Pov's Arel
No one was meant to hear the gates breathe.
Yet on the night the sky turned silver,
The wind stopped first. Birds froze in mid-flight, their wings locked as if time itself had tightened its grip on the world. Then came the sound—low, ancient, and deep—like stone grinding against stone beneath the earth.
Arel dropped the bucket he was carrying. Water spilled across the ground, but he didn't notice. His heart was pounding too loudly.
The gates…
The elders had spoken of them only in whispers.
The Ten Gates of Heaven were not doors in the sky, as children imagined. They were seals—each one binding a power too vast for mortal hands. Long ago, the heavens locked them away after the Great Fall, when humans reached for divinity and nearly shattered the world.
And now… one was waking.
A beam of light tore through the clouds in the distance, striking the old mountain beyond the village. The ground trembled. Houses creaked. People screamed.
Arel's mark burned.
He cried out, clutching his left palm. A symbol—one he had been born with—glowed like molten gold. Until now, it had been nothing more than a strange birthmark. But tonight, it pulsed with life.
"You cannot hide anymore," a voice echoed inside his mind.
Arel fell to his knees.
"Who are you?" he whispered.
"I am the Guardian of the First Gate," the voice replied, ancient and weary. "And you have been chosen."
Chosen.
That word carried both honor and doom.
From the mountain, a shockwave of light burst outward. High above, something unseen cracked—like glass breaking in the heavens.
The First Gate of Heaven had opened.
And with it came a truth the world had forgotten:
If all ten gates were opened, humanity would either ascend…
or be erased forever.
Arel looked at his glowing hand, fear and determination warring in his chest.
Whatever the gates were about to unleash, his life would never be the same.
Then arel feel into a deep sleep...