The moon sat in the sky, hidden like a forgotten eye watching over the Clay Bank Mountain, veiled in a swirling shroud of storm clouds. Lightning teared across the sky, casting fleeting glimpses of the jagged peaks below. A low, mournful wind whistled through the crevices, carrying with it an ancient whisper.
Deep within the heart of the mountain, a still, black pool shimmered like liquid night. Shadows crept and bent along the cavern walls... they didn't merely shift, they retreated, as if aware that something greater had come to claim them. The air became thicker, colder, toxic and suffocating, consuming everything around it. The ground trembled faintly as he arrived.
A ripple of nothingness spread outward, swallowing all light. The cavern shrank in his presence, as if reality itself feared to contain him.
He did not step into the cavern, he simply became, a void given form. The Master of everything void, the origin of all darkness and despair. His presence did not announce itself with footsteps, nor with sound. Instead, it pressed against the walls, the ceiling, the very air, an unseen force that suffocated all who dared exist in his wake.
His cloak did not simply conceal him, it devoured light, a fabric woven from the abyss itself. The shadows that once slithered on the outskirts trembled in his presence, shaking as they slowly withdrew, as if fearing they might be consumed by something darker than themselves.
His eyes, two abyssal embers burning through the void, cast a haunting, unnatural glow that did not illuminate but instead corrupted the darkness itself. When he spoke, his voice was not just sound but sensation, a whisper that crawled into the mind, a weight pressing onto the soul. A promise. A curse.
A sudden disturbance rippled through the pool. From its depths, three spectral figures emerged, their long hair drifting like threads of midnight mist. The Sisters of Prophecy, beings cursed to eternity between realms, regarded him with a mix of fear and reverence.
"The child approaches," Francesca intoned, her voice a soft, melodic echo, yet carrying an undeniable weight. "Born of betrayal and bound by fate. He will shape the six worlds… or shatter them."
Leah stepped forward, her gaze holding something unreadable. "His blood is a tether between two forces," she murmured. "Light and dark entwined. He will either rise as a beacon… or as a weapon in your hand."
Francesca's gaze darkened. "He is not merely a child… but a convergence. A moment in time that should not exist yet cannot be undone."
The Master's voice curled through the cavern like smoke, seeping into every crack and crevice. "I do not ask. I take. Tell me how to bind him before the light dares touch him."
Leanne's laughter splintered the silence, brittle and sharp as shattered glass. "Oh, Master, how little you understand. Light and dark are not so easily conquered. A child conceived of both walks a path beyond your reach, unless you sow the darkness at his very inception."
Francesca's shadow stretched unnaturally across the cavern, shifting in time with her words. "Bring the darkness," she whispered. "You must be more than the master of his fate… you must shape his very soul."
The Master extended his hand, and the shadows surged toward him like ink drawn to paper, thickening the air with the scent of scorched earth. The pool stirred violently, sending cold droplets spraying into the air. The cavern walls trembled, bowing beneath his will.
"There is one who already falters… King George." His voice slithered through the chamber, wrapping around the sisters like a coiled serpent. "His fears and failures have left him vulnerable."
Leah hissed, her smile twisting cruelly. "Ah, yes. A king on the edge of ruin. Fear consumes him like wildfire. His mind fractures… his heart drowns in shadow."
A ripple of satisfaction flickered through the Master's ember-like gaze. "Then he shall serve me."
His outstretched fingers curled, and the pool blackened like an eclipse swallowing the stars. The cavern itself seemed to shrink, as if the darkness had become a living thing, inhaling all light, all breath, all hope.
"A whisper in his dreams. A shadow in his thoughts. A hunger he cannot explain. He will be mine before he knows he is lost."
Francesca stepped forward, her gaze piercing. "And from that darkness, the child will be born. His blood tainted; his fate inextricably tied to your will."
Leanne tilted her head, eyes glinting like fractured ice. "Yet beware, Master… even shadows cast their own light."
The Master's gaze burned brighter, a flickering inferno within the abyss. "I do not falter. I do not fail. The boy will belong to me before he takes his first breath."
The sisters fell silent, their forms dissolving into a mist that slithered along the pool's surface. Their laughter echoed faintly, like ghosts fading into the wind.
Outside the cavern, the storm intensified. Lightning illuminated the mountains, casting long, jagged shadows across the landscape. The wind howled, a dirge carried through the night.
Deep within the heart of the mountain, the Master's final words lingered, sinking into the very bones of the earth.
"Let him be born in darkness. Let him never know the light, he will be the one to break my seal, remove my curse, his pain and suffering will be my anchor and once he is lost in eternal darkness we will bend this galaxy to my will."
The shadows shuddered. The pool recoiled. The cavern groaned as if it, too, had borne witness to something that should never have been spoken.
And then…silence.