The Sun breathed. The corona opened and closed like a living veil. Soluva chose the road inside the fire—no duel today, a survey instead. Her sun-flame hair fell across her shoulder; the six-rayed star on her chest glowed with a quiet warmth.
Below, Shiora's single line stretched: Light, Void, Dark. She turned first toward Light. Wherever she stepped, heat left warmth, not scars.
"Where should I begin?" she'd asked herself on day one.
The answer arrived like a reply: Light is simplest.
Light
The Light region sat closest to the Sun's gaze. A steady hum, as if one note of the Life Symphony had been left behind to keep time. Soluva knelt and set her palm to the surface. When Sense woke, a fine map unfurled under her eyes: warm pockets, temperate lines, hidden channels that ferried heat.
"This will be a square one day," she said. She pressed two fingers down and bled a trace of Growth. Tiny sparks scattered and blinked—Dawn Seeds—not for now, for later. No rush.
She rose and walked to the border. The star on her chest pulsed once. With Breath, the space opened; with Pulse, the rhythm settled. The Sun's heartbeat echoed as order in the Light.
"Good," she said. "I'll come back here."
The Edge of Void
Crossing from Light into Void didn't start with a line; it started with a hush. Sound thinned; movement stood out. The Void wasn't hungry for Light—if anything, it wanted balance.
Soluva stood at the margin and only listened. Here the Symphony was more listening than song. Valuva's sentence from yesterday returned: Choose a line.
She chose: founding.
"First—an anchor," she said. The star poured into her palm; Will and Heat flared together, writing a thin sigil. She set it into the surface, a small shard of the Solar Seal, a nail that marks the border.
Right then a fine wrinkle showed in the Void's skin—time's little stutter. "Hello," Soluva said, with no need of the spear. She raised Pulse, found the wrinkle's thread with Sense, and pinched. The crease smoothed; a single bell of the Symphony answered.
"There'll be many of these," she thought. "I'll firm the edge first."
She followed the border. Every ten steps she left a tiny Dawn Seed—a witness that measures heat and time. One day, joined together, they could become a wall, a ward. Today they only recorded.
The Void breeze stroked her hair back. Soluva smiled. She loved to fight; but today, building gave a clean pleasure. "Fighting tomorrow," she said. "Today: the line."
A Short Word — From Afar
Valuva did not appear; he didn't have to. Time curled like a brief ribbon; a sentence arrived along the bend.
"Curiosity scatters a soul faster than any blade," he had said.
Soluva nodded. "I know," she murmured. "I'll wonder without scattering."
Her smile was for herself. The star warmed; Will settled over the choice she'd made.
Dark on the Horizon
You didn't approach the Dark by walking; you named it and looked. Far off at the reach of the plane, it lay like a bed of quiet. From there the Sun would show black—Soluva knew that. Naming it was enough: Dark.
Valuva's shadow must be keeping watch at the Moon; Soluva didn't turn that way. Another small unevenness rose at the edge—this time a sound. A faint murmur at her ear: something like a distant Neruathen echo, but not an attack.
"No spear," she told herself. "Not needed."
She opened Sense, dropped Pulse, and drew a line through the noise. It led to a pinhole in the Void. With Heat she softened the thread; with Will she tied a knot. The sound went quiet.
"Done," she said. "Record: rift—eighteen steps north, two breaths of warp."
Talking as if an invisible scribe stood by pleased her. The Symphony answered with a small, approving chime.
The First Place
Between Light and Void she found a low, flat rise. Not too hot, not too mute. She walked to the center.
"This will be the Dawn Threshold," she said. The word settled like weight. Name = being; being = place. As she named it, place happened. Dawn Seeds brightened in a ring around the rise. For now the ring was only intent; later it could become a ward.
Soluva crouched inside the circle and listened without closing her eyes:
Breath—steady; Pulse—true; Heat—clean; Sense—edges clear; Growth—seeds asleep; Will—circle locked.
"Good," she said. "This is my first mark."
As she stood, a faint threshold tremor brushed in from far away: a shadow-note, very brief, very distant. It smelled like a Black Sun harbinger, but only a tremor—clear, understandable, far. Not now.
She turned and kept along the line. Every forty or fifty steps she left a tiny marker: sometimes a dash, sometimes a point, sometimes a hair-thin script. One day they'd mesh into a net.
Reading the Void
Near what the Sun would call noon, the Void shifted. A thin blade-mark—an invisible scar—leaned toward Light. This time she wanted her spear: a sweet drill.
The star ran to her palm and became a spear of flame.
Soluva believed—something simple: that she belonged here.
The point met the line. The line chimed; the splinter of reality split and drifted off as neutral steam. The Symphony rang a clean bell.
"Good," she said. "Quick and tidy."
She let the spear fold back into the quiet star. Back to the survey.
Late Light
By the time she closed the Light border, a small map hung in her wake: the Dawn Threshold ring, marker stones, seed dots, smoothed creases, logged warps. Together they sketched the skeleton of what tomorrow would raise.
Valuva's voice arrived without stirring the air.
"That's enough for today," he said. "Tomorrow, you'll use both spear and plan."
Soluva smiled. "Tomorrow we spar," she said—child-bright joy underlined by adult intent. "And we set pillars."
"Yes," said Valuva. "Both tomorrow."
She looked once more at the ring of the Dawn Threshold. The star on her chest sealed the day with one clear note. Light settled as if a chair had found its corner; the Void accepted the order beside it; the Dark kept its distance.
The Sun quieted toward evening.
Soluva spoke the plain sentence that crossed her mind:
"I will found a country here."
Then she turned and went on. The survey was done; the road, now, was hers.