The world was silent.
No wind. No sky. No color.
Just white—an endless void of white, stretching into infinity.
Ryen stood barefoot, his school uniform soaked in blood that wasn't his. His fingers twitched. His mouth opened, but no sound escaped.
Then came the sound of chains.
Clink. Clink. Clink.
From the horizon—or where a horizon might've been—a figure emerged. Dragged, not walked. Cloaked in shadows that bled like oil. A face hidden beneath long, matted hair. Arms outstretched, wrists bound by glowing black chains, nailed into nothing.
He hovered—half-suspended, half-crucified—by force alone.
Ryen stumbled back instinctively.
The figure spoke.
Not with a voice.
But with thought.
> "You are the fracture. The unseen thread. The anomaly."
> "They will come for you."
> "Good."
"W-what is this…?" Ryen rasped, voice barely his own.
The chained god raised his head.
A single glowing eye—like a sun behind murky water—pierced through the strands of hair.
> "This is not yet real. But it will be."
> "Remember this place."
> "Remember me."
"Who… are you?"
The figure paused.
Then, softly—
> "Askarion."
> "The last god who believed in truth."
Suddenly, the void shattered. Reality cracked like broken glass, and Ryen fell—screaming—into blackness.