The observation chamber of House Shadow was hewn from obsidian and blackglass, its cathedral-high vaults lost in drifting banners of midnight silk that stirred as though alive. Enchanted sconces burned with restrained shadowflame, casting violet light and long, serpentine silhouettes across the polished stone. Ancient sigils were etched deep into the walls, their low hum sealing the chamber in a reverent hush—as though even sound knew better than to linger.
Through towering arches of spell-glass framed in onyx, the coliseum spread beneath them in full—a vast bowl of bloodstained sand, blackstone walls carved with the crests of ancient houses, and layered wards shimmering with barely restrained violence. Power coiled there. Waiting.
Moments ago, this had been a chamber of leisure.
Scions reclined with practiced ease upon velvet seating, their laughter low, their movements languid. Knights of high standing stood in quiet clusters, while bishops and saints drifted through the space. The chamber itself was far larger than it appeared, folded outward by spatial mana into a grand hall capable of housing thousands—and tonight, it did. Wine flowed freely. Deals were murmured. Strategies were debated with detached amusement.
Below, the duel had been spectacle. A Rank One bout. Entertaining, perhaps even admirable. Few had expected the adopted boy—raised scarcely eight weeks prior to true notice—to endure against the golden prince. Astra of Shadow had surprised them, yes. Endured longer than anticipated. Enough to earn a nod or two.
They had watched comfortably.
Until the voice rose from the sands.
"Brace yourself, Champion of Shadow," it rang out—clear, commanding, impossibly heavy. "For you are about to witness… the father of all."
A pause.
"The Sun."
The words struck the coliseum like a war-drum against bone—too loud, too absolute, cutting through wards that should have smothered them.
Then came the light.
Not soft. Not gentle.
Absolute.
Radiance tore across the arena in a violent flood, filling the dome with molten gold. This was no imitation, no conjured flame. It was the sun itself, wrenched into being by will alone, its presence oppressive, suffocating, undeniable.
The observation chamber inhaled as one.
Goblets tipped. Dark wine spilled across velvet and jeweled gloves, forgotten. Scions surged to the balcony, drawn forward as though by instinct, faces drained of color beneath the unnatural glow. Shadows clung tighter to the walls, recoiling from the intrusion.
"The Sun of Dawn," someone whispered—not in awe, but in fear.
"Another herald," another voice snarled, shadow curling defensively around its speaker. Even the chamber resisted; the shadowflame sconces dimmed, fighting the invasion of light.
A silver-masked demigod leaned forward, voice sharp and measured. "How many Sun-bearers remain? Under fifteen? And of those—how many could wield a domain like that? Five?"
A lean bishop laughed softly, the sound brittle. "Fewer. Most of the bloodlines burned themselves hollow generations ago. House Dawn hoards what remains like sacred relics. Breeds them like cattle."
"And now they've produced this," someone murmured, eyes fixed on the blazing arena. "To invoke that spell at Rank One… how troublesome."
Silence followed, thick and uneasy.
"This Prince Lucien," another voice said.
"He's more than a Sun mage," the masked woman said quietly, her gloved fingers tightening around her goblet until the crystal creaked. "That domain isn't mere technique. It's inheritance. That boy wasn't trained into it—he was born carrying it. Cursed blood."
A murmur rippled through the chamber.
"House Dawn was fading," a noble near the rear said, voice edged with disbelief. "Bloated with titles, starved of strength. A desert kingdom gilded with old sunlight. But now?" He gestured toward the blazing arena below. "With an heir like that…"
"Imagine him after ascension," another whispered, as though speaking too loudly might draw the sun's attention.
"Their rise begins again," a third muttered. "As it always does. Light first. Conquest after."
"And schemes," an elder finished, eyes narrowing beneath a hood heavy with sigils. "There are always schemes when the sun grows bold."
"He's a symbol now," sighed the bishop in burgundy. "The dangerous kind. Sun-bearers are rare for a reason—the mana resists them. Too pure. Too violent. It burns the body hollow if the soul cannot bear it."
"Then that boy must be fireproof," someone said, without humor.
"He's young," came another voice, thoughtful, wary. "And controlled. Too controlled for someone carrying radiance like that. That's the Dawn way—smiles like silk, and blood beneath."
A pause followed, thick as held breath.
"And the other one?" someone asked at last, eyes shifting downward. "This Astra. I'd never even heard his name before the festival. Where did he come from?"
"That," another replied slowly, "even I don't know. The ordeal that brought him in was sealed. The council wrapped him in silence."
"They did?" The surprise was genuine.
"He's performed admirably," a bishop observed, tone clinical. "Composed. Talented. This will be a good loss for him."
"Or a cruel one," another countered dryly. "The kind that sharpens ambition… or leaves only ash."
In the corner, Alistair smiled.
He stood among knights and bishops alike, unassuming, silent—a Rank Four assistant to the councilors, trusted, informed. He knew far more than he let on, and said nothing.
Now more than a thousand nobles crowded the chamber—pawns and squires, knights and bishops of House Shadow. Dark robes whispered as they shifted, unease rippling through them like a living thing.
In a recess half-swallowed by gloom, Vesper leaned against the obsidian wall, arms crossed. Still. Silent. His expression betrayed nothing.
Around him, younger Rank Ones stared past the balcony rail—at the arena, at the blazing figure below—and then, inevitably, at him. Waiting.
Velora stood at his side, golden eyes sharp, calculating. "It's… beautiful," she murmured, though the word rang hollow, as if she didn't trust it herself.
Below, mana spiraled violently around Lucien Solaris. He stood wreathed in divine fire, his blade gleaming like something forged in a star's heart. Shadows twisted and shrieked as they fled from him, recoiling in terror. Even here, behind layered wards and shadowglass, the heat pressed against the chamber before fading—leaving the shadows deeper, darker, and deeply displeased.
Vesper finally spoke.
His voice was low. Even. Certain.
"It isn't just light," he said."It's dominion."
A younger scion whispered, hands trembling, "W-what kind of spell is that?"
His eyes never left the glass. "The Sun of Dawn. A pinnacle-tier working that defies classification. Its structure remains constant, but its magnitude scales relentlessly with rank. Here, under this density of ambient mana, it manifests at pinnacle Rank Two. It belongs exclusively to House Dawn's inner bloodlines. Its power does not obey conventional ceilings. No common light mage could survive invoking it—only those truly favored by the sun can endure its embrace." A pause. "And it is cruel."
An older scion exhaled, voice dry as ash. "At higher ranks… it becomes unbearable."
Beyond the wards, the sky writhed gold, overwriting Duskfall's eternal twilight like a tyrant revising holy scripture. Lucien's domain continued to swell, flooding the battlefield with suffocating radiance.
Velora stepped closer to the glass. "It drains life mana from everything," she said softly. "Air. Stone. Ambient threads. It scorches the world hollow—and in return, it exalts him. Speed. Power. Precision. His presence alone becomes a weapon. Those caught within it don't just weaken. They unravel."
"Can he end it?" someone asked.
"Yes," she replied. "He can bring it down like a falling star. Like judgment." Her gaze sharpened. "But he's still Rank One. Control has limits."
The chamber fell quiet again—not silence, but reverence. The kind priests felt beneath a sky about to split.
Vesper did not move.
"Tch," he muttered. "Flashy bastard."
A noble glanced at him. "You're not worried My prince?"
Vesper smiled faintly. Almost fondly. "No. Astra's a scary, talented bastard."
A few brows furrowed.
"He's the type that thrives under pressure," Vesper continued. "The worse the odds. The steeper the climb. The more lethal the task—the more dangerous he becomes. This kind of battlefield doesn't bury him." A pause. "It sharpens him."
The light caught his eyes then—deep obsidian flecked with ember-red, like coals smoldering in a midnight hearth.
"That little princess has gone through more evolutions in weeks than most manage in years." He pushed off the wall, shadows sliding from his shoulders like a discarded cloak. "That sun?" He nodded toward the arena. "Maybe it's the end. Or maybe it's the fracture he needs."
Behind him, the chamber had changed.
The nobles no longer reclined. No longer drank. They crowded the windows, masks loosened, spines rigid. No longer spectators.
Witnesses.
And far below, in the heart of that crucible of light—where no shadow should have endured—
the harbinger of night still stood.
.....
Astra stood beneath the merciless sun, its dominion absolute.
The heat bled through his armor as though it were parchment, searing flesh and bone alike. His lungs burned with every breath; his thoughts blurred, sluggish and heavy, as if the light itself pressed down upon his mind. Sweat stung his eyes, turning the world into a wavering smear of gold and white. This was not warmth. It was judgment.
The shadows—once obedient, once eager—had fled him. They clung to nothing, refused to gather, cowed beneath the tyranny of radiance.
Damn it.
His breath came shallow, ragged. Strength drained from his limbs with every heartbeat, mana slipping through his grasp like water through sand. Even the water mana he could normally draw upon lay thin and anemic here, a whisper drowned beneath the sun's roar.
The light is suffocating.
Lucien Solaris stood before him, radiant and unassailable, his presence like a mountain pressing against Astra's chest. Though still Rank One in name, the spell above them elevated him far beyond it. The Sun of Dawn fed him endlessly—ambient mana pouring into his core, exalting him, sharpening him. Where another Rank One might exhaust themselves after a handful of higher workings, Lucien wielded Rank Two power again and again without falter.
In this domain, he was nearly a Rank Two combatant in truth.
"What a predicament," Astra muttered, voice raw.
His violet eyes still gleamed—but the edge had dulled, dulled by pain, by heat, by attrition.
Lucien raised his sword, its edge blazing, the point settling with casual certainty at Astra's chest.
"Come now, Champion of Shadow" The prince declared, voice carrying cruel authority. "Feel the wrath of the Sword of Dawn."
Astra clenched his jaw.
A famous domain spell of the highest calibre. Of course it had to be a domain spell.
From what he could tell, Lucien's control was exquisite—light shaped into both weapon and bulwark, the sun itself bent to his will. Not perfect. Not yet. But terrifyingly close. Astra had been too overwhelmed by the spell's sheer scale to think clearly at first, too busy surviving beneath its weight.
Yet now—now that Lucien actively called upon the domain again—he felt it.
A flicker. An idea. Dangerous. Reckless. Insane.
Do I try? Panic clawed at his chest.
"If you won't come," Lucien said calmly, "then I will."
He moved.
Light flashed. Astra barely had time to raise his guard before a fist slammed into his chest, sunfire detonating on impact. He instinctively dragged water mana into place, steam exploding outward as it blunted the worst of the blow—but not enough. He was hurled backward, skidding across scorched sand, air ripped from his lungs.
"Damn it—"
Pain flooded him. His body screamed, magic wavering, control slipping. Shadows offered no refuge. There was nowhere to run. The sun pressed closer, hotter, intent on erasing him entirely.
I can't escape this.
He looked up through the glare, eyes burning—
And then it struck him. Wait. No. It shouldn't work. It couldn't— But what if it does?
His heart thundered. It was a gamble bordering on suicide if this was a true battle to the death, but it was the only path left. Backing down wasn't an option—not now, not here.
Fragments of memory slammed together: his past domains, his grasp of will, Lucien's sun siphoning ambient mana without discrimination. The pieces aligned, slowly, dangerously
On the precipice of defeat he did not feel dejected, no. Instead he felt ever more audacious!
Astra forced himself upright, legs shaking, the light still gnawing at him.
"A precipice in front" he murmured, a breathless laugh escaping him. "A tyrant at my back."
How exciting!
This wasn't just about surviving. It was about understanding. It was about affinity.
Celestial mana. Shadow magic. Domains and intent. The sun and the stars—opposites, yet bound by the same sky. Lucien's spell didn't create light from nothing; it stole it, drew it, consumed it.
A shadow did not create.
A shadow leeched.
What was Astra if not a shadow?
I can use his sun!
The realization sent a shiver through him.
But it needed concealment. If Lucien sensed celestial mana directly, it would be over. He needed a veil. A deception. Shadows to mask what lay beneath. Celestial mana was dangerous to reveal—but without it, the sun would never listen.
A subtle revelation for the world. But It can be masked.
Ah, fuck it.
Five seconds passed.
Lucien closed the distance again, intent clear now. Lances of sunfire erupted from his blade—beams of incandescent heat screaming through the air. Astra dodged by instinct alone, barely slipping past each strike, retreating step by desperate step as scorched sand burst behind him.
Lucien pressed harder.
This was the end he intended.
The sun's heat crushed down upon him as he reached for the shadows—and found them thin, anemic, barely willing to answer beneath that merciless sky.
No. Don't think of what you lack. Just do it.
He closed his eyes for half a heartbeat and followed the threads inward, past pain, past exhaustion, to the place where intent was born. The idea took shape there, whole and terrible and brilliant all at once.
The stars are within me. They had always been. Sleeping. Waiting.
He could feel the celestial mana stirring deep in his core, vast and volatile, a pressure like a held breath. He could bend it. Shape it. But not openly. Not here. If he revealed it naked and true, the arena would know, and Lucien would know, and everything would end before it began.
Mask it. Use the sun itself as the veil.
Astra reached for the tatters of shadow clinging to the scorched sand and bent them to his will. They resisted—fearful, cowed—but they came, thin as smoke, barely enough to form a shroud.
It would have to be enough. I can do this. I have to.
His fingers trembled as he brushed the edge of that celestial power, the sensation sharp and electric, as though the stars themselves crackled just beneath his skin.
Then Lucien moved.
He crossed the distance with predatory grace, light rippling around him. Before Astra could react, a hand closed around his throat. The world lurched as Lucien lifted him effortlessly from the ground and drove him down again, armor crashing against armor, gold against black. Astra locked his arms, forcing a deadlock, the two of them straining chest to chest beneath the false sun.
Lucien leaned in, golden eyes narrowing, their brilliance sharpened by suspicion.
"Tell me, Astra," he murmured, his voice cold, threaded with unsettling curiosity. "Why does my sun react to you as it does? It shows you favor… and disdain, all at once. And yet you are nothing but shadow. Or are you?"
His grip tightened. He leaned closer, his breath hot against Astra's ear, amusement darkening his tone.
"This should not be possible. So tell me—what are you? Why does my domain smile upon you, when you should be its eternal enemy?"
Astra's vision blurred, his pulse roaring in his ears. Damn it—of course he can feel it.
Lucien was not merely a sun mage. In his own way, he was bound to the heavens as well—celestial, though narrowed, refined, constrained to a single blazing truth. His perception was keen enough to sense the discord, the wrongness in Astra's presence.
He knows something's there.
The pressure on his arms burned, but Astra forced his thoughts into stillness.
Focus.
Do not let him pull you apart.
The shadows, weak as they were, still clung to him. Beneath them, the celestial mana churned, hidden, impatient. He needed seconds. Just seconds more.
"Prince… Lucien," Astra rasped, his voice barely carrying. Maintaining the veil was draining him dry; mana slipped through his fingers no matter how tightly he grasped it.
Then—The shadows surged. Thin, furious, defiant.
They pushed against Lucien's grip just enough.
Astra struck.
His fist crashed into Lucien's helm with a hollow, ringing crack, denting gold and silver alike. Lucien staggered back a step, blood spilling from his mouth as he spat it onto the scorched sand, eyes alight with dark amusement rather than pain.
Astra collapsed to one knee, dragging air into his lungs as he forced himself upright. The last of his strength surged through him as the pieces of his gamble slid into place, locking together with dreadful inevitability. He dismissed his ruined helmet.His face was slightly bruised, his hair wet with sweat, blood tricked down the side of his head, yet his eyes remained bright and defiant.
"Witness," Astra declared, his voice cutting through the heat-warped air—weak, yet razor-sharp,"a champion's fleeting gamble."
His presence, already strained beneath the sun's tyranny, seemed to sink even lower. His aura dimmed, faltered, as though on the verge of extinction.
This was it.
Either he would break through here—now—Or he would be crushed utterly.
His heart thundered. His body trembled, ravaged by heat and exhaustion, but he pushed forward all the same. There was no retreat left to him. Rise, or fall forever.
Astra lifted his gaze to the golden sky, to that merciless sun hanging above like a father passing judgment.
His aura had dimmed. Until now.
Then it stirred.
Shadows writhed at his feet, flickering and curling like hounds roused from an age-long slumber. A pulse ran through Astra, raw and untempered, and his mana answered with sharp, eager conviction.
With trembling arms, he lifted his hands to the sky. Breath came in shallow, ragged pulls, but the set of his jaw was iron. Sparks leapt from his fingertips, black fire coiling and twisting, molten and alive.
He did not call upon the celestial mana directly—not yet. Instead, he wove it into the shadows themselves. The Star Core he had hidden, protected, kept secret all this time, now lent its essence. His shadows drank it in, their dark tendrils absorbing a property of the stars themselves. If Lucien's sun burned with positive radiance, Astra's shadows, now charged, mirrored it. The polarity clashed and converged, allowing the shadows not merely to resist—but to siphon, to leech, to return the stolen power in a relentless, viscous cycle. A parasite made manifest. And with every pulse, the shadows grew stronger.
It should have been impossible to conceal. Celestial mana was a radiant signature, pure and unmistakable. But Astra's spell twisted it, feeding upon Lucien's sun while masking its own origin. Only those versed in the deepest mysteries of the stars could discern its truth. The audience, the judges, even Lucien himself—none of them knew. All assumed the flares of light came from him, not realizing he fed them with his own hidden brilliance.
"No… no way," Astra chuckled, eyes wide beneath sweat-streaked brows. "It's working."
The leech construct, designed to absorb hostile magic, would not suffice alone against a power like Lucien's sun. But Astra had refined it. With each shadow that surged, he siphoned a sliver of the prince's celestial mana—and fed it back into the spell, funneled through his own veiled brilliance, distorted, hidden, deadly.
A true parasite!
The shadows hissed and writhed, twisting as though alive. Astra's voice cut through the heat-thick air, low and searing, syllables of power spilling from him as the shadows embraced him, drew him higher. Strength coiled within him, rising beyond what he had known. The incantation mattered little—it was the intent, the command, the very will of night and star and shadow that made it real, that bent the ambient mana to his purpose.
"Shadows of Night…"
The words tore from his lips like a blade, and the darkness answered. Shadows burst outward, coiling across the sand in furious spirals, summoned not by gesture but by the command in his voice.
His cores trembled—both of them—the wellspring of Mana and the hidden Star Core, stirring together for the first time. Sunlight poured upon him, yet it was drawn in, devoured hungrily by the black tide at his feet.
"Shall rise and fall…"
From the depths of shadow, a sphere emerged, swollen and seething, a globe of darkness fed by Lucien's own light. It floated above him, unstable, shimmering with the cruel glitter of stolen sunlight. The crowd's breath caught. Even Lucien's hand, poised to command his own sun, could not stem the siphon.
Astra felt the surge, the pull, the raw, intoxicating power. His spell consumed, twisted, and returned Lucien's brilliance, not merely copying but elevating it, reshaping light into shadow under his will.
"Leech thy cruel light…"
The orb pulsed like a second sun, jagged and unstable, wrapped in writhing tendrils that lashed outward at the golden rays. Sun and shadow, opposing forces, should have torn one another asunder. Instead, they danced, bound by Astra's fierce command.
"As you eclipse all…"
The black sphere hung above like a sovereign in its own right. Shadows thickened, spreading beyond reason, reaching for every corner of the arena.
"Oh darkness of—"
"Shadowfall."
Then it erupted.
The orb cracked open—not with flame, but in a whispering, suffocating silence—releasing a tide of shadow that swept across the sands. The arena dimmed. Gasps erupted; sunlight faltered. Darkness fell like an unbidden eclipse, swallowing the field in a wave of tenebrous mana. Judges stumbled, mouths agape. Spectators outside the arena recoiled, unsure if their eyes could be trusted.
Yet the light fought back.
Lucien's sun flared in defiance, burning hotter, golden corona expanding, scorching into the tide of night. The battlefield split asunder: one half bathed in relentless daylight, the other cloaked in rolling, restless shadow.
Above them, the sky held two sovereign orbs: one a blinding miniature sun, the other a black globe pulsing with stolen celestial threads. The clash was absolute. A Rank One duel had become legend incarnate, a domain spell collision that should not have existed in the pawn division, rare even among Rank Three masters. Its power was mirrored, amplified, unparalleled.
The shadows at Astra's command thickened, binding him in place. They coiled along his arms and spine, serpentine and disciplined, no longer chaotic, but instruments honed to the razor's edge. The black sun above poured waves of mana into him, feeding and steadying. Limbs once trembling became pillars of control, breath deep and steady.
The shadows themselves had changed. They obeyed not with hesitation, but with the authority of a tyrant. Each tendril pulsed, waiting, hungering, ready to strike at the faintest flicker of thought.
"The pinnacle of Rank Two…" a voice whispered from the stands, awe-stricken. To the spectators, Astra appeared to have stolen Lucien's mana, an act of audacious ingenuity.
Yet he remained Rank One.
S-rank affinity to shadow against S-rank affinity to light—a clash of ideologies as much as of magic. The black sun had crowned him. His shadows moved with sovereign authority. His presence rivaled Lucien's, and for a moment, the arena understood: this was no mere duel. This was the rising of a master.
Astra lifted his eyes.
Across the scorched arena stood Lucien, incandescent, a living star given flesh. His golden aura shimmered and pulsed, heat radiating in visible waves, scorching the stone beneath him. His eyes—brilliant, molten-gold—pierced Astra's very soul, sharper than any blade. The prince's expression was unreadable. Confused, yet beneath it—uneasy, disquieted, almost fearful.
He looked again at the black sun hovering above Astra, and a frown creased his brow. "What heresy is this?" he muttered, the air thick and wavering with heat. "How dare you sully the glorious Sun of Dawn with… with your corrupt shadows?"
The words carried no arrogance, no pride. Only caution. Disgust. Alarm. The Sun of Dawn had been House Dawn's pride for millennia perfected across generations, revered as untouchable. And this boy—a Rank One of shadows—had successfully dared oppressing it? Blasphemy. Sacrilege.
Lucien did not see the truth. He did not perceive the hidden core, the celestial mana Astra had buried within his shadows, feeding the black sun from the inside. To him, it was clever shadow-magic, daring and wild, running unchecked—but something was wrong. Something alien. Something that set his teeth on edge. And that alone was enough to make him hesitate.
He stepped forward, deliberate, aura swelling like molten sunlight. Gold rippled across his shoulders, each movement a promise of destruction. "You should not be standing. That spell should have drained you dry."
Astra said nothing at first.
"How?" Lucien demanded, frustration sharp enough to crack stone.
"For far too long," Astra replied, voice low, steady, unwavering, "have shadows laid dormant. Oppressed. Forgotten. It is time… for the realms to feel the wrath of the shadows under their lord."
The crowd erupted. Cheers, gasps, cries of disbelief—names shouted for both combatants—shook the stands. Shock, awe, adrenaline twisted into one unbroken roar. No one could look away.
Astra stepped forward. Shadows writhed at his feet, moving in perfect concert with him, fluid and purposeful. His sword rose, black and gleaming, wrapped in the flickering aura of the orb above.
"Golden Prince of Dawn… you shall learn what it means to fear my shadows."
He did not raise his voice. He did not need to. The words cut the air sharper than any steel.
Lucien's golden aura flared in response. Sunfire leapt outward, bending the very air, commanding the arena with the authority of light itself. "Dark champion of Shadow," he said, malice dancing in his tone, "show me the true darkness of your house."
The black sun pulsed in answer. Light strained against shadow, heat against cold. Astra felt it in his bones—a raw, wild surge of power that moved faster than thought, beyond control. The spell fed him like a storm beneath his skin, raw and untamed. This was no training. This was survival.
The Sun of Dawn—Lucien's domain—was terrifying in its simplicity. It did not merely radiate light. It ruled. It commanded the battlefield, bending air, earth, and perception alike. Each motion Lucien made was precise, intentional, as if the world itself obeyed him. Astra's power surged, yes—but it was raw, unshaped, still learning its limits. It was like wielding armor untested, blades unmastered.
He struck—too wide, too slow.
Lucien moved like wildfire over dry leaves. The punch landed clean. It tore through Astra's guard and slammed into his ribs, lifting him from the ground. Pain tore through him as he skidded across the cracked arena floor, shadows flaring wildly to soften the impact. Dust rose in choking clouds.
The crowd roared.
Astra's mind raced. Lucien was faster, sharper, more synchronized with the rhythm of battle than any mortal should be. Astra's spell gave him strength, yes—but it was untamed, untempered, raw. A weapon he barely knew how to wield.
And still, he stood.
Still, he breathed.
Still, he refused to break.
He had to adapt. And fast.