Kael spread the word only to those who needed to know, and the chosen five were given one week.
The news rippled through the highest circles. Each person who learned carried the weight of Earth's future in their silence.
Adrian spent his days in the Rune Hall, walking its familiar corridors one last time.
The ink-stained walls held memories of breakthrough after breakthrough, of students who had become masters under his guidance. Every corner whispered of the revolution they had built together.
"You're brooding again," Selena said, falling into step beside him. Her golden tattoos caught the light as she matched his pace. "It's unbecoming for someone about to become Earth's clan leader."
Information about clans was already passed to the chosen ones.
"I'm not brooding." Adrian paused before a wall covered in practice runes, some crude, others elegant. "Just remembering."
"Save the nostalgia for when we're old and grey." She nudged his shoulder. "Though knowing you, you'll probably figure out how to reverse aging before then."
Thomas and Elara walked the barracks together, their hands clasping those of comrades they might never see again. Old soldiers understood farewells without speeches. A firm grip, a steady look, promises that needed no words.
"Take care of the youngsters," Thomas told Commander Voss. "They still think courage means charging headfirst into everything."
"Like someone I know," Elara added dryly. Thomas squeezed her hand, his smile rueful.
Kael drilled the younger S-ranks, ensuring Earth would not be leaderless when he was gone. Each session pushed them harder, faster, his commands sharp as blade edges. He left nothing to chance.
"Sir," one of them panted during a break, "when will you return?"
Kael's expression remained steady. "When Earth needs us to."
None of them sought farewells in the streets. The departure was kept from the masses, not out of deception, but mercy. The truth would bring panic and grief long before it needed to.
...
At dawn, a week later, they gathered atop the Central Tower.
The morning air carried the scent of distant rain. No crowds, no ceremonies, only the weight of history settling on their shoulders.
Aurelia's ship waited, its hull reflecting the sky like polished obsidian. The vessel seemed to drink in the dawn, beautiful and alien against Earth's familiar skyline.
Kael stood calm, a commander facing yet another campaign. His hands rested at his sides, steady as stone. Only the slight tension in his jaw betrayed the magnitude of what lay ahead.
Selena leaned against Elara, who scolded her even here. "Stand properly. We're representing Earth now." But her own eyes burned with anticipation, the thrill of discovery overriding maternal concern.
"I am standing properly," Selena protested. "This is my diplomatic posture."
Thomas looked as he always had, steady, dependable, already bracing for battle. He checked his gear one final time, habits of decades impossible to break. His gaze found Adrian's, a silent question passing between them.
Adrian stood apart, caught between the thrill of the unknown and the weight of what it meant.
Earth spread below them, Billions of lives continuing their daily routines, unaware that five of their defenders were about to step into the galaxy. Or die trying.
The Sentinel himself stood before them, his golden radiance soft yet unshakable. He had watched Earth for millennia, now he watched them prepare to leave it.
"Do not think of this as leaving Earth," his voice carried like a vow. "You are carrying it with you." His eyes met each of theirs in turn. "Every choice you make, every battle you fight, remember what you represent."
They bowed their heads in unison. The gesture felt final, a closing of one chapter and the opening of another. Then they stepped into Aurelia's ship, their footsteps echoing in the alien corridors.
The vessel lifted from the platform, its cloaking shimmer bending the air around them.
Through the viewing glass, they watched the Sentinel's figure grow brighter and brighter until he was only a star against the receding planet. A guardian's farewell, blazing with promise and sorrow.
And then Earth itself shrank, a blue marble spinning in the endless dark. Fragile and perfect, their home became just another point of light in an ocean of stars. The sight struck them all silent.
For Kael, Selena, Thomas, and Elara, the silence of space was a revelation. The stars stretched unbroken by atmosphere, infinite and merciless.
They felt no pressure, no void, as Aurelia's ship shielded them, but the weight of that emptiness pressed against their minds.
...
Hours passed in silence, each of them processing the weight of their departure.
Aurelia's voice broke the silence from the command deck.
"Prepare warp drive. Destination, border of the Orion Arm."
The AI's response echoed through the ship. "Acknowledged. Aligning trajectory."
Adrian moved to the viewport, his parents flanking him. Outside, runes blazed across the ship's hull in patterns that hurt to follow directly. Space folded like origami in the hands of a master.
Stars blurred into rivers of light, reality bending around them. The sensation made his stomach lurch despite his enhanced physiology.
Aurelia's voice was calm, almost clinical as she joined them at the observation deck. "Warp travel bends space, accelerates us beyond light. This vessel can travel five thousand times faster-than-light."
She gestured to the streaking void outside, where constellations had become abstract art. "Even so, it will take four months to reach the nearest border system connected to galactic routes."
Kael's jaw tightened. "Four months just to reach the edge?"
"It lies sixteen hundred light years from Earth," Aurelia continued. "And that is only the nearest populated star system."
Silence answered her. The distance was too vast for words, too incomprehensible for human minds raised on a single world. Earth was not just isolated—it was forgotten, stranded at the very edge of the galaxy.
Thomas ran a hand through his hair. "We really are in the middle of nowhere."
"Worse than nowhere," Selena muttered. "We're in the cosmic equivalent of a backwater village."
Aurelia reached into her storage compartment and withdrew five smooth, rune-inscribed spheres. Each one pulsed with internal light, their surfaces covered in flowing script that seemed to move when observed directly.
"This is a Node," she said, handing one to each of them. "Once linked, it connects you to the Galactic Net, communication, navigation, forums where scholars and warriors exchange ideas."
Adrian turned the Node in his palm. Its surface was warm, alive with faint energy that resonated with his Source. The runes seemed familiar yet alien, like words in a language he almost remembered.
Elara examined hers. "It's beautiful. The craftsmanship is extraordinary."
"But remember," Aurelia warned, her expression growing serious. "The Net is not only communication. It is surveillance."
"Overseen by the Lexaria Empire, its runes tied into their core systems. That is why I never gave this to Sentinel, Earth cannot yet afford such eyes upon it."
Kael frowned, "What kind of surveillance are we talking about?"
"Location tracking, data mining of your searches," Aurelia listed. "Personal Communications are said to be safe, but no one knows for real. They claim it's for galactic security, but empires use it to monitor potential threats."
Adrian weighed the sphere in his hand. Knowledge versus privacy, a trade as old as civilization itself.
"Use it wisely," Aurelia concluded.
Adrian pressed the Node to his palm without hesitation. A shimmer of energy scanned his face, his eyes, mapping the unique patterns of his mana signature. The process felt invasive yet necessary.
The sphere pulsed, then projected a holographic interface that hung in the air before him. Text appeared in flowing script that his mind somehow understood despite never seeing the language before.
[Registration Required. State your name for galactic records.]
He spoke clearly to the floating projection. "Adrian Blackwood."
The runes shifted, processing his response. Moments later, his information appeared on the display in stark, official text.
[Adrian Blackwood – Human. Registration complete. Welcome to the Galactic Net.]
Adrian frowned at the screen, a chill running down his spine. "How does it even know the human race? Earth was never connected before."
He looked to Aurelia, confusion evident in his voice. "Is it because of the Celestial Eleven? Did you register our species when you first connected?"
Aurelia shook her head, her expression troubled. "No. When we first registered, the same thing happened. We thought we were the first humans to access the Net."
She paused, choosing her words carefully. "But the system already recognized our kind. We thought maybe someone from Earth had reached the galaxy in ages past."
"We later learned the truth," Aurelia continued. "There are other humans in the galaxy. Entire clans bearing our race."
The room froze. The revelation hit them, each processing the implications in stunned silence.
Thomas whispered, "So we aren't unique."
Even Selena's perpetual smirk faltered, replaced by genuine shock. "Other humans? How is that possible?"
Adrian's thoughts flashed to Valerius, to his humanoid frame, to the faint familiarity in his features that had nagged at him during their confrontation.
He had brushed it aside then, focused on the immediate threat. But now, it gnawed at him.
Kael's strategic mind was already working. "Are they allies? Enemies? What's their relationship to Earth?"
"We don't know," Aurelia admitted, her voice heavy with years of unanswered questions. "Whether Earth's humans once came from the stars, or whether others were scattered from here long ago."
She gestured to the stars streaming past the viewport. "But humanity is not alone in the galaxy. There are clans out there who call themselves the same race, who share our appearance, our basic physiology."
The silence that followed was heavier than the void itself. Each of them grappled with the fundamental shift in their understanding of humanity's place in the universe.
Had Earth's people always been alone? Or were they just one fragment of something much older, scattered among the stars like seeds on cosmic winds?