Jin Yue POV
Jin Yue stood frozen, his back pressed against a crumbling column as the echo of the voice faded into the trembling air. His lungs burned, but he dared not breathe too deeply. Not while the darkness listened.
The altar cracked further with a deafening groan, splitting down its center like an overripe fruit. Pale light bled from within the stone, no longer warm and golden—but cold, silvery, and tinged with violet. Ethereal. Unnatural.
Something was rising.
He wanted to run. But his feet rooted to the spot, body paralyzed by instinct and dread. Not fear—no, this was deeper than fear. This was recognition. Some part of him—some long-silenced thread in his blood—recognized the pulse beneath the earth. The entity in the deep.
The light dimmed. From the shattered altar, mist began to pour—silken tendrils curling across the floor, winding around his ankles like vines. A whisper, softer this time, brushed against his ear.
"Do you remember me?"
His mouth was dry. He wanted to say no. He wanted to scream it. But the words never formed.
The air around him warped. The mist shimmered, coalescing into a tall figure cloaked in shadow and flickering starlight. Its face was obscured beneath a hood, yet its presence pressed on him like the weight of an avalanche.
He stepped back. It followed.
"What are you?" he managed, his voice a strained whisper.
The figure tilted its head.
"The better question is… what are you?"
With a wave of its hand, the temple shifted. The walls trembled as symbols—long dormant—flared to life in crimson and black. Ancient, broken runes that he had only seen once, hidden in forbidden tomes in the palace archives. He remembered sneaking glances at them under candlelight as a child, fascinated and terrified by their warnings.
And now they surrounded him.
"You are not a priest," the figure continued, its voice both male and female, echoing with layers. "Not just a warrior. Not only flesh." It pointed toward his chest. "Your soul remembers the bond."
The pendant around his neck grew hot. Jin Yue gasped and tore it off, but it clung to his fingers like iron.
"What bond?" he hissed.
The figure moved closer, until he could see swirling starfire within its hood.
"You were born of two legacies—one of blood, one of storm. And now, the storm calls you home."
The room began to spin. Images flooded his mind—flashes of a temple older than this one, submerged in the sea. A creature made of flame and shadow bowing before a boy with silver eyes. A sword, heavy with ruin, piercing the heart of a god.
His knees buckled. The memories were not his—and yet they burned like truth.
The figure knelt before him.
"Awaken, Jin Yue. Or this world will drown in what sleeps beneath it."
Then it vanished—dissolving into the mist, the runes fading into cold stone once more.
Jin Yue fell to his hands, breath ragged.
The temple was silent again. But he knew the silence was temporary.
The storm within him had begun to rise.
And so had the darkness.
—