The silence did not last. It was broken not by a sound, but by a presence—a cold, patient hunger that began to seep into the edges of the silent Celestial Hall. The star-charts on the floor, now devoid of the Divine Decree's light, did not merely remain dark. In their dimness, a deeper shadow began to coalesce, a stain spreading against the void.
The Supreme Deity watched, his expression impassive, yet his divine sense perceived the violation. This was not the chaotic but natural ambition of mortals or lesser gods. This was an antimatter to creation itself. "The Keeper of the Void," he murmured, the title a long-forgotten secret in the cosmic records. "You have come early."
From the pooling shadows, a form emerged. It was not a shape, but an absence of them, a silhouette that drank the very concept of light. THE KEEPER OF THE VOID did not speak in words, but its intent echoed directly in the hall's metaphysical foundation. THE SONG HAS ENDED. THE SINGER IS HOARSE. THE SILENCE… IS MINE TO FILL.
Meanwhile, in the newly consecrated Samsara Pavilion, the NEW GODDESS OF SAMSARA felt a sudden, sharp chill in the flow of souls. A thread of panic, pure and undiluted, spiked through the normally serene cycle. She focused her will, tracing the disturbance back to its source—a forgotten corner of the mortal realm where a star named Lyra had simply… ceased. It was not death, not destruction. It was un-creation. The souls there did not pass on; they were erased from the karmic stream entirely.
Her first instinct was to reach for the Tome of Samsara, the artifact through which all cycles were managed. But its pages, which once glowed with the clear, commanding light of the Divine Decree, were now blank. The rules were gone. The protocols were silent. A cold realization washed over her: her brother and the Supreme Deity had not just given her power; they had given her a universe without an instruction manual.
Her jaw tightened. She was the New Goddess of Samsara. The title was not a gift; it was a responsibility. If the old laws were silent, she would write new ones.
Back in the Celestial Hall, the Supreme Deity observed the Void's encroachment. He could have smothered it with a thought in the old days, re-writing the local reality to reject its existence. But the Covenant held him. His power was now a shield, not a sword. He was bound to protect himself and the core of existence, but not to act as its active enforcer.
He turned his gaze inward, to the faint, unbreakable bond he shared with the new Goddess. He did not send her a command or a warning. He sent her a single, pure data stream: the cosmic coordinates of the dying star Lyra, and the true name of the entity causing it—The Keeper of the Void.
It was not a command. It was a test.
In her pavilion, the New Goddess received the information. She felt no order, only a profound and terrifying trust. She looked from the blank Tome to the weeping scar in reality shown by the coordinates. There was no Divine Decree to guide her hand.
So she picked up her own stylus, its tip flaring with the unique energy of her soul—a blend of mortal resilience and divine potential—and touched it to the first blank page of the Tome.
A new law, the first of her reign, ignited upon the page. It was not a complex prophecy. It was a simple, brutal edict of protection: "That which seeks to unmake a soul shall itself be unmade."
The energy shot from the Tome, a spear of pure, nascent divine will across the realms. It struck the heart of the shadow enveloping Lyra.
The silence of the heavens was broken by the first cry of a new law. The war for the future had begun, not with the closing of a chapter, but with the writing of its first, defiant word.