Noctis stood once more in the ancient hall, its towering walls of onyx stone stretching endlessly into the shadows. The air hummed with a primordial stillness, the darkness around him so deep as if striving to become the void.
Moonlight seeped through cracks in the ceiling, silver threads cutting through the gloom like celestial blades, yet they did little to soften the hall's oppressive weight.
Noctis moved his hand to take a look. The cracks in his white porcelain body glimmered faintly, faintly mirroring the fractured dim light above. "The same as ever…" The shadows clung to him, his ragged black cloak matching the dark.
Noctis was slowly becoming accustomed with the view before him. The dark stones, silhouetted against the faint moonlight, held a strange beauty that slightly stirred something within him.
Noctis trailed his fingers along the dark table, the stone smooth and unnervingly warm beneath his touch. Strange glyphs were etched into the onyx, their patterns twisting like serpents frozen mid-motion.
The moonlight shifted, pooling at his feet. For a moment, the glyphs seemed to writhe, their edges bleeding into the shadows. Noctis jerked his hand back, but the hall offered no answers—only silence, thick and suffocating.
Noctis sat in the dark hall thinking "That connection I felt… maybe it's the key to entering this place," he thought, his porcelain fingers tracing the cracks in his arm.
"Could I have become a seeker because of that damned scroll?"
He gritted his teeth, forcing himself to recall fragmented knowledge. "Seekers… mystical figures who wield authority over a domain. But what does that even mean? What powers do they have? Myths claimed their abilities depended on the "domain" they aligned with—but what even is a domain? What do they seek?"
Frustrated, Noctis closed his eyes and focused inward. The whispers in his mind swelled, chaotic yet familiar, as if they spoke a language just beyond his grasp. Straining, he glimpsed a shard of darkness and threads of glowing text written in an ancient script.
"Sirin? No… similar but older." A thought echoed in his head. His history classes flickered to life —this was the precursor to the liturgical language used in church prayers. The words sharpened faintly:
The Twilight that swallowed the Sun's Last Flame;
The Herald of Shadows no Light can Claim;
...Who Carved the Stars with Night's Own Name.*
Above the stanza of ancient characters loomed a mysterious title:
Harbinger of Night.
Above it, a black shard pulsed, darker than void, speckled with flickering starlight. Noctis tried to focus his consciousness to reach for it—
Pain exploded in his skull. He gasped, consciousness slowly ripped away.
...
When he awoke, he was sprawled on the cold wooden floor of his apartment, temples throbbing. Disoriented, he crawled to the upholstered chair and collapsed into it, his mind fractured. Exhaustion dragged him back into uneasy sleep.
***
Meanwhile, A Cemetery in the City of Irys.
"The Imperial Court? The Six Churches? How are they tied to this?" Vera whispered, her crimson eyes narrowing.
Lumian crouched beside the disturbed earth, brushing dirt off a small wooden box. "Tsk. So it's just some old scripture." He paused, grinning. "But let's see what this 'relic' can do."
"You're avoiding my question," Vera said flatly.
"Honestly, I've got no answers," Lumian admitted. "But now it is safe to assume that seekers are indeed real, And there's no way the major powers in this world doesn't know.." After a short pause Lumian continued. "Those three robed fools mentioned the Court's eyes are here for a week. That's plenty of time to play detective."
"What do you plan on doing next?" Vera asked, her tone casual but her crimson eyes sharp.
"Oh, a plan? Yeah, I totally have one of those…" Lumian replied, scratching his neck and avoiding her piercing gaze.
"But before that," he continued, recovering his smirk, "we need information—specifically about seekers or mysticism. We need to know what to do with this thing after all." He tapped the wooden box tucked under his arm.
Vera nodded, though her expression remained skeptical. "So we're just going to take this and run?"
"Oh, trust me," Lumian said with a grin, "anything's free if you run fast enough… assuming you don't get caught, of course."
Vera sighed.
Lumian's spoke. "Also the Court and Churches seems to have interest in this 'relic'? very interesting."
"Since three nobodies were tasked to hide it. That means it's either not that valuable… but was still valuable enough to warrant hiding in order to avoid exposure." He pried open the lid, revealing a yellowed parchment inside. "Let's find out."
"Hope it's worth the trouble," Vera muttered.
"No rush," Lumian said, tucking the box under his arm. "Time to borrow you for research, Mr. Relic. Maybe you'll teach us how to become seekers."
Vera sighed. "Let's hope it's that easy."
***
Noctis woke up still exhausted. He blinked slowly, scanning the room to confirm he was in his apartment. The fading sunlight outside told him it was late afternoon. "How long was I out?" He'd skipped the academy entirely, but that was the least of his worries.
"Those lines… What did they mean?" The words "Harbinger of Night" clawed at his thoughts. Was he a seeker now? The idea felt absurd—he didn't feel any powerful, In fact, He just felt drained.
His stomach growled, pulling him to the kitchenette. He lit the oil lamp and began chopping vegetables for a simple stew, his mind adrift. "I need information. The academy's library is open tomorrow…"
The knife slipped, nicking his finger. "Ow!" He took care of the cut and kept cooking, the stew's humble aroma soon filled the room.
As he ate, moonlight streamed through the window, rivaling the lamp's dim glow. Shadows stretched across the floor and Noctis was too tired to care about anything right now.
He extinguished the lamp and collapsed onto the narrow bed, the thin mattress offering comfort. Moonlight bathed the room, painting everything in different shades of blue and silver.
"Tomorrow."
Sleep took him swiftly, the voice in his mind fading to silence.