Prologue

They say every story begins with a question.

Ours began when the universe could no longer answer.

The first star disappeared on a Tuesday.

No one noticed.

It was only one light among countless others scattered across the endless sky of Elysion.

Life carried on as it always had. The observatories continued their work. Celestial trains crossed the Star Bridges without delay. Merchants opened their stalls before sunrise. Children laughed as they chased each other through the suspended streets. Musicians filled the plazas with familiar melodies. Lovers promised to meet again beneath the evening sky.

The world moved forward...

As if nothing had changed.

Three days later...

Another star vanished.

A week after that...

A third.

By the end of the month, astronomers argued over calculations.

By the end of the year...

They argued over fear.

"Are you certain?"

The Director of the Central Observatory stood before an enormous celestial map, his tired eyes fixed upon the missing pieces of the night. Entire constellations had begun to fracture. Not because stars had shifted. Not because they had died. But because empty spaces now existed where light had once been.

A young researcher swallowed nervously.

"We've confirmed it with every observatory in Elysion."

Silence.

"They aren't moving."

Silence.

"They aren't exploding."

Silence.

"They're simply..."

Her voice failed her.

Because no language possessed a word for what they were witnessing.

That night...

For the first time in nearly four hundred years...

The Bells of Elysion rang.

They did not announce war.

Nor plague.

Nor the death of a king.

They announced something far more terrifying.

Uncertainty.

Far from the capital, in a quiet town built upon enormous crystalline roots, a little girl looked up at the night sky.

"Mom?"

Her mother smiled warmly.

"Yes?"

The child pointed upward.

"Why is there a star missing?"

The woman's smile faded.

Slowly...

She raised her head.

Her eyes searched the heavens.

Then...

She froze.

She remembered that star. She knew exactly where it belonged.

Yet now...

There was only emptiness.

Not darkness.

Not clouds.

Nothing.

As though that star had never existed at all.

That same night, across every continent, millions of people experienced the same impossible sensation.

A quiet sadness.

A hollow ache deep within their hearts.

Like trying to remember someone precious...

Only to realize you could no longer remember their face.

Far above the floating cities...

Far beyond the constellations...

Beyond even the reach of time...

There was a wound.

A scar carved into reality itself.

Black.

Silent.

Endless.

It was known only by one name.

The Silent Rift.

It had existed since before recorded history. The people of Elysion no longer questioned it. Just as no one questions the moon. Or the mountains. It had always been there.

So they stopped wondering why.

That night...

For the first time...

The Rift breathed.

No sound.

No light.

No explosion.

Only movement.

So slight...

That no instrument in existence could measure it.

So slight...

That only one person in the entire universe happened to look up at the exact moment it occurred.

A boy.

Alone.

Sitting upon the roof of an old library.

A sketchbook rested across his knees. His pencil stopped moving.

Slowly...

He lifted his eyes toward the sky.

A single tear rolled down his cheek.

"...Why?"

The word barely escaped his lips. He didn't know what he was asking. He only knew...

His heart was grieving for something his mind could no longer remember.

He closed the sketchbook.

Carefully.

Almost reverently.

Across its worn leather cover, a single sentence had been written by hand.

"Drawing is the only way I've found to stop the world from being forgotten."

The wind stirred.

The final page turned by itself.

Blank.

Completely blank.

Then...

Silence.

And in that silence...

For the first time since the birth of existence...

The universe...

Began to die.

End of Prologue