Chapter 65: Toward the Unmoving Star

  Aeor was ready for the moment to snap.

  For chaos to come crashing down on them the way it always did.

  But it did not.

  The being simply stood there.

  Unbothered by the two figures facing it.

  Aeor darted his eyes across the ground, searching for the faintest glint of his lance. Anything. A reflection, a line of shadow, the hint of wrapped cloth.

  Nothing.

  The dark had taken it.

  Aeor steadied his stance and lifted his gaze back to the entity, invoking Threadgaze.

  Race: Astral Shepherd

  Essence Tier: Awakened (E)

  Essence Stability: Refined

  Status: Unbound

  Archive Note: Where it walks, the starless kin gather.

  Shepherd?

  The word lingered in Aeor's thoughts, but before he could grasp the whisper fully, the Astral Shepherd's cloak shifted. A thin, pale hand slipped free, fingers long and jointed in a way that felt subtly wrong. They moved with deliberate slowness as sickly green Essence gathered around it.

  The Shepherd did not speak.

  But Aeor felt it.

  A vast pressure of Essence welled beneath him. Zoey felt it too. They moved in unison, throwing themselves aside as the ground between them erupted.

  A massive pillar tore free from the stone, its surface carved with dense, spiraling scripts that burned faintly as it rose. The force split the ground apart, dust and debris thrown outward as the pillar locked into place.

  Aeor skidded and snapped his gaze back to the Shepherd. He let his Essence burst free and surged forward, violet mist pouring from his frame as he launched himself into the air.

  Essence gathered in his hands, shaping itself into the familiar length of a spear.

  Zoey regained her footing a heartbeat later and rushed after him.

  The Shepherd raised its hand again.

  The ground between them flared to life.

  Lines of green light raced across the stone, and more pillars erupted in rapid succession, tearing the path apart as they rose. The terrain became a shifting maze of ascending stone and glowing script.

  Aeor pushed harder, weaving between the pillars as they surged upward. One rose too fast, too close.

  He slammed into it.

  His scaled armor met the pillar head-on. The stone shattered on impact, bursting apart in a spray of fragments and releasing tiny motes of green light that drifted briefly before fading.

  The collision threw him off balance, but Aeor twisted midair, planting a foot against another rising pillar. He kicked off hard, forcing himself back on course.

  He closed the distance in a blur, Essence spear leveled as he drove himself forward.

  He struck true.

  The spear pierced straight through the Shepherd's torso.

  The force of Aeor's charge carried through, driving the massive entity backward, its cloak rippling from the impact. But it did not react.

  The Shepherd's cloak shifted.

  Its other hand slid free from the folds, fingers spreading as it reached for him.

  Aeor released the spear at once and tried to step back, but the Shepherd caught his leg mid-motion.

  Then the world inverted.

  Aeor was slammed into the ground with crushing force. Stone cracked beneath him as the impact rippled outward, the breath torn from his lungs.

  The blows came immediately after.

  The Shepherd struck again and again, its fists descending in a relentless barrage. Each impact rang through Aeor's frame. He let the scales take the punishment, violet light flaring as the armor absorbed the worst of it.

  Still, some of the force bled through.

  The Shepherd raised both hands.

  Essence gathered overhead as a pillar began to form, its mass swelling rapidly, rivaling the Shepherd itself in size. Scripts ignited across its surface as it solidified, humming with oppressive weight.

  Aeor saw the opening and forced himself to move.

  He could not.

  Strange sigils burned to life beneath him, etched into the ground in a tight formation, their glow sinking into his limbs like hooks. The pressure locked him in place.

  Aeor roared and let his Essence surge outward. Primeval Essence flooded from him, devouring the sigils as they unraveled and burned away.

  It was enough to break the hold in time.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  The pillar finished forming.

  Then it came down.

  Aeor wrenched one arm free and raised it to brace for the impact.

  It did not matter.

  Zoey was there.

  She stepped in front of him without hesitation, slamming her shield up as the pillar crashed down. The impact thundered through the ground, but the shield held. Icy blue Essence surged outward from its surface, flaring violently as it clashed against the sickly green force pressing down upon it.

  The collision screamed.

  Aeor's Primeval Death finished tearing through the sigils beneath him. The pressure vanished, and he moved.

  Violet mist exploded from his frame as he launched himself upward, driving straight toward the Shepherd's head.

  Essence coiled tightly around his hands, dark and hungry, as Aeor poured everything he had into the strike.

  The blow landed.

  A sharp crack rang out as the Shepherd's grip on the pillar faltered, collapsing into drifting fragments as the Shepherd reeled back, a raging roar tearing from beneath its hood. Immense waves of Essence spilled from its body, warping the air around it.

  "Echoes must not walk!" the Shepherd bellowed.

  Its hand rose, and the bell snapped back into its grasp. It rang once.

  The sound rolled outward, hollow and absolute.

  The Astral Shepherd's form blurred, then faded, unraveling into the dark until nothing remained.

  Aeor and Zoey stepped back instinctively, eyes scanning the space where it had stood.

  Colors bled softly into one another. Deep violets gave way to cold blues, then to bands of pale gold so faint they felt imagined rather than seen.

  Stars began to form, suspended in the vastness of liminal space. Some burned steadily. Others flickered, their light stretched thin by the immense distance between all things.

  Nebulous veils drifted like translucent silk, folding and unfolding upon themselves. Luminous dust caught the starlight and scattered it into gentle halos. Every glow felt deliberate, yet indifferent, beautiful without needing to be witnessed.

  When it finished taking shape, the moment held.

  Despite the shift, Aeor could still feel the ground beneath his boots.

  Air pressed against his skin, carrying the faint pull of gravity. Yet his eyes told a different truth. The world beneath them had been erased from sight, replaced by this vast imitation of the cosmos.

  Zoey inhaled sharply beside him.

  "What is happening?" she asked.

  "I do not know," Aeor said. "Stay close."

  Time dragged on, measured only by the bell's toll. With each echo, the stars shifted.

  At first it was subtle. A single star drifted, its light smearing faintly, as if brushed by an unseen current. Then another followed. And another.

  The stillness started to lose its hold as shapes began to take form.

  From the depths of liminal space, Astral Cervants stepped out.

  Some descended from above, hooves pressing into unseen ground as though it had always been there. Others surged up from below, tearing free through the illusion where solid ground should have been.

  They charged as one.

  The stars behind them smeared into streaks as their speed tore through the false sky.

  Aeor reacted without thought.

  "Move!"

  They broke into a sprint.

  Violet mist coalesced along Aeor's arm, snapping outward into a cutting arc that tore through the oncoming dark. One Cervant veered aside at the last instant, its antlers scraping past in a rush of cold.

  Zoey skidded to a halt beside him, shield snapping up just as antlers slammed into it. The impact drove her back, frost splintering outward in sharp cracks. She gritted her teeth and held, then twisted, her blade flashing as she carved across the creature's flank.

  The bell tolled again.

  More came.

  Aeor spun, deflecting one charge as another tore past close enough for cyan light to wash across his armor.

  "Left!" Zoey shouted.

  Aeor pivoted, a spear of violet Essence forming even as he ran. He hurled it into the dark where a Cervant had been moments before. It struck. Light tore apart in a spray of fading stars.

  There was no time to watch it fall.

  The surge of Cervants did not slow.

  No matter how far they ran, the sky reformed. The stars shifted, folded back into place, and the Cervants returned.

  Aeor felt it before he saw it.

  He turned just in time.

  A Cervant burst from below, antlers rising toward Zoey. Aeor lunged and met it head-on. His hand closed around one antler, Primeval Death flaring as he wrenched the creature's momentum aside. The force tore through his arm and shoulder, dragging him a step off balance, but the charge broke. The Cervant skidded past instead of through her.

  Aeor snapped a look at Zoey, breath sharp in his chest.

  Before he could speak, she did.

  "It's the bell," Zoey said, voice tight but certain. "This isn't random. Every time it tolls, the space resets. It has to be."

  Another charge forced them to move.

  They drove forward.

  Aeor intercepted blows meant for her, his armor bearing the cost. The violet glow around him flickered now, dimmer than before, each breath drawn deeper than the last. Zoey stayed just behind his shoulder, contributing where she could, shield flaring, blade striking, but her attention kept drifting upward.

  "They're all moving," she said between breaths. "All of them... except one."

  Aeor followed her gaze.

  There, amid the shifting constellations, one point of light remained fixed. It did not drift. It did not bend. No matter how the surroundings shifted, it stayed where it was, steady and untouched by the bell's rhythm.

  Zoey pointed.

  "There."

  Aeor nodded once.

  They turned and ran toward the unmoving star.

  The moment they committed, their surroundings reacted.

  The bell's toll deepened, and the stars accelerated with it. Shapes formed faster now, rougher, less deliberate. Astral Cervants tore themselves into being in greater numbers, converging on the same path Aeor and Zoey had chosen.

  Each second stretched thin. The strain demanded more from their bodies than it should have, keeping their muscles tight and their minds sharpened to a constant edge.

  Aeor hurled another spear of Essence over his shoulder. The motion was practiced, but the wear showed. The weapon formed unevenly this time, its edges flickering as if struggling to hold shape.

  The Cervants did not slow.

  One dipped its head and met the spear head-on, antlers sweeping up to deflect the blow. Violet flame caught along the branching tines, crawling and devouring cyan light where they touched, but the creature pushed through anyway, momentum carrying it forward despite the burn.

  Zoey reacted instantly.

  A wall of flame surged up in front of them, heat blooming outward as the Cervant rushed into it.

  Zoey twisted away at the last possible moment, antlers scraping past close enough to leave frost and heat clashing along her shield. She stumbled, caught herself, and kept moving.

  The Cervants pressed closer, tightening the space with each toll. They streaked past in narrowing arcs, their paths curving into a closing ring.

  Aeor turned, tracking the next rush.

  And then he saw it.

  For a single instant, between two converging charges, a familiar silhouette caught the light. Spinning end over end as it drifted through the false sky.

  His lance.

  It hung there, suspended in the liminal space.

  Aeor's focus locked onto it as the next wave of antlers lowered and surged toward them.

  "Cover me," he said, already moving.

  Zoey answered without a word.

  Ice surged upward as she thrust both hands forward. A massive wall took shape just as a Cervant charged, its antlers slamming into the frozen barrier with a concussive crack. The impact spidered fractures across the ice, fissures racing outward, but the wall held.

  Aeor sprinted.

  Another Cervant tore in from the side. He dipped low, feeling its antlers cut the air above him as he dove. His boots barely touched down before he pushed off again.

  The lance spun through the dark.

  Aeor reached out and caught it. The familiar weight settled into his grasp, solid and real.

  He looked back.

  Zoey still stood her ground, shield flaring as she turned aside one charge, ice blade flashing as she drove another back. A third forced her to retreat a step.

  Aeor started toward her.

  "No!" Zoey shouted, breath ragged but her voice clear. "Just go. End this."

  Aeor turned.

  He flew straight for the star.

  The lance carved his path through the distortion, its point slicing warped light and unraveling shapes that dared cross his way. The closer he drew, the clearer the truth became.

  The star was no star at all.

  It was the bell.

  Suspended in the void, its sickly green glow pulsing in a steady, malignant rhythm.

  Aeor did not slow.

  He drove the lance forward and stabbed into the heart of the bell.

  Space fractured without sound.

  Stars split apart, their light collapsing into tiny green motes that drifted downward in slow, gentle arcs. Astral Cervants unraveled mid-charge, their forms dissolving into the same fading dust as the illusion lost its hold.

  Darkness rushed back in.

  Aeor was still suspended in the air.

  His lance had punched clean through the bell now clutched in the Shepherd's grasp. For a heartbeat, the two were locked together in that impossible moment.

  Then the bell shattered.

  The shockwave tore outward.

  Aeor was hurled back as the Shepherd was flung in the opposite direction, both sent tumbling through the air while fragments of the bell disintegrated into nothing.

  Pain flared through Aeor's body as he fought to stay conscious. Bruised and spent, he forced Essence forward, pouring it into the ring on his hand.

  Wings unfurled.

  They formed in a rush of violet light, scaled and draconic, matching the mantle that clung to his frame. With a heavy beat, Aeor caught himself, the air roaring past as he twisted and surged forward.

  Below, the Shepherd struck the ground.

  The impact shook the earth, stone cracking beneath its weight as it struggled to rise. Aeor was already upon it, fury burning behind his eyes as he descended like a falling blade.

  The Shepherd raised a hand, sickly green light gathering as another pillar began to form.

  Too slow.

  Aeor tore through the half-formed defense, the lance shattering it in a spray of broken Essence.

  He did not hesitate.

  The lance pierced the Shepherd's head.

  The impact drove them both still.

  "Curse... the Echoes," the Shepherd rasped, its voice unraveling even as the words left it.

  Aeor stood there, panting, his grip locked tight around the haft as the Shepherd's towering form collapsed inward. It dissolved into dust, breaking apart into tiny motes of Essence that drifted briefly before vanishing into the dark.

  Silence returned. Aeor let out the breath he had been holding and leaned on his lance.

  Turning, he saw Zoey kneeling nearby, shoulders heaving as her shield and blade melted away, leaving only her skillet in her hand. She looked up at him, breathless, and offered her usual smile. Worn, but unbroken.

  Aeor could not stop the grin that spread across his face.

  He lifted his gaze to the sky.

  Above them, the last traces of cyan light faded as the distant battle between Wyrmkin and Cervants came to an end. The motes dissolved one by one until nothing remained but darkness.

  The bell was silent.

  The fight was over.

  Chapter 66 releases Friday at 6 PM EST.

  Enjoying the story? A quick rating helps a lot.

  Chapter Discussions ? Polls ? Official Artworks