Rain began before dawn.
Not a storm.
Just a thin silver drizzle that coated Solmire's streets in reflection.
Lantern light stretched across wet stone.
White towers blurred behind mist.
The kingdom looked softer in rain.
Quieter.
Almost peaceful.
Then the screaming started.
In a modest home near the eastern gate, a child hid beneath a table.
Hands over ears.
Eyes wide with tears.
His mother still lay where she had fallen the night before.
Motionless beside the bedside lamp.
Breathing slow.
Face calm.
As if sleep had only become deeper.
Then her fingers moved.
The child looked up.
Hope flashed across his face.
"…Mama?"
Her arm bent backward with a sickening snap.
Bones shifted beneath skin.
Dark veins burst across her neck like ink dropped in water.
Her closed eyes split open—
not with pupils.
With black light.
The room shook.
Furniture splintered outward as her body rose unnaturally from the floor.
A twisted cry tore from her throat—
half scream.
Half laughter.
Shadow gathered around her limbs and hardened into jagged claws.
The ceiling cracked.
The child screamed.
The front door exploded inward.
A silver-coated knight crossed the room in a blur.
One strike.
A crescent blade of aether cut through the creature's chest and drove it through the wall into the rain outside.
The nightmare thing writhed in mud and broken wood.
Still moving.
Still smiling with the mother's face.
The knight's jaw tightened.
He raised his weapon again.
"…Forgive me."
The second strike ended it.
The dark body collapsed into ash.
What remained beneath it—
was only the sleeping mother.
Unharmed.
Still breathing.
The knight froze.
Rain fell through the broken roof.
This was no monster.
It was a puppet.
Captain Darius Fenroth stood in the alley outside the ruined home while rain struck his shoulders.
The squad knight knelt before him.
Mud-covered.
Still shaken.
"It came from the sleeping body, Captain."
Darius said nothing.
His scarred eyes studied the ash dissolving in puddles.
No blood.
No flesh.
Only residue of hostile aether.
Selene Voss crouched beside the remains.
She touched the ground once.
A thin line of frost crawled over the stones.
"…Dream residue," she said quietly.
Darius's expression hardened.
"Then sleep is no longer the problem."
He turned.
"Now they can wake as weapons."
The rain suddenly felt colder.
By midday, the rain had stopped.
Clouds hung low over Solmire's walls.
At the South Gate, guards resumed inspection of travelers entering the capital.
Carts rolled slowly.
Merchants argued over tariffs.
Steel doors stood half open.
Routine tried to survive.
Then the line parted.
A lone cloaked figure approached on foot.
Tall.
Broad.
Head lowered.
No wagon.
No escort.
No visible weapon.
The gate captain stepped forward.
"State your name and business."
The figure stopped.
Said nothing.
"Remove your hood."
Still nothing.
The guards raised spears.
The ground beneath them groaned.
One guard dropped first.
Knees slamming into stone as invisible pressure crushed him downward.
Then another.
Then five more.
Armor buckled.
Spears bent.
The gate itself shrieked as iron bars twisted inward.
The captain roared and charged.
His blade never reached halfway.
He was driven face-first into the road by a force no eye could see.
Stone cratered around him.
Panic erupted.
Civilians fled screaming.
Horses broke their reins.
The cloaked figure stepped through the bent gate without urgency.
Each footstep deepened cracks in the road.
Then—
as alarms began to ring from the towers—
the figure vanished into the dust beyond the walls.
Gone.
As if the earth had swallowed him.
The strategy chamber filled faster than ever before.
Rainwater still clung to armor.
Reports stacked across the glowing table.
Voices overlapped.
Urgency replaced protocol.
Rein stood at the center.
No crown.
Only command.
Darius delivered first.
"Sleeping victims can manifest hostile constructs through their bodies."
Leonhart slammed a fist into the table.
"Then we evacuate districts and burn every marked zone."
Seraphine's voice cut sharper than expected.
"And kill our own citizens in their beds?"
Silence.
Orion unfurled a scroll filled with moving script.
"The gate attack left spatial compression fractures in the stone."
He looked up.
"Gravity manipulation on a scale beyond standard military classes."
Rein's eyes narrowed.
Two enemies.
Different methods.
Same timing.
He moved glowing cards across the map.
Sleep incidents in blue.
Gate breach in red.
The ring around the palace tightened.
This was not chaos.
It was choreography.
As the others argued, Rose's gaze had drifted to the lower layers of the palace map.
To a symbol engraved beneath Sunspire itself.
A sealed circle marked in royal gold.
Her gloved hand trembled.
Rein noticed.
"…Rose?"
She hesitated.
Then spoke quietly enough that only the captains nearest heard.
"There is something beneath this palace."
Every eye turned.
"An archive sealed by the first royal line."
She swallowed.
"Not treasure. Not gold."
Her voice lowered further.
"A relic."
Orion stepped forward instantly.
Interest sharpened into hunger.
"What relic?"
Rose's curse surged beneath her sleeve.
Dark veins briefly touched her wrist.
"…The Solar Core Archive."
Even the air in the room seemed to still.
She looked directly at Rein.
"Only the blood of the crown can open it."
Now the pattern was complete.
They were not merely targeting Solmire.
They were targeting its king.
Far from the palace lights—
in a chamber lit by black candles—
two figures stood before a cracked stone altar.
One seated with crossed legs.
One towering in silence.
Faces hidden by shadow.
A map of Solmire burned in pale flame between them.
The palace at its center.
The seated figure smiled.
"…The city dances exactly as expected."
The larger one gave a low laugh like shifting mountains.
"I guess it's time."
A pause.
Then the first voice answered softly.
"…Yeah."
The smile widened.
"…It's a really good time."
The candles went out together.
Deep beneath Sunspire Palace—
past locked vaults and forgotten stairs—
past doors no servant had touched in generations—
an ancient chamber waited in darkness.
At its center stood a massive sealed gate engraved with a sun being devoured by shadow.
For centuries, it had not moved.
Tonight—
a thin line of gold light appeared across its surface.
Something inside had awakened.