The moon hung high above the imperial city, its pale light dimmed as if shrouded behind an unseen veil.
Far below, in the labyrinth beneath the palace, cloaked figures gathered around a circular chamber carved with solar symbols long forgotten by time.
Their torches burned black instead of gold.
At the center stood the woman with the eclipse mark on her wrist. Her name — whispered but never spoken aloud — was Seraphine Vael. Once a high priestess of Solarius, now the leader of its shadowed order.
"The Emperor ascends," she said, voice echoing through the hollow stone. "And with his rise, the balance falters. Do you feel it? The warmth fading from our sun?"
A murmur rippled through the gathered priests.
One stepped forward. "We have retrieved three fragments, my lady. The relics of the First Light."
Seraphine's lips curved into a cold smile. "Good. The Eclipse Engine will soon awaken."
She turned toward the altar — a slab of obsidian etched with swirling golden veins, faintly pulsing in rhythm with a heartbeat that was not human. A single drop of her blood fell upon it, and the entire chamber seemed to inhale.
A faint whisper filled the air.
—Light births shadow. The Emperor must fall.
Seraphine closed her eyes, allowing the voice to sink into her mind.
"I will not fail you," she whispered. "The heavens belong to balance. And if the stars forget that, we will remind them."
Meanwhile, in the upper halls of the Celestial Palace, Lyra stood at the window overlooking the courtyard.
The air shimmered faintly — a sign of the Emperor's aura bleeding into the mortal world.
She could sense Aster even when he wasn't in sight. His presence hummed through the stone, through the air, through her bones.
"He's pushing himself again," she muttered.
A voice behind her — calm, yet carrying hidden tension — replied, "He's searching for something he cannot see."
Lyra turned. It was Kael, Aster's most trusted guardian and the only being who could stand near him without burning under starlight.
"What do you mean?"
Kael's eyes, the color of fractured silver, reflected the night. "He believes the stars are his allies. But he forgets — stars can die too."
Far above, in the observatory, Aster stood alone.
The constellations above him flickered uneasily. When he reached out to them, the starlight wavered — not in resistance, but in pain.
He closed his hand, trying to stabilize the connection. A pulse of raw energy shot through his veins. His breath caught as flashes of visions burned across his mind: a sun devoured by darkness, a woman with eclipse eyes, and a machine of molten light tearing through the heavens.
When the vision faded, his hands trembled.
"Someone's building something," he whispered. "Something that shouldn't exist."
He turned sharply toward the door. "Lyra."
Within moments, she appeared, sensing the urgency.
"What happened?"
"They're stealing fragments of the First Light," Aster said, his tone grave. "And they're not using it to restore balance — they're trying to weaponize it."
Lyra's eyes widened. "The Order of Solarius?"
"Yes. They've survived. And they're moving fast."
Aster's gaze shifted toward the night sky. The moon's edge darkened further, faint shadows crawling across its surface.
"The eclipse begins sooner than I thought."
He exhaled slowly, the starlight around him pulsing with restrained fury.
"Then I'll have to remind the old gods why they sealed the stars in the first place."
Far away, beneath a ruined temple at the edge of the desert, Seraphine stood before a towering construct — a sphere of black metal and golden veins humming with restrained power.
It pulsed once — like a heart.
"The Eclipse Engine," she whispered. "Born from the bones of gods and the light of stars."
She pressed her hand to its surface. The sigil on her wrist glowed brighter.
"Let the Emperor of Starlight come," she said softly, her smile wicked and beautiful. "When he reaches for the heavens, I'll make sure the sky devours him whole."
The sphere trembled — and for a brief, terrible instant, the stars themselves seemed to blink.