The Silver Dawn

Darkness stretched endlessly around him.

It was not the suffocating blackness of the void, nor the absence of light. It was something else. Something vast. Something infinite.

Ariel stood in the middle of it, weightless. The world he had known—the training grounds, the pain of his body hitting the dirt, Arthur standing over him—was gone.

There was no sound. No air. No walls.

And yet…

The moon was here.

It hung above him, larger than he had ever seen it. A luminous sphere of silver-white light, its glow soft yet unbearably heavy. It was as if the sky itself had been swallowed, leaving only this pale, celestial presence behind.

He wasn't alone.

Something watched him from the distance.

A shape—indistinct, flowing, shifting like mist. A presence as vast as the moon itself, yet closer than a whisper.

Then, for the first time, he heard her.

"You have come."

Ariel stiffened. His breath caught in his throat.

The voice wasn't a sound. It didn't enter his ears—it resonated within his very being, threading through his thoughts like a quiet ripple across still water.

He turned.

There—standing at the edge of existence itself—was a woman.

She was unlike anything he had ever seen. Unlike anyone.

Her form was both human and not—her skin a deep silver, her hair a cascade of flowing moonlight, shifting and shimmering as if woven from light itself. She stood barefoot on the unseen ground, her robes blending seamlessly with the shadows around her, moving like waves beneath a distant tide.

Her eyes…

Ariel had seen many things in his short life. He had seen his home turn to ash, seen monsters tear through people he had known, seen the sky split open with Abyssal fire.

But he had never seen eyes like hers.

They were endless. Abysses of silver and white, each swirl carrying the weight of millennia, of forgotten time, of something far beyond his understanding.

And they were staring straight at him.

Ariel swallowed. His throat felt dry. His body felt small.

The woman tilted her head slightly. Then, she took a step forward.

"Tell me, child of the moon."

Her voice was soft, yet absolute.

"Why do you tremble?"

Ariel tried to move. His feet wouldn't respond.

He felt like he was standing before a force of nature. Like a storm had taken human form, like the very fabric of the world had turned its gaze upon him.

"Who…" His voice was hoarse. Weak. "Who are you?"

The woman smiled.

And suddenly, the weight of the sky became unbearable.

Ariel's breath vanished. The space around him collapsed inward, folding around the presence before him like the pull of the tides. It wasn't magic. It wasn't mana. It was something deeper.

Something primal.

The silver glow around her pulsed—just once—and the entire world shifted.

"You already know."

Ariel's heart pounded.

The truth clawed at the edges of his mind. It had been there since the moment he awakened. Since the moment he stood beneath the broken sky and felt the moon calling to him.

This presence. This voice. This power that hummed within his very bones.

It was her.

The Moon Goddess.

A Silent Question

The realization settled into him like ice.

Ariel clenched his fists. His breath was still shaky, but his mind fought through the fog of fear, sharpening.

He looked at her. Really looked.

There was something about her that felt… distant.

Not unkind. Not cruel.

But detached.

Like an observer watching from a place too far to touch the world.

"Why…" Ariel's voice was still rough, but stronger now. "Why am I here?"

The Moon Goddess studied him for a long moment.

Then, she raised a hand.

The air shifted—and suddenly, Ariel was no longer standing on nothing.

He was in a field.

Or what was left of one.

He recognized it immediately.

His breath caught in his throat.

This was Eldrin.

Or… what remained of it.

The ruins of his home stretched around him, bathed in a pale silver glow. The town square was nothing but collapsed buildings, charred wood, and shadows that should not exist.

The echoes of fire and screams still lingered in the air.

His knees nearly buckled.

"No," he whispered. "No, no, no…"

He turned wildly, his breath coming fast. He knew this wasn't real. He knew.

But it felt real.

The scent of smoke. The weight of the moon overhead. The way the wind carried the distant whisper of something broken.

It was all exactly as he remembered it.

A soft voice brushed against his mind.

"Look."

Ariel's head snapped forward.

At the center of the town square, where the ground had been torn apart, where the Rift had swallowed his world whole—

Stood himself.

Or rather…

What was left of him.

A boy, silver-haired, eyes empty, standing alone at the epicenter of destruction.

Ariel's breath hitched. He had seen this before.

He had lived this.

The pulse of moonlight. The raw power he had unleashed.

He turned to the Moon Goddess, anger rising in his chest.

"Why are you showing me this?" he demanded.

She didn't answer immediately. Instead, she gazed at the scene with something unreadable in her expression.

Then, she spoke.

"Do you regret surviving?"

Ariel froze.

His breath caught.

His hands clenched into fists.

The Moon Goddess watched him carefully. Her voice was soft. Gentle. But it carried the weight of something much deeper.

"Do you wish you had perished with them?"

Ariel's chest tightened. His throat closed.

He wanted to say no.

He wanted to say yes.

He didn't know what he wanted.

The weight in his chest pressed down on him like a second sky.

The Moon Goddess exhaled, slow and measured.

"Power comes at a price, child," she murmured. "The question is… what are you willing to pay?"

Ariel looked up at her. Silver eyes met silver eyes.

And in that moment, something shifted.

The ruins vanished.

The field of destruction was gone.

The moon shone brighter, too bright—until the light swallowed him whole.

And then—

He woke up.