The huge obsidian doors slamd shut behind Damon as he left his father’s chambers, still deep in thought as he walked through the corridors, his father’s words echoing constantly in his mind.
"Trust no one."
He already had his suspicious towards Varus and Antares, but he needed to gather information to fully confirm these suspicious, and that certainly wouldn’t be easy.
He was currently right in their territory, which ant he needed to be intelligent. Even if he confird, it would be risky to kill them here, so he had to make a detailed plan on how to solve these issues.
As all of those thoughts swirled through his mind, Damon stepped into the sunny courtyard, spotting Artemis and Astralene.
On the right, Artemis was crouched by the edge of the central training arena, sketching runes into a floating crystal tablet, her brow furrowed as she experinted with new combinations of elental magic.
Her long hair shimred in the light, her fox ears twitching as she concentrated.
Across from her, standing tall with regal elegance, was Astralene.
The Astronomanian Princess, no, the forr Princess, was standing barefoot on the smooth tiles, holding the Book of Destiny, it’s surface glowing with a barrage of constellations and patterns that constantly shifted like a living map of the cosmos.
As if noticing Damon’s silent arrival, Astralene suddenly turned to him, a trace of longing in her eyes.
Once their gazes t, Astralene smiled brightly, and her entire deanor shifted, as if the stars themselves were blessing her and enhancing her beauty.
"You’ve returned," she said, her voice like a soft chi across a moonlit lake.
Damon gave a small nod and walked forward. Artemis looked up and gave a small wave, quickly turning away as another shy blush arrived on her cheeks.
Then she stood up and brushed off her cloak, quickly moving to the other side of the courtyard to avoid embarrassing herself anymore.
anwhile,
"How did things go with your father?" Astralene asked, her tone careful, knowing full well it might not have been a casual conversation.
While she had been sealed for a long ti, she was intelligent enough to read various context clues, and those clues told her that eting might’ve been more serious than Damon let on.
"As expected," Damon replied simply, then turned toward Astralene, "Astralene, I believe we still have unfinished business."
The beautiful woman raised an eyebrow, clearly amused. She closed the book of destiny and sent it to her storage space before refocusing on Damon.
She suddenly closed the gap before Damon could even blink, and suddenly she was gently hugging him, her voluptuous breasts pressed against Damon’s chest whilst she moved his hands towards her waist.
"You an how you broke the seal holding in a dreamless eternity? The stars have already realigned themselves around your existence, my soulmate." Astralene said, her heart pounding in her chest as she felt his hands on her body.
Now being so close to him and without any danger of dying, she could truly appreciate the handsoness of Damon. He seed to perfectly fit the type of man she liked, and they had already been bound as soulmates for all of eternity.
She wished she could give herself to him imdiately, but she needed to wait for the right mont.
Damon was a bit surprised at skillfully Astralene closed the distance, reminding him to never underestimate people from the Primordial Era. Still that didn’t make him forget his purpose.
"Yes," he said, "I want to know more. About the Primordial Era. About you, before the seal."
Astralene tilted her head, her expression shifting into sothing more serious, "Then walk with , Damon. I always liked to take walks under the stars back then."
She turned gracefully and began to walk toward the spiraling garden path that coiled around the palace’s central lake. Damon glanced once toward Artemis, who nodded and returned to her rune practice, though her ears still twitched to listen in from afar.
The duo walked in silence for a while, the only sounds being the sound of running water in the background.
"It’s strange," Astralene said at last, her voice quiet and tinged with lancholy," I’ve only been out for a short ti, but I can already see the world has changed so much. And yet this place.....the feel of it, it’s almost nostalgic."
"Did you live in a place like this?" Damon asked.
"No," she answered with a faint smile, "The Astronomanian civilization was different. We didn’t build palaces of stone. We constructed cities from star-tal and starlight, weaving our hos into the fabric of constellations. Our temples floated in the sky, drifting among astral currents only we could see."
Damon’s gaze lingered on her as she spoke, not just taking in the words but the subtle tremor beneath them, the ache of soone who had lost everything.
"What happened to them?" he asked. Lilith had only told him vaguely how they were defeated, he wanted to learn more clearly.
"They were corrupted," she said softly, "Turned into monsters. The Abyss took them all."
She stopped walking. The air around her shimred faintly, the light from the sun dimming slightly as if in mourning.
"My people were attuned to the stars. We saw possibilities and threads of fate that others couldn’t even perceive. We were warned of the Abyss long before it arrived. We studied it, feared it, tried to prepare. But even we... we underestimated it."
Her hand tightened around the Book of Destiny.
"They ca in waves. They corrupted minds, turned friends against each other. And when our defenses fell... our cities were swallowed. The stars themselves darkened in mourning."
She turned to Damon, and he saw sothing burning in her eyes now, not sorrow, but rage.
"And the worst part? We were betrayed from within. So of our own, star-readers, visionaries, they gave in to the Abyss willingly. They believed it would grant them greater power, that they would beco one with the ’true’ cosmos."
Her lip curled in disgust, "They tore open a crack in the veil of reality. That’s how it started."
"The Heretics," Damon murmured. "Lilith told about them."
Astralene’s eyes widened slightly in surprise. "So that’s how you knew where to find . Then you truly have the weight of a Sovereign’s will upon your shoulders."
"I didn’t ask for it," Damon replied.
"No one ever does," she said, the corners of her lips lifting just slightly.
They continued walking, reaching a shaded terrace where wind-chis of ancient crystal hung, playing haunting lodies in the breeze.
"You were sixteen when they sealed you," Damon said, "It must have felt like monts ago for you."
"It did." Astralene sat on the marble bench, her eyes gazing up at the sky. "I rember falling asleep surrounded by the Sovereigns. They were afraid, I had never seen them like that before."
"They were the most powerful people in the world, yet there was genuine fear in their eyes. They said I was the last hope of my people. That I needed to be preserved, kept away from the war until soone with the power and fate to save ... to save the world... could break the seal."
Her eyes t his again, "That person was you."
Damon felt sothing stir in his chest. A faint pressure. A connection. A bond deeper than magic or logic. It had been there since the mont he shattered the crystal, an unspoken thread pulling them together.
"You don’t even know ," he said.
Astralene stood, walking closer to him, her gaze intense and unwavering.
"Damon Flandre, you are the only being in existence who could have broken my seal. The runes on that prison weren’t just protective spells, they were laced with Destiny itself. The Sovereigns placed a Chrono-Stasis Field around , but more than that, they bound my soul with a Celestial Thread."
She raised her hand, and a faint golden line shimred into view between them, flickering like a strand of starlight.
"This thread only activates when one’s destined partner, their cosmic equal, is near. It’s a connection that supersedes ti, race, even reality. You awakened , Damon. That ans sothing."
Damon looked down at the glowing line, and for a mont, he felt its pull too. A warmth blooming in his chest that couldn’t be rationalized or dismissed.
"I’m not saying we’re bound by fate," Astralene added. "You still have a choice. But I will not deny what I feel. Not after sleeping through three eras for you."
Damon was silent, then asked, "And what do you feel?"
Her smile was slow, confident, and filled with a quiet kind of fire. "That I want to walk beside you. Fight beside you. That I want to help you destroy the Abyss and rebuild the world. And maybe, just maybe, learn what it ans to be loved in this new era."
From a distance, Artemis watched them, her hands trembling slightly. Her fox ears twitched, and her heart ached. She had seen it from the beginning, that Astralene wasn’t just powerful, she was fated. And fate, as always, was cruel to those who stood in its way.
But she would not give up.
She turned away from the scene, gripping her crystal tablet with renewed determination.
If Damon was fated for soone like Astralene, then Artemis would have to fight fate itself to stand beside him.
Back beneath the shade of the terrace, Damon and Astralene sat together in silence, the golden thread still faintly glowing between them. He didn’t say anything, not yet. There were too many emotions, too many thoughts swirling.
But he didn’t pull away either.
And for now, that was enough.
Reviews
All reviews (0)