A few hours passed. Recovery came slow, but steady.
Altha stirred in his chair, blinking the fog from his mind. A soft glow pulsed in the air before him—the holographic screen, still floating where it had been, patiently waiting like a loyal dog or a silent judge.
A single word nested in the center of the display: [Profile]
He pointed at the screen like it had personally offended him.
"I just got here. So why is everything already falling apart?"
The screen remained impassive.
He sighed and slouched in the chair, one leg dangling over the armrest as he tool a moment to just breathe.
"Well... at least the connection's back."
Starring at the screen for a little longer wary from the minutes prior he eventually yielded to his curiosity.
He reached out mentally to his connection to the Spire, and the system responded with smooth, silent obedience. The text rearranged itself, lines of pale light sliding into a new configuration:
---
> [PROFILE]
[GENERAL STATUS]
Name/s: Altha, Noctorin
Surname: Valkeriel
Age: 15
Gender: Male
Height: 5.5 ft
Weight: 57.5 kg
[MEANING]: Red-Phage
---
Altha narrowed his eyes and focused on the term.
---
> Red-Phage
You are deeply entrenched in fate—but unbound by it. You can perceive its crimson strings and, when needed, unweave them.
Because of this, you are unwelcome in the folds of fate. The multiverse can have you—cruel as it may be. You are not protected by it but instead opposed. The wandering Other.
---
Altha quirked a brow. "Well this isn't entirely unexpected... puts a lot of things into perspective actually. This makes me feel strangely vindicated."
He returned to the screen:
---
Dream Name: Fate's Other
Runic Name: ---
Insignial Name: ---
True Name: ---
---
"Fate's Other? Like otherness? Spire... are you calling me weird when you're a literal psychic inanimate object. I mean to each their own I guess. Far be it for me to point out glass houses."
---
[EXISTENCE STATUS]
Existence Sequence: Inceptuous
Existence Category: ???
Existence Tier: 1
[ENERGY STATUS]
Output: 5 Re (High)
Input: 5 Re (High)
Signature: Grey (???)
Type: Psyche
Quality: Einer/2
Quantity: Inceptuous/2
Conversion Rate: ???
[ASTRAL STATUS]
Status: Candidate
Remembrance(s): 0
Inner-Existial(s): 0
Spire Sequence: 1
---
Altha paused trying to make it all make sense. He looked at Spire Sequence along with Existance Sequence and gathered that the Existance Sequence must be the name of the name of the Spire Sequence meaning Inceptuous is the first sequence of existance for an Astral.
---
[ESSENCE STATUS]
Soul: ---
Genius: ---
Psyche Factor: 30% Remaining
Supposition: Outer-Grey
---
He squinted and focused.
---
> Outer-Grey
A place where nowhere exists. An exception to law, purpose, and structure. A region severed from meaning—where the Omniverse dissolves. The contradiction and unification of everything and nothing—Meaningless.
---
"So I'm... essentially a walking anomaly," he muttered, dragging his hand down his face again. "Cool. Love that for me."
---
[ASPECT STATUS]
Unbound: Exception
Deific: Cognizance, Clairvoyance
Divine: Esper
Primary: ---
Auxiliary: ---
Minor: Fate, Prisma
---
He stared at the glowing screen for a long time.
"I'm so confused," he admitted flatly. "How does anyone begin to make sense of this gibberish?"
He closed the screen with a thought and leaned forward, elbows on knees.
"Alright... new plan." He stood up and rolled his shoulders, his joints popping with fatigue. "First—we'll work toward survival, I'll make sense of the Spire's technical mumbo jumbo later. I'll Secure the temple then I'll try to find some water, food, and Safe ground."
"Then we can investigate the temple a bit more. Who knows, maybe we'll find some clues. Honestly whoever the architect that put this place together was must've been quite the arcanist." He chuckled, "But then that makes me wonder. If they were crafty enough to build this place and powerful enough to protect it, then the only two questions left."
He look to the blurry landscape beyond the barrier. "Who was he protecting it from? And why? What lurks out there that would require this much protection? Was it even for protection?" He asked
Altha stepped into the hallway. The echoes of his boots tapped against the ancient stone, crisp and lonely.
Crossing through the ivy-choked archway, he entered the garden once more. Pale light streamed between the broken dome and vine-wrapped columns.
Altha approached the stairway leading down to the fountain, its waters glittering like liquid silver in the gloom.
He exhaled softly.
"I don't think I really need to guess where my water's gonna come from. Now... as for food, that might be a little tricky."
Altha descended the garden steps, shoes soft against the worn stone as he approached the fountain.
The water shimmered—a still mirror under pale light.
Clear. Cold. Undisturbed.
He crouched beside it, running his fingers along the edge.
"Looks clean," he murmured. "But I'm not taking any chances."
He tapped the side of the fountain.
"They say stagnant waters turn foul but this one seems more... stubborn." He paused wiping his finger on the fountain's surface. "Best to boil it first. I can't afford getting sick now… not in a place like this."
Rising to his feet, he looked up toward the great cathedral beyond the courtyard. The massive structure loomed, its jagged windows like fractured eyes watching him.
"Maybe I'll find some answers in there," he thought.
The vast doors groaned as he slipped back through them.
Inside, the cathedral was exactly as he'd left it: choked in dust and silence, the air thick with the scent of burned parchment and old stone.
A hush clung to every surface. It was oddly comforting.
Ash coated the floor like snow.
He sighed—reluctantly—and began to rummage through the mess.
His shoes disturbed long-dead memories. Hands moved through debris. Pages turned to flakes at his touch. Everything he touched crumbled.
"So much ash…" His mind flashed back to the dark knight and the wolves—each one reduced to ashen ruin in the end.
He knelt and dragged two fingers along the stone floor. A layer of ash and soot came away on his skin.
He dragged a finger on the floor and rubbed the ash between his fingers curiously. Suddenly he was still, his head in a far off place.
He rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger—slow, curious. Its texture was dry. Fine. Too fine.
And then—he went still.
His surroundings blurred as his senses rewired.
He was a grey man, no, a woman with ember eyes.
She was clothed in red robes traced with golden thread, a deep hood hovering over her eyes casting shadows over them. Her vision blurred as she focused on the image of a tree depicted in glass.
No, he was in light armour, white fabrics overlaying blackened armour trimmed in gold and a red armoured hand. He sat slumped against the wall, cradled in the arms of a red-robed woman. Crimson poured from his side and leaked onto the floor. His fingers trembled against hers.
The robe blending almost seemless with his fading life essence, blending blood with devotion.
His vision dimmed.
Then—darkness.
Altha gasped.
He shot upright, one hand instinctively pressing against his stomach. Sweat trickled down his temple. His breathing was shallow, but steady.
His eyes flicked up—drawn to the stained-glass window above.
There it was, a tree.
A tree of golden leaves, a crimson trunk outlined with white smoke that dance around its limbs, encased within the burning eye of a blackened sun.
He stared at it, jaw tight.
"The Lord..." he whispered.
The words trembled in the air as his entire body shuddered.
"The Lord of the Ashen Pyre."
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
The sound snapped him back from the depths of his thoughts.
Altha turned on his heel and sprinted toward the door connecting to the bridge, casting one final glance over his shoulder at the stained-glass tree as he left.
Outside, the sky had changed.
Black clouds had gathered, coiling above the golden tree, spiraling like a noose around a dying god as fire pulsed within them—veins of ember running through stormstuff, trembling with malevolent light.
One look and he knew exactly what was to come. He quickly hid.
The first bolt of flame screamed from the heavens. Then another. And another.
Fire began to rain.
It poured from the sky like judgment, slamming into the tree and the courtyard below,
As the inferno raged, Altha's left eye shifted—burning gold, haloed by a single crimson ring. A whisper of fate stirred in his vision.
The crimson strings returned. And this time there were two. One leading to the incinerating fire while the other string travelled downward presumably to what would be almost certain death by a certain six armed knight.
Two threads. Two fates.
He hesitated, breath caught in his throat.
And then—through the curtain of roaring flame—Something walked.
From the curtain of anguished death and destruction emerged a single, blooming rose with velvet petals the color of arterial dusk, curled around emptiness like it was shielding a wound or weakness.
Then emerged it's vaguely humanoid form.
It moved like a memory of war—lightless and fluid, yet dragging an unseen weight with every step.
Its body was a jagged frame of charred obsidian metal, ribs splayed like shattered armour, each joint tipped with cruel thorns that pulsed faint red beneath the skin.
Its arms were scythes—not held, but become. Crescent blades fused to elongated limbs, as though forged by grief and sharpened by purpose. Each step it took left no sound. Only a rising tension in the air, like something forgotten was remembering itself.
The air changed. Growing heavier. Sharper.
The scent of blood and roses clung to it. A paradox. A warning.