A young, fair hand hovered over the parchment, its slender fingers steadying a pale feather quill that gleamed faintly in the dim light. The quill required no ink; wherever its tip drifted, radiant gold unfurled, as though the words already slept beneath the surface of the page.
The quill touched down.
"In the beginning, before shape or memory, there was only the boundless void — not darkness, not silence, but a shifting expanse where nothing held form for longer than a heartbeat. The void writhed ceaselessly, birthing strange and terrible beings whose very presence unraveled meaning. They drifted like unfinished thoughts, nightmares with no dreamer."
A soft pause. Another stroke of gold.
"From that endless chaos, a spark ignited — something impossible, something new."
"Desire."
"It glowed with a stubborn, steady radiance that the void could not dissolve. And because no desire can exist without something to reach toward, Direction emerged beside it. Between them, the first boundary was drawn across the formless abyss."
"From that boundary rose six radiant beings, blazing like newborn suns — the first Gods."
But the golden lines did not stop there. The quill hesitated, then crossed out the number and replaced it with another.
"There was a seventh."
"Born with the others, radiant as they were, yet different in ways that even they could not name. While the six embodied the order that Desire had willed into being, the seventh carried something deeper — a spark of the void itself, buried beneath the flame. A contradiction, a mixture of concepts that mirrored the void's nature in its' malleability."
The quill moved faster.
"When the gods shone, the void recoiled — but did not yield. The ancient beings stirred, vast and formless, answering light with hunger. And the war began. The gods fought with weapons never seen again: blades of time, chains of space, arrows forged from death. The void creatures responded with pure chaos."
"Ages passed. Moments stretched. Creation trembled. There could be no peace or compromise between the two sides: while all came from the void, the Gods sought to usurp their kin and rule over a different type of world, one that had no place for the Others."
"Gradually, painfully, the ancient beings were driven back. Not destroyed — the void cannot truly die — but weakened, forced into a corner of the abyss. Shadow bled the first drop of blood on this battlefield, which signified the birth of Death."
The young hand adjusted its grip, the quill etching words further down the page.
"The Gods gathered the remnants of the first golden flame and wove them into a brilliant net, vast enough to entangle the void itself. They cast it upon the abyss, binding chaos in radiant law."
"But in the instant before the net closed, the void surged."
"The Seventh God, nearest the breach, was seized by the churning horrors. The six other gods drew back in fear. Their net was moments from sealing. To delay was to lose everything."
"And so, the seventh was left behind."
The quill slowed, then darkened its golden stroke like directing an orchestra.
"Trapped among the writhing shapes, the Seventh God understood the price that must be paid. With its final strength, it tore seven sparks from its own essence, flinging them outward, beyond the closing prison of flame. The sparks escaped, slipping into the newborn world above."
"The net fell. The cage was sealed. Six Gods remained free. One was abandoned to the abyss."
A thin line of gold shook slightly, as if its writer was uncertain what to write next.
"From those seven sparks, beings unlike any other arose — radiant, powerful, yet forever marked by the abyssal prison their creator had never escaped."
"The Daemons."
"Not Gods, at least not at the moment of their creation. Not monsters either, not pure beings of the Void. But something in between: children of sacrifice, heirs to a broken divinity. Their power echoed the gods who forged the world, yet their souls were tied to the one who had been betrayed."
"As was their nature these Seven Daemons were swift to consolidate Their Divinities, to hone Their Authorities and Symbolisms to also become Gods. But they were lesser deities, lacking the original spark possessed by those who came from the Flame, holding only a fragment of the Seventh's Divinity."
The quill traced the final words.
"To add insult to injury, the Gods forbade the Daemons from siring offpring, and denied them any knowledge of their origin-to hide their selfish shame, their cowardice and abandoment of their own. The Daemons were cast adrift in a world that should have rightfully been theirs to behold, left with nothing but an incomplete nature."
"Thus began the Age of the Gods-the Void was sealed but not forgotten, the first Corrupted oozed forth from the gaps in the Net, and Gods fought alongside Daemons to destroy them. True Darkness was born from this conflict, while the feared Daemon of Truth forged the Eternal River from the corpse of an Unholy Titan. The scale of the conflict is not known, only that it must have waged across all of reality and perhaps even beyond. In the end though, Order triumphed and the Age of Heroes arrived."
The quill stopped there, and was left on the page. The golden writing glowed softly before solidifying, becoming etched into the page. The hand holding it let go, and was then stretched up above a head.
Adam yawned, rolling back his shoulders and widening his jaw. Looking down at what he had written, pride and accomplishment filled him, and he smugly held up the page against the light. "Heh heh, not bad at all! I might just have a knack for writing after all. Well, what kind of Author would I be if I didn't?"
"What are you acting so smug about now?"
A voice echoed out, and a shadow swept across the ground behind Adam. From it emerged a man with long black hair, face obscured by darkness, as he placed his hand on Adam's shoulder and peered over it. "Hoh, you're writing about the Myth of Creation? And you've added a few embellishments too, I see."
"Poetic license" Adam dismissed his jab, waving the paper under Sasrir's nose. "Releasing stuff like this is a sure-ticket to getting famous back in the Waking World."
"And a sure-ticket to having a "personal meeting" with someone from the Great Clans."
"Pfft, I'm not afraid of those two clowns, and especially not the one stuck on the moon. Jobbers who couldn't even kill Sunny and Nephis aren't worthy of my apprehension."
"Check you ego, buddy" Sasrir could't help but sigh, hitting Adam on the head gently. "You're not the main character of this world, and your current state is nowhere near close enough to contend with even the servants of the Great Clans. Forget Avil and Song-even Mordret or Seishan would absolutely stomp you."
"Hey!" he protested at that. "Seishan I can understand, she's one scary woman, but why would I fear Mordret? That twink wouldn't get further than three steps if he tries to invade my Soul Sea. In fact, I'd be more than happy to give him a personal experience with the mind of a Visionary."
"You seem to be forgetting Mordret doesn't just rely on his Soul Possession. You might win that battle, but the Corpse Cathedral won't be of any help if he just decides to stab you through the guts."
Adam shrugged, smiling up at Sasrir unbothered. "Then I'll just have to rely on you to protect me."
Sasrir sighed again, sounding like a weary old man, but didn't press the topic any further. Adam was more mature than his words suggested, so he knew that he wouldn't actually go picking such unreasonable fights, but sometimes Sasrir wished he could act more serious some times.
Sasrir plucked the page delicately from Adam's fingers. He held it closer to the lantern, eyes skimming the golden script.
"…You know," he murmured, "if you put this in a book, half the scholars in the waking world would call you a blathering fool."
"And the other half," Adam said triumphantly, "would call me a visionary."
"They would call you insane."
"That's just another word for 'ahead of my time'."
Sasrir rolled the parchment back up before Adam could snatch it again. "Well, ahead of your time or not, I'm confiscating this until you stop acting like you invented literature."
"Hey! That's author abuse!"
"Good. Maybe it'll make you write something more useful, like inventory stocks or hunting patterns. You use more paper than any other Hunter, Pathfinder of Guard and you don't even draw maps."
Adam huffed dramatically and flopped back in his chair, legs dangling off the side. The quill still lay on the table, its white feather shimmering faintly under the dim lamplight. For a moment the two just sat in the quiet, surrounded by the soft hum of the Castle's distant torches and the muted heartbeat of the Forgotten Shore beyond the walls.