The stars were falling again.
Across the sleeping hemisphere, people woke to the sound of thunder that wasn't thunder — a deep, metallic echo that rolled through the bones of the earth.
And when they looked up, they saw the heavens bleed light.
Dozens — no, hundreds — of fragments cut through the night, burning in hues no human spectrum could name. Silver. Violet. Something between fire and memory. They trailed across the atmosphere like divine tears.
To most, it was the end of the world.
To others, the beginning of a new one.
But to Nexus Truebool, it was just another lie the sky told.
He stood alone on the cracked remains of the old observation tower, wind tugging at his coat, the city below a broken silhouette of what it once was.
Eterna City, once a symbol of human ambition, now a hollowed monument to failure — its skyline punctured by the scars of past impacts.
The air shimmered as another fragment streaked across the horizon, bursting into a storm of radiant dust.
"Third Descent," Nexus whispered. "Right on schedule."
His voice was calm, but his hands trembled around the rusted data drive clipped to his belt — the last thing his father had ever left him.
The old man had spent his life trying to prove the meteors weren't natural. He'd died when one leveled half the city.
And now, standing beneath the falling light, Nexus could almost hear his father's voice again.
The rocks are not falling, he had said. They're being sent.
A wind swept across the tower, carrying the scent of ozone and smoke. The sky brightened — one fragment was descending faster, brighter than the rest, a streak of molten white that tore through the clouds like a spear.
It was coming straight for him.
Instinct screamed to run. But something — something ancient — reached inside his mind. A whisper.
A plea.
> Please... don't let me die again.
The words weren't his. They echoed through his bones, into his breath, into the spaces between his heartbeats. He froze, eyes wide, as the falling star collided with the earth a few hundred meters away. The impact was silent — light swallowed sound.
A wall of dust and silver fire rose into the sky. The tower shook. Metal screamed.
Nexus staggered to his knees, shielding his face as shards of glowing debris rained down. One fragment — no bigger than his palm — rolled to a stop at his feet.
It pulsed. Once. Twice. Like a heartbeat.
He hesitated only a moment before reaching for it. The surface was cool, impossibly smooth — not stone, not metal. It felt alive.
> `[Resonance Detected.]`
> `[Host: Human — Identification pending…]`
> `[Warning: Entity Core unstable.]`
The voice was inside his head, cold and mechanical, yet strangely... compassionate.
> `[Initiating Emergency Bond.]`
The fragment burst in his hand — light surged through his veins, searing pain carving symbols into his skin. He gasped, falling backward as his vision filled with alien constellations.
A face appeared within the light. Not human. Not divine. Something older. Eyes like dying stars, voice trembling like shattered glass.
> My name... was Orren... I was the one who judged your world.
> Now... I am nothing but a fragment.
> Will you carry me, mortal? Will you let me see the end?
The pain peaked.
Nexus screamed — and the scream echoed with two voices.
> `[Resonance Initiated.]`
> `[Host: Nexus Truebool.]`
> `[Bonded Entity: Orren, the Fallen Celestial.]`
> `[Resonance Level: 3%. Connection unstable.]`
> `[Welcome to the Final Trial.]`
The wind died.
All around him, fragments burned in the night sky like silent candles — hundreds of them — each seeking a host, each choosing the next generation of Awakened.
And as the world below erupted in chaos, Nexus lay amid the falling dust, his eyes reflecting the heavens.
For the first time in human history, a Celestial's voice trembled.
> "You shouldn't exist… and yet… you are my only hope."