room. Everything was normal. Everything should be normal.
TIC.
TOC.
The second hand struck the twelve o'clock mark. And then, as if time had broken, everything stopped.
It was not a simple dream.
It was an absolute and uninvited descent into darkness.
An invisible force dragged every human body—children, the elderly, soldiers, criminals, kings—into an unfathomable abyss. Whether they were sleepy or not, everyone fell. As if the world had been covered by a sacred... or cursed cloak.
And for exactly twenty-four hours, no human heartbeat was heard.
—
One day later.
A ray of sunlight pierced through the blinds. The birds weren't singing. The air was denser. The silence was different... almost reverent.
Laziel sat up with difficulty. His head hurt and his body felt heavy, as if he had been buried underground.
"What... was that...?" he muttered, bringing his hand to his face.
Looking out the window, the first thing he noticed was that the sky was not the same. It was vaster, more distant. As if the planet had grown. But not only that.
In the distance, huge energy barriers pulsed as if they were breathing. Circles of blue light enveloped unknown lands.
Like mystical walls dividing the planet into isolated regions, invisible before that moment.
"That... wasn't there yesterday..." he said, his voice still hoarse.
His mother, Loana Ariane, was still asleep in the next room. Like many others, she had not yet woken up.
Laziel went out into the street.
The neighbors were beginning to open their doors. Some were crying. Others stared at the sky in confusion. No one had any answers. No one understood why the world was now at least ten times larger.
A local reporter was trying to improvise a broadcast, although the airwaves were distorted. People could only hear his voice:
> "...There are no records of earthquakes. There were no explosions. Nothing was warned. It just... the planet changed.
> Barriers now divide our continent from what appear to be new territories.
> Some experts say it's as if ten worlds were joined into one overnight..."
The words fell like swords.
But no one could deny the obvious.
—
Laziel walked to a small hill on the outskirts of Noctheran, the region where he lived.
From there, he could clearly see the immense ring of energy surrounding the continent. It was impossible to break.
Some adults tried to approach it with tools and even firearms. The bullets disappeared on contact with the barrier.
No sound came out. No object returned.
It was as if the rest of the world no longer existed... or did not want to be reached.
And on his right palm, without him remembering, a thin black mark had appeared, like ancient writing that pulsed faintly.
It did not move. It did not react. It did not hurt.
It was just there.
And he... didn't know what it meant.
But something inside him whispered that this mark was no coincidence. And that the world he knew had disappeared forever.
—
Somewhere underground, far from Noctheran, a group of beings watched the human awakening without intervening.
Their eyes were not human.
Neither were their bodies.
And their realm was not visible to the naked eye.