The light faded.
Silence returned.
The ocean shimmered like a sheet of glass under his back. Riven lay still, barely conscious, his body broken—his breath shallow.
And then—
A soft, amused voice cut through the stillness.
"Oh my…"
A figure shimmered into existence above him. Tall, robed in starlight that flickered like a dying constellation. A man—but something more. His eyes held the weight of galaxies, yet he smiled with the playfulness of a child who knew too much.
He crouched beside Riven, waved a hand gently in front of the boy's dirt-smeared face.
"You alive there, young kid?"
He chuckled, standing again with a stretch of his arms and a dramatic sigh. He walked a slow circle around Riven, barefoot on the surface of the water like it was solid stone.
Then he turned, hands on hips, staring up at the towering, ancient tree rising from the ocean.
"This is crazy, isn't it?"
He gestured grandly toward the monolithic trunk.
"Hey, I'm talking to you, old tree. Can't you at least reply today?"
No response.
Just the wind brushing gently through blue-glowing leaves, like whispers in another language.
"I've been trying to make you talk for, what, a million years?" he muttered, throwing his arms up. "You could try being polite just once, you know."
He looked back at Riven, whose chest still rose and fell with ragged, shallow breaths.
The man's expression softened. He knelt beside the boy again, brushing strands of wet hair from Riven's forehead.
"Still breathing... barely. Huh. You're a tough one."
He sat down cross-legged beside him, gazing out across the endless ocean.
"So. This is the guy you chose this time?"
A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"Color me impressed. He made it further than most."
He leaned back on one hand, reaching with the other into thin air—pulling a piece of fruit from nothing. He took a casual bite, juice dripping down his fingers.
"No one's ever succeeded in your trial... except me, that is."
He winked at the tree.
"Yeah, I see you. Don't look at me like that."
He pointed the half-eaten fruit accusingly toward the glowing bark.
"Every ten thousand years, you pick someone. Brave soul. Strong heart. Hope in their eyes. You lure 'em in with your blue moonlight, then toss 'em into a nightmare and wait to see if they crawl out."
He took another bite. Chewed slowly.
"And every single one of them?"
He waved the fruit across the horizon where broken starlight danced on the water.
"Turned into corpses. All buried here, one by one. Right beneath our feet."
His tone dropped. No bitterness—just tired amusement.
"Well… all but one."
He stood again, tossing the fruit into the air—it vanished in a flicker of embers.
His cloak fluttered with a breeze that hadn't been there before.
He began pacing.
"There was that one guy... What was his name?"
He tapped his chin in mock thought.
"V-A-E-L-I-R. That's right."
He chuckled, the sound echoing strangely across the water.
"Didn't succeed... but didn't die either. Ran away. Half-dead. Broken limbs. Lost his power."
He stopped walking, turned again to face the tree.
The humor drained slightly from his voice.
"Wasn't that a little cruel? Even for you?"
The wind stirred again. Leaves shimmered in response. But no answer came.
He let out a long sigh.
"Hah... no reply. Figures."
He turned back to Riven. The boy still hadn't moved—his breath shallow, his body limp—but something flickered behind his closed eyes.
A spark.
The man crouched again.
Soft now. Low.
"But this one's different, isn't he?"
He reached out, placing a hand gently on Riven's chest—right over the heart.
"You didn't just choose him."
His eyes narrowed, voice almost reverent.
"You marked him."
The surface of the ocean rippled gently. The Blue Moon glowed a little brighter. The great tree hummed—low, ancient, alive.
The man smiled, but this time it was somber.
"Well then... guess we'll see if this one becomes another buried memory..."
He rose.
"...or something the world won't be able to forget."
The man stretched his arms above his head, a lazy yawn escaping as though he'd just woken from a long nap instead of stepping into a place where reality bled into myth.
"Aaah... I used to love this place," he muttered, his boots pressing lightly onto the surface of the calm, mirror-like ocean. "Quiet. Isolated. Nobody knew it existed. I made it my base once, y'know... back when I still had use for solitude."
His gaze lifted to the immense, world-sized tree rooted in the endless sea. It shimmered faintly beneath the moonlight—Thee Blue Moon, hanging like a god's eye in the sky.
He let out a soft, breathy laugh.
"Guess it's not mine anymore."
He looked down at Riven's motionless body lying near the tree's roots. The boy's chest rose and fell—barely. Bruised. Bloodied. Barely breathing.
"You chose him?" he asked the tree. "This kid?"
No answer. The tree, as always, stood tall and silent. Watching, but never speaking.
"Tch... same old. Hiding in your quiet. You always were a drama queen."
He crouched beside Riven, resting his elbows on his knees, fingers steepled under his chin. His eyes were calm but piercing, as if he was peering through time itself.
"I know you can hear me, kid. Even half-dead, your soul's still awake now. You felt the bond, didn't you? That crackling fire burning behind your ribs? Yeah... that's what this place does."
He stood, pacing across the glowing roots like a man strolling through memories.
"But I can't reach you again after this. Not in the real world. Once this tree accepts someone, it severs any lingering ties. Won't even let me track you in my dreams."
He turned, cloak rippling gently behind him.
"Still... you've done something that no one else in history has ever done."
A pause.
"Except me."
He grinned, pride flickering beneath his voice.
"I passed the trial when I was eight thousand years old."
He looked back at Riven.
"You? You're what—twelve? Thirteen? Almost eight thousand years younger than I was when I bled in this place."
He laughed, the sound echoing like thunder far away, wild and weightless.
"That's insane. You're insane."
The grin faded. His expression turned serious, voice slowing like a drumbeat before a war.
"We will meet again. No matter how much time it takes. This realm binds us now. Our fates tangled like the roots of this damn tree."
He stopped walking and turned toward the great trunk, speaking not to it—but to the presence within.
"Let me give him something. As the last wielder of this realm, I leave behind a gift."
He raised his hand. A glow gathered—not a sigil, but a spiraling nebula of ink and violet flame, twisting, coiling, condensing—
—into a grimoire.
It hovered above his palm, ancient leather embossed with silver veins, its lock glowing with celestial runes that shifted like constellations.
"This," he said, lowering it gently beside Riven's body, "is Inkveil. My companion, my memory, my madness."
The book pulsed once. Then faded to translucent light.
"It will stay dormant—until you call it. When your soul burns with enough intent, it'll solidify. Become your weapon. Your record. Your mirror."
He smiled again, softer now.
"Every time you open it... it'll remember something I forgot."
He turned back to the tree, arms spread.
"You gonna give him your gift now? Or wait 'til I'm gone, as usual?"
No answer.
"You're so dramatic," he chuckled. "Afraid I'll judge what you give him? Or are you just shy? All this time... you still won't say a word."
He looked down once more at Riven.
"Well, kid... I'm outta time."
The Blue Moon brightened overhead. Light began to peel him away from reality—his form unraveling into shimmering strands of thought and stardust.
His voice echoed one final time, drifting between the crashing silence:
"We'll meet again, Riven Altharys. This isn't goodbye. This is just... page one."
And then—
He was gone.
The calm returned.
But the tree stirred.
The roots glowed.
And the ocean began to rise.
Inkveil, the grimoire, hovered beside Riven—flickering between form and light—waiting for its new master to wake.