The sky over Aethoria—once a beacon of stability in a world of magic—shattered like glass, its pieces sparkling as they rained down in a spectrum of colors. As they fell, they left trails of starlight in their wake, turning the heavens into a kaleidoscope of cascading light. The very fabric of reality groaned, as if the world itself was crying out in pain.
Where these fragments touched the earth, reality itself seemed to buckle and warp. In the golden wheat fields of the Whispering Plains, farmers watched in awe and terror as their crops aged and withered in minutes, only to sprout anew in an endless cycle of growth and decay.
In the bustling port city of Tideshore, a magnificent merchant galleon, sailed out of the harbor only to reappear moments later, its hull encrusted with the barnacles of a century's passage. The crew emerged with wild eyes and graying hair, babbling about years spent adrift in a timeless void.
At the foot of the Spire Mountains, a village phased in and out of existence. One moment, it was there—people going about their daily lives, smoke rising from chimneys, children playing in the streets. The next, it vanished completely, leaving nothing but undisturbed wilderness. Travelers learned to time their journeys carefully, lest they be caught in the village's temporal flux and disappear along with it.
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High Remembrancer Edward Vortis stood in the heart of the Mnemosyne archives, surrounded by the accumulated knowledge of ages. His breath hitched as a tome slipped from its shelf—a priceless record of Aethoria's history. But instead of crashing to the floor, it defied gravity, reversing its descent to nestle back into place. Edward's hand hovered in the air, trembling with disbelief and a growing sense of dread.
A strange energy swept through him, thick and suffocating, coiling within his Wellspring—the source of a mage's power. Time seemed to twist and convulse, each second stretching into eternity or snapping shut like a trap. All around, he could sense the countless others reacting in kind, some flaring with newfound power, others guttering like candles in a storm.
In his arms, cradled protectively against his chest, his infant son Elden began to cry. But there was something different about the child's wail – it seemed to echo, as if coming from multiple points in time at once. Edward looked down at his son, and for a moment, he could have sworn he saw the child's eyes flash with an otherworldly golden light.
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In the void between realities, where the concept of space itself unravels. Fractals of light and shadow dance in patterns that would drive mortal minds to madness. A figure stood vigil. His form is a paradox—at once solid, yet ethereal. Where a face should be, there is only a shimmering veil of starlight.
Before him stretched an intricate web of threads, each pulsating with countless lives and infinite possibilities. The threads wove together in a cosmic tapestry, intersecting and diverging in ways that defied mortal comprehension.
With a slow, deliberate movement, the figure reached out and let his fingers brush against a single thread.
The moment he made contact, the entire web shivered.