1 Prologue – The Last Horizon
The relentless rain beat against the windows in a steady rhythm, matching the throbbing ache in my chest.
The apartment was dim, the faint hum of the neon streetlights casting eerie shadows on the walls. Thunder rumbled far away, but it was just another noise in the hollow silence of my life.
I was only seven when my world shattered, when I learned that love wasn't the safe, warm thing I had always believed it to be. It could be as fragile as glass, easily shattered, irreparably broken.
My parents had always fought, but that night was different. Their voices were sharp, cutting through the thin walls like daggers. I didn't understand it at first. I still remember the hollow look in my mother's eyes as she stood in the doorway, bags in hand, her gaze not meeting mine.
Then she said it, the words that would haunt me forever.
"I'm leaving."
Dad's face went pale, his fists trembling. "Take him with you," he pleaded, desperation flooding his voice. "He's your blood."
Her lips curled into something bitter, something cruel. "He's not my responsibility anymore."
I froze, clutching my teddy bear as if it could shield me from the storm inside. My heart slammed against my ribs, my tiny body trembling as I watched her walk toward the door. A cold, primal panic surged through me.
"Mom… where are you going? It's still raining," I called out, my voice cracking, raw with fear.
She stopped, just for a moment, her back still turned to me. Her eyes were icy, distant. She turned, and with one quick shove, pushed me aside.
"Don't call me 'Mom,'" she spat, her words more jagged than anything I could ever say.
The sting of that moment still sits with me. I staggered backward; my words caught in my throat. "Did I do something wrong?" I asked, but she didn't answer.
Without a second glance, she stepped into the night. A sleek black car was waiting for her, its engine purring like a predator. The man behind the wheel didn't even look my way.
"Let's go, honey," he called, the final words of a world I would never see again.
And just like that, she was gone.
I collapsed in my father's arms. His embrace was the only thing keeping me together, and I buried my face in his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart, drowning out the sound of the rain. In that moment, I understood something I couldn't articulate. She wasn't coming back.
Days turned to weeks, then months, and still, she never returned.
That was the day I learned the cruellest truth of all. Some things break beyond repair. Some things are gone forever.
***
#A Life Built on Ashes
Life went on, even if it felt like a shadow of what it could have been.
Dad and I built something together, something small but steady. He worked tirelessly, his hands rough and calloused from years of labour. He didn't have much, but I never went without. He made sure of that. I worked hard, too. Top grades, a decent job as a manual tester at a corporate gaming company. I found stability for the first time in my life. Just the two of us.
He never stopped, though. No matter how many times I begged him to take it easy, he only ever had one answer.
"It's not for you, idiot," he'd chuckle. "It's for my future grandkids."
I groaned every time. "Dad, I'm not getting married anytime soon."
"Then I'm not retiring," he teased, his smile as warm as the summer sun.
We laughed about it, like we always did. That was how life was—simple, steady. Until the day it all came crashing down.
***
#The Call
It was evening when my phone rang. The ID showed an unknown number. My finger hovered over the screen, but I answered anyway.
"Hello?" I said, my voice tired from a long day's work.
"Mr. …. ...….?"
"Yeah?" I answered, my pulse quickening for reasons I couldn't place.
A pause. Then, the words that would unmake me.
"We regret to inform you that your father was involved in an accident at Owen Bridge… We recovered identification matching his, but the injuries were severe—his face was unrecognizable."
"The authorities are still conducting further..."
The rest of the words blurred into nothing. Something about contacting the coroner's office. Next steps. Arrangements. But I couldn't process any of it. My phone slipped from my hand and hit the pavement with a dull thud. My knees buckled, and the world spun around me, slipping through my fingers like sand. The rain, the sounds of the city, it all faded into nothing.
That was the moment everything stopped. I was standing at the edge of a cliff, and I didn't even realize it until I had already fallen.
***
#Lost in the Void
The years that followed were a haze.
I lost my job first. Fired for not showing up. My career, once full of promise, lay in ruins. I turned to alcohol, to distractions, to anything that could drown out the emptiness. I numbed myself, day after day, until there was nothing left but the hollow sound of my own thoughts.
The company I had once worked for? The one that had discarded me like trash? It became the name everyone whispered. The one that ruled the gaming industry now. Their latest project?
Arcadia: The Last Horizon.
The game that had consumed me for years. The game that had once given me purpose.
Back then, I wasn't just a tester. I was a part of something bigger. I saw the potential—watched it grow from a simple idea to something grand. But when it launched, I was nothing. Just another name on a list of people who'd faded into the background. Just another cog in the machine.
But it was never just a game for me. It was an escape. A world where I could lose myself and feel something again. A world where I mattered.
It started simple a cultivation game, an escape into a different reality. But then, as if by design, the developers transformed it. It became something far grander, a sprawling, high-tech world of sci-fi fantasy.
***
#The Game's Description (In-Game Text):
Thalvoria. A world once known for its peace—a realm where humans, elves, dwarves, and supernatural beings coexisted, their lives entwined with the very flow of nature beneath the twin suns.
For centuries, it was an age of unprecedented harmony. Cities soared into the sky, their spires touching the heavens. Advanced technologies thrummed through the earth, driving progress in ways humanity had only dreamed of. The world's peace felt unbreakable, as if time itself had stilled to hold it together.
Until it shattered.
The Starfall—a celestial event unlike any before it. One of the twin suns darkened, and with it, dark energies seeped into the world. A slow unravelling began.
First, the whispers in the skies, strange storms that came from nowhere. Then, the ground itself trembled, the reality around them warping as dark forces moved.
And then, the Demons arrived.
The world that had once known balance was plunged into chaos. Dungeons opened, cities burned, and kingdoms crumbled. The ancient powers that had shaped Thalvoria's destiny turned on themselves, and the people, once united, now fought to survive.
But amidst the destruction, heroes rose. They forged their destinies in the fires of war.
And they would fight against the demons and monsters to save Thalvoria.
I stared at the screen, my heart pounding in my chest. The game was calling me. Maybe it was fate, or maybe just the desperate need to feel something again.
I wasn't sure what I was looking for anymore. Escape? Redemption? A second chance?
I clicked.
And the world went dark.