CHAPTER ONE — A Throne Made of Shadows
The night the sky cracked open, Kairo wasn't looking for fate.
He was looking for a place to hide — preferably somewhere his debt collectors wouldn't rearrange his bones for decorative purposes.
Storm clouds writhed like something alive, lightning slicing purple veins across the darkness. The whole world buzzed like a glitching screen.
Kairo ran.
His boots slapped the pavement, lungs burning, heart pounding like it was trying to jailbreak from his chest. Panic clung to the air, thick and sharp — people screaming, car alarms wailing.
Then everything went quiet.
Too quiet.
He stumbled to a stop… and that's when he saw him.
A boy stood in the empty road, barefoot, haloed in soft silver light. His hair, long and moon-white, drifted around him even though the air was still. His eyes glowed — not human glow, but cosmic glow — like he'd swallowed constellations and forgotten to dim them.
Kairo blinked, breath catching.
He wasn't used to staring at boys like this — boys that looked like poems written by gods with too much free time.
"You're staring," the boy said softly, voice like warm wind.
"Sorry—" Kairo swallowed. "Just… didn't expect to see… that."
"'That?'" the boy smirked. "You mean me existing?"
Kairo's ears heated. "Okay, fair."
The ground trembled.
A low growl rose from beneath the street, deep enough to rattle Kairo's ribs.
The boy stepped closer. "Your world is breaking, Kairo of Dusthaven. And you're the only one reckless enough to fix it."
Kairo's brows shot up. "Hold on—how do you know my name?"
The answer came in the form of a nightmare.
The street split open, asphalt peeling like skin, and something huge climbed out — a beast of shadows with horns scraping the sky. Its eyes were hollow, smoke swirling inside the sockets like lost souls.
Kairo's survival instincts screamed. "Nope. No. Absolutely not."
The silver-haired boy grabbed his wrist.
The touch hit Kairo like electricity — warm, charged, too intimate for strangers.
"Kairo," he whispered, stepping closer, their faces inches apart. "Choose. Run… or rise."
The beast lunged.
Kairo reacted without thinking, swinging his free hand up — and shadows erupted from his palm. A blade made of darkness, sharp and unreal, sliced the air with a violent hiss.
The creature staggered back.
Kairo stared at his hand, chest heaving. "What—what did I just do?"
The boy smiled — small, proud, heartbreakingly soft.
"You woke up."
Above them, the sky split wide, revealing a floating throne made of swirling darkness.
Every monster in the shadows howled.
Kairo turned to the boy. "Okay… who are you?"
The boy stepped closer, placing a hand over Kairo's racing heart.
His touch lingered.
His eyes softened.
"I'm Aster," he whispered. "The first person who's ever believed you're more than the world tried to make you."
And for a moment — even with the world cracking apart — Kairo felt .