The grand show ended perfectly.
Spring had returned, with it, the season of falling cherry blossoms—the time when love often quietly blooms.
Seraphine spent the evening happily at Hayden's Pavilion, dining with Orianna.
Afterward, she floated leisurely back to the Floating Castle.
Upon arriving at the top floor of the Mage Tower and stepping into the library, she immediately heard Ms. Syndra's voice:
"Demacia has a mage who controls rhythm."
Seraphine paused, surprised. "Someone with a soul resonance like mine?"
"No," Syndra replied, shaking her head slightly as she sat at the desk.
"She's simply gifted with voice magic."
Seraphine blinked, then asked curiously, "So... do you want me to recruit her?"
"She's of little strategic value to us. Swain thinks it's time for you to visit Demacia—help open their minds."
Syndra's voice was calm, almost disinterested.
"But… aren't we enemies?" Seraphine frowned.
To her, enlightenment meant healing confusion and helping others find emotional clarity—something she excelled at, but doing that for Demacia?
It felt like aiding the enemy.
Still flipping through her book, Syndra said carelessly, "This is part of the Empire's cultural outreach. Consider it your next coursework. From here to Demacia—every town, every crowd—is your stage."
Seraphine stared at her for a moment.
Syndra's nonchalance revealed something deeper.
It seemed neither Syndra nor the Noxian high command saw Demacia as a real threat.
They had the power and confidence to overwhelm them whenever they wished.
"That sounds… kind of amazing," Seraphine said with wonder.
"Should I take a break from the academy, then?"
Syndra responded without looking up, "Read ten thousand scrolls. Walk ten thousand miles. That's what he always to say. And it's what every Noxian mage should strive for."
Seraphine immediately understood Syndra's subtext.
This wasn't just coursework. It was a mission—a test.
She sighed softly. These words were once spoken by her other teacher, Ryan.
And in Noxus, they had become a standard for every true mage.
To Ryan, a mage wasn't just a spellcaster.
A true mage had to understand the stars above and the history beneath the land.
They had to read deeply, travel far, and uncover the essence of magic itself.
Her entire training had been shaped by that philosophy.
No wonder she often felt less like a student… and more like a mage-in-reserve for something far greater.
"I'll prepare well," she said with quiet resolve, eyes gleaming with excitement.
To walk between Noxus and Demacia, to witness the clash of two civilizations—maybe this wasn't just duty.
Perhaps it could be something beautiful.
Syndra gave a slight nod, her focus already back on the book in her hand.
Allie hovered beside her right arm, pulsing gently with magical signals.
The two seemed to be silently communicating.
----------------
At sunset, in the desert near Icathia's border…
A small, worn-down village received two dust-covered visitors.
The farmers looked up warily from their work.
Suspicion flickered in their tired eyes as they sized up the strangers.
The visitors were Kai'Sa and Ryan, who had arrived after days of travel and several encounters with the Void.
After surviving multiple attacks from Voidborn, Ryan had finally learned to rein in his power.
At least now, he could avoid attracting every mindless Voidspawn within miles like a blood-scented beacon.
"Outsiders, what is your purpose here?"
A dark-skinned old man stepped forward, his tone openly hostile.
Kai'Sa opened her mouth to respond, but Ryan gently stopped her, replying calmly:
"We're travelers from Noxus. We're headed to Icathia."
The old man's expression shifted slightly, brows furrowing deeply.
"Icathia? That land has been dead for centuries. No one in their right mind goes there."
"But it was a cradle of ancient magic," Ryan said with a faint smile.
"There must still be remnants worth studying."
"You seem like a powerful mage, young man," the old man said, his voice softening only a little.
"But take my advice—there's danger beyond your reckoning."
"We appreciate the warning," Ryan replied politely.
"Still, we'd like to rest here for the night. May I ask if that's possible?"
The old man sighed.
"You may stay at my home tonight. I only hope you live to leave."
Despite his concern, he welcomed them into the village.
As they walked, the vast emptiness of the settlement became apparent.
Though large in area, the village felt hollow.
Only one house stood in the distance, separated by fences enclosing each homestead.
Behind those fences, livestock bleated, clucked, and mooed—a surprising number for such a sparsely populated place.
Ryan and Kai'Sa took in the surroundings quietly, occasionally talking with their host.
They soon learned his name: Karu, the village elder and mayor.
He led them to a plain courtyard and spoke briefly before leaving:
"Don't wander tonight. It's not safe after dark."
Once Karu was out of earshot, Kai'Sa frowned.
"Lord Ryan, this is the fifth village we've visited. They're all the same—barely any people, but an excessive number of livestock. Something's off. I sensed it in Karu. He's afraid of Icathia… but underneath that fear is something else."
"Frenzy?" Ryan asked, watching her face.
He saw Karu having a few words with a middle-aged man, and the middle-aged man ran towards the desert with a solemn expression.
She nodded. "Yes. I can feel it. With my connection to the Void, it's clear—these people know more than they let on."
Ryan's eyes narrowed, the faint blue glow of runes flickering in his pupils.
"The village is brimming with life energy," he murmured.
"Yet I don't sense the Void nearby. That's unnatural. There must be a reason the Void avoids this place."
"You're saying it's connected to the Void?" Kai'Sa asked, voice tense.
Ryan nodded thoughtfully.
"It has to be. Over the past decade, anyone who didn't submit to the Void was likely filtered out."
The Icathian frontier was a dead zone in terms of major powers.
Shuriman warlords had long since abandoned it.
This land had been left untouched for decades.
The last organized force to pass through here was under Ryan's command—during the invasion of Shurima, when he sent scouts to locate Kai'Sa and her kin.
That was eleven years ago. And even then, his soldiers only passed through Kai'Sa's village.
He knew little about the broader region. But one thing was clear:
The villages that still survived likely did so by surrendering to the Void.
Maybe they were livestock. Perhaps they were complicit.
And whoever was managing the "offering"—sacrifice or supply—was the Prophet.
Whether the Prophet believed they were saving humanity or was simply another vessel of the Void didn't matter.
The result was the same.
Ryan's eyes gleamed with cold curiosity.
There are Void creatures under this land, he thought.
But magical detection doesn't work here—it might even provoke them.
Whoever this Prophet was, they weren't a mindless beast.
They had intelligence. Control.
It had been a long time since Ryan faced an enemy he knew nothing about.
Interesting.
"Maybe tonight," he said, glancing at the window, "or tomorrow after we depart… something will reveal itself."
Kai'Sa followed his gaze.
Karu was speaking with a middle-aged man.
After a few words, the man turned and ran into the desert, heading straight toward Icathia.
"This village is different," Ryan said softly.
"The livestock here aren't just large—they're old."
"In the other villages," Kai'Sa added, "they explained the absence of older animals by saying they'd been sold off, and the young ones were still growing. But here? They're all mature. That means they're not selling them. They're storing them."
Ryan's expression darkened slightly.
"Then the worship here… It's not far off."
"Is that so..." Kai'Sa nodded slowly, her expression clearing.
Lord Ryan had always told her: Look at the big picture through the smallest details.
Every time she recalled one of his lessons, something clicked into place.
In these past few days, his guidance helped her understand things she'd never questioned.
It reminded her of simpler times.
Her father had worked for a caravan, constantly on the road delivering rare treasures to far-off nobles.
Though he wasn't home often, he would share stories whenever he returned—strange places, strange people, stranger creatures.
On one such journey, her father encountered a gravely injured mage on the verge of death.
That mage was Ryan.
Moved by pity or perhaps something deeper, her father brought Ryan home to recover.
During those weeks, Kai'Sa, just a young girl then, had been captivated by the strange mage's insights.
He told stories of stars and runes, ley lines and magical theory—perspectives she'd never imagined.
It was Ryan who taught her to think like a mage, even when her world collapsed.
His teachings stayed with her during those endless years trapped in the Void.
Without him… she doubted she would have survived her first encounter.
Or maybe, she thought bitterly, Mother and I would've died together that day.
The thought brought a flicker of pain to her eyes.
She pushed it down with practiced ease and forced a smile.
"Lord Ryan," she asked gently, "do you think we'll find the Prophet this time?"
They had wandered the desert for days now.
Each time they approached a village, livestock, crops, and people.
But never the true Void.
And wherever there was no life… there, they sensed the Void's hunger.
It didn't make sense.
Ryan pulled back the edge of his translucent blue spell-shield, and Kai'Sa immediately tensed.
Someone was approaching.
Then he spoke, voice calm, analytical:
"The Void is chaotic. Disordered. That much is clear. Either the higher Void entities lack the strength to breach our space… or they lack the understanding to do so with precision."
They had fought Void creatures nearly every day on this journey.
And each time, Ryan's understanding of them deepened.
"The Void is parasitic," he continued.
"It feeds without restraint. Devours all life. Then, when it's consumed everything, it dies too—because it has nothing left to feed on."
Kai'Sa nodded. That part, she knew all too well.
"They even devour each other," Ryan added.
"Consume enough, and they evolve into something more dangerous."
The common Voidlings they had seen were worm-like, armored, with sharp limbs and insect-like aggression.
But Ryan had once encountered something far more terrifying—a mutated entity with a massive eye, a remnant from his experiments on a captured specimen from Va'Zuan.
Even after millennia of decay, with its energy almost completely drained, that creature hadn't died.
It didn't even need to move to kill. Just the whisper of its voice—or the weight of its gaze—was enough to steal life.
"We haven't seen Void of that level out here," Ryan mused.
"Not yet. Which might mean the Prophet can't control them. Or…" he paused, "he's just helping them."
As he spoke, Ryan felt it.
A flicker.
A sliver of awareness brushed against his mind, like something was watching.
But it vanished just as quickly as it came.
Whether it was because of the world rune he bore or something about Runeterra, the Void could not hold its gaze on him.
Not yet.
He smiled faintly, not out of arrogance, but satisfaction.
"Whatever or whoever the Prophet is," Ryan said, eyes narrowing, "we now know this much—he can command Void creatures. And if I see their rituals firsthand, I can trace them."
He looked around at the strange abundance of livestock in the village. Kai'Sa followed his gaze.
"These people are feeding something," he said quietly.
"That's the only reason Void creatures this far from the core haven't starved. They're being sustained."
Kai'Sa's face darkened with realization.
These villages… weren't just survivors.
They were suppliers.
The hour of sacrifice in the village drew near, and Ryan was determined to uncover the truth behind the so-called Prophet.
Meanwhile, just a kilometer away from the ruins of Icathia, a deep and narrow gully cleaved the desert floor like a scar.
Its depths were pitch-black, seemingly endless, evoking a primal dread in any who dared to approach.
The middle-aged man who had left the village earlier stood at its edge.
He knelt, legs folded beneath him, and slammed his forehead against the stone.
His posture was one of utter submission.
Both palms faced the sky, held upright as though presenting his soul to something unseen.
"The Void… the Great Void…" he whispered in a trembling voice.
"Answer the call of your faithful servant…"
His words were spoken in an ancient tongue—a forgotten dialect of Icathia, lost to time but resonating with hidden power.
Though softly spoken, each syllable carried a strange resonance, as if the words themselves pulsed with an unnatural frequency.
As his chanting continued, the pitch of his voice began to rise—and with it, the atmosphere began to shift.
The earth trembled faintly.
Once a narrow split, the gash in the ground began to widen… slowly, ominously.
Hissss!
A harsh, raspy screech echoed from the depths.
And then another. And another.
Within moments, a swarm of Void phantoms surged upward through the rift—dozens, then hundreds—twisting and writhing, their forms ephemeral and grotesque.
They merged as they climbed, weaving together into a monstrous entity.
A massive beast, humanoid in shape but utterly alien.
It stood on four massive limbs, each rippling with the strength of countless Void spawn fused.
The head of the construct—an amalgam of Void spirits—howled, unleashing a storm of howling wind.
The force of the gale struck the middle-aged man like a divine punishment, shredding the cloth on his back and lashing his skin with deep cuts.
Only his prostrate position saved him from being hurled away.
Even so, his legs trembled beneath him, and he could barely keep his voice steady as he cried:
"Great Void… god of all consuming… Two mages have entered our village. They seek to reach Icathia."
"Tomorrow night is the sacred time of offering. Shall we offer them… as tribute?"
His tone was laced with both reverence and fear.
He was not just asking—he was begging for divine guidance.
Across the barren wastes, the villages had long shared information.
All were aware of the two mages and their gradual march toward Icathia.
Ordinarily, travelers of that sort were rare prizes.
Most who sought Icathia's buried secrets perished long before reaching it.
Those who survived often possessed power; to the Void, mages were more than just prey.
They were nourishment beyond compare. One mage could sustain a village for an entire month, eliminating the need to offer livestock or kin.
Other villages had sought permission to claim the mages for sacrifice.
The Void's answer had been silence.
Most of the others had days or weeks before their next sacrificial rite.
They could only watch and wait.
But this village… was different.
Tomorrow night, under the broken stars of Shurima, their sacrificial day would come again.
And if the gods willed it, these two powerful mages might be just the offering they had been waiting for.
On this so-called sacred day, the villagers prepared cattle and sheep as offerings.
In return, the Void would grant them another month of safety—at least, that was the belief.
This tradition had persisted for nearly a decade.
But with the arrival of the two mages, an opportunity had presented itself.
A rare offering. One that could bring greater favor from the Void.
But first, they needed to be sure their actions aligned with the will of their god.
"Let… them… leave… Tomorrow night… sacrifice… as usual…"
The stacked Void beast let out a guttural roar, interlaced with a language reminiscent of ancient Shurima.
Though fragmented and warped, the middle-aged man understood the message enough.
He bowed again, trembling, and then turned to leave.
Throughout the process, he didn't dare lift his head—he didn't even breathe too loudly, let alone look upon the monstrous entity.
When he returned to the village, disheveled and ghost-pale, the chief, Karu, was already waiting at the entrance.
"Well?" Karu asked with urgency, though he maintained a reverent pose.
The sun had long since dipped beneath the horizon, and moonlight now bathed the desert.
Under the stars, dozens of villagers stood with iron forks and spears gripped tightly in their hands.
Just moments ago, they had been feeding livestock.
Now, they were all assembled—waiting, hopeful.
They had already decided that the two mages residing in Karu's home would be the extra tribute.
"The Void has spoken," the man said in a strained voice.
"The sacrifice will proceed as usual. We are to let them leave tomorrow."
He swayed as he spoke, the journey having drained the life from his limbs.
Cold sweat clung to him like frost, and his body quivered uncontrollably.
"We obey the will of the Void," Karu declared solemnly, face hardened with religious zeal.
Around him, disappointment clouded the villagers' eyes. Slowly, they lowered their weapons in silence.
Two mages could have bought them two months of peace.
And it wasn't difficult, in theory: two unsuspecting travelers, killed in the night.
They'd done worse before.
The house where Ryan stayed was no ordinary home.
It was built from flammable reeds and resin-treated wood—an easy tinderbox.
One spark would reduce it to ash. The stone tiles on the roof would collapse in sequence, crushing anyone inside. Even mages wouldn't escape unscathed.
And if they tried to resist?
Iron-tipped spears hurled from afar had proven effective in the past.
The Void didn't require the living.
A fresh corpse, even a day old, would still retain its mana.
Still… the will of the Void was absolute.
It had rejected their idea.
In the meantime, Ryan sat calmly at a small table, flipping through a worn book by lantern light.
A faint, sardonic smile played across his lips.
It was unclear whether he was mocking the villagers' blind faith or the Void's predictable cowardice.
The night passed quietly.
At sunrise, under the wary eyes of every villager, Ryan and Kai'Sa departed the village.
Karu himself offered a pious farewell, eyes shining with forced respect.
The villagers said nothing. They watched in silence as the two figures walked south, toward Icathia.
Their path took them past the gully, now eerily sealed as if nothing had happened.
Night fell once again.
On a sandy hill overlooking the village, Ryan and Kai'Sa stood motionless.
A faint, translucent blue shield surrounded them, elevating their forms a few feet above the ground. Silent, invisible, untouchable.
Even if someone passed beneath them, no trace would be found.
"It's just like that night…" Kai'Sa murmured.
In the distance, flames flickered. The villagers had lit their ritual bonfire again.
Pain flickered in her eyes.
She remembered a night like this—when her village had done the same.
Cattle and sheep sewn together grotesquely, tied to wooden stakes around the fire, the villagers chanting in a long-lost tongue.
But her village was poorer—there had been fewer animals.
And she… she had made a terrible mistake.
She and her childhood friends had freed the livestock in secret, thinking they were saving lives.
They were just children.
But in doing so, they had doomed their home.
The Void had come anyway.
Because of her.
Now, whenever she thought of it, the memory burned through her chest—anger, guilt, and sorrow tangled into a knot of helpless rage.
If they had let the ritual proceed, the village would have survived like this one.
Or, like countless others, it still would've been wiped out—deemed an unworthy sacrifice.
But why… why must humanity be reduced to offerings?
Why must they cower before creatures so mindless—so unworthy?
Why must they live like food?
The Void was her eternal enemy.
And one day, she swore to herself that she would wipe it from Runeterra's face.
Just then, Ryan's eyes narrowed slightly. He placed a hand on her shoulder and said calmly:
"The sacrifice… has begun."