Luna sat alone in her room, a pen gripped tight in her hand, the pages before her already littered with cramped notes on essence.

It had become her ritual, carved into her bones. She gathered scraps of understanding, refining them, archiving them, as though knowledge itself might one day be her salvation.

Maybe Mira would inherit it. Maybe she would pass it on to the Sect she sometimes imagined forming—that's if that dangerous seed of thought ever took root.

When she finished, she stacked the papers neatly and slid them into a hidden drawer. Her movements were meticulous, almost paranoid.

Anything mentioning the forbidden library, or the suffocating Dream Singularities that clawed at her mind while she was here, she burned to ash. No trace could remain since she had a feeling that she was being watched by the Sect.

She didn't know why the Singularities tormented her, only that they grew stronger, sharper, more insistent with each passing night. Ever since her understanding had deepened, reality itself felt thinner, fraying at the edges.

The Dreaming no longer seemed foreign to Luna—it felt like home. She knew the twisted corridors of the Astral Vigil as if she had walked them for centuries. She knew the secret passages, the cold stone carvings, the maddening symbols etched into statues that stared with eyeless judgment.

"What the hell is happening to me…" she muttered, pressing her fingers to her temple. The Singularities left her doubting whether she was awake, whether she was even real.

A good night's sleep had turned into a rare occurrence.

"At least I'm close to becoming a Saint," she said to herself.

A spark of awe flickered in her exhaustion. True Sorcery—this raw, unshackled use of the Gate of Insight was more intoxicating than anything she had ever touched.

Although she was limited only to the essence around her, it didn't matter because Luna could finally conjure weapons born from the domain of fire, rivaling the Zenshi constructs of ordinary ascenders.

With this refined ability, Luna finally felt like she belonged among them. She no longer needed to rely solely on swords and could now use her weapon knowledge to its fullest as a martial artist.

She knew her powers alone were never enough from the start. To truly stand at the top, Luna was aware that she needed all her skills and talent, hence why she couldn't let her Martial skills die out like that.

When the weight of thought grew too heavy, she stepped out to walk, her mind cooled by the silent corridors. She did what she always did when she had nothing to do: she watched, observed. And Measured the others, their progress, their flaws. She didn't approach anyone because she didn't waste words on shallow connections.

Also, Luna had no interest in being liked.

"Ascender Lara."

The false name stopped her cold. She turned, expecting Anna, and disappointment coiled in her chest when instead a tall, dark-haired man stepped into view, his robe trailing, his gaze steady.

"Ginyu," she breathed, bowing her head. Recognition chilled her spine. Another Saint-class—one she had not expected to meet so early

She knew almost nothing about his abilities; he was always away on missions, a ghost in the castle's corridors, so this moment marked their first true conversation.

The calm gentleman smiled at her, his expression unreadable.

"Would you like to go on a walk with me?"

"Outside the castle?"

"Well," he replied softly, "I am a Saint."

A faint thrill coursed through Luna, though she hid it well.

'How can I resist such an offer?' she thought, forcing a polite nod.

"Please, lead the way."

Ginyu's chortle was quiet, almost hollow, yet his voice carried a serene weight. "Are you that curious about the outside world?" His tone never wavered—never too high, never too low. It felt as though his words were carved from silence itself, as if centuries of meditation had worn away any human inflection.

"Who wouldn't be curious about a world like this one?" Luna answered. "I've read about Titans. At first, I wanted to assume they were like the Cursed Emperors…but they're not. They come from the realm of death, and they're drawn to souls."

"Haha… Titans are much deeper than that. But you can put it that way, too, Ascender Lara." His eyes glinted with something unreadable. "I heard you were close to Saint Class. Tell me, what Concept do you pursue?"

"Fire."

"An element…" Ginyu tilted his head. "That's quite interesting. Fire can both destroy and give life. Do you believe it will become your Aura?"

"No. I don't feel the true connection, yet."

"Then it will not be your primary Concept," he said with quiet finality, "if you cannot feel it even now, then you don't have a connection."

They walked into the castle garden, where a massive ancient stone structure waited. It was crusted with runes, its surface eroded but still humming faintly with power. It looked like a relic dug up from the bones of a forgotten civilization, its stillness more menacing than welcoming.

This was none other than one of the Astral Vigil's teleportation rings—this is how ascenders traveled so easily around the dream world.

"Today," Ginyu said, "you and I will walk through the Dreaming. I need to see how you fight. You will battle anything I point to. If you die, you die for real."

Luna did not flinch. 'I already knew that.'

She began to summon the Sun Ember, but Ginyu's voice cut through the air like a blade.

"The gods are not welcome where we're going. Use something else."

Her heart stilled for a beat. 'A place where the gods are not welcome?' A sliver of unease stirred in her chest. This was no simple walk. This was a test. Maybe even a trap.

She schooled her expression, dismissing the thought of the Sun Ember. Still, her mind ran ahead of her. The Dreaming beyond the castle was not safe. It crawled with monsters and demons that Saint Class cultivators waged endless war against in their climb toward higher ascension, and protected this human part of the Dream World.

Luna was not yet among them. Fire alone did not make her a Saint. It was the complete understanding of concepts that would make her a Saint in these ranks. The saint rank came with so many privileges, one of them being that she could explore the Dreaming more.

Luna wanted to see more of this majestic world, and maybe even learn a thing or two about her enemies in the divine realm.

Meanwhile, as she stood there in silence, Ginyu walked to the Teleportation Ring and placed his hand on the stone surface. His lips moved in a whisper, a chant too low for her to catch, but the air itself reacted.

The wind shifted. Bluish threads of light unraveled from the runes, flowing like veins of power toward his hand. They crawled and coiled, hissing as they awakened, until the ring shuddered under their pull.

Something in Luna's gut tightened. The light was not holy, nor neutral—it was cold, sterile, and wrong. Like the Dream itself was preparing to swallow her whole.

"Hail to the Goddess, guardian of humanity and master of this realm. Grant me a way to this place so I may protect my kin."

Ginyu's eyes turned black, and the teleportation ring unfurled like a wound in the air, revealing jagged mountain peaks bathed in the molten glow of a golden sun.

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He withdrew his hand from the portal and turned to Luna. The black veins spreading from his eyes made him look less like a man and more like something touched by the abyss. For a heartbeat, she wondered if he even remained human.

'What kind of power could forge a ring like this?'

"Follow me."

His command was calm but absolute. Without hesitation, he stepped through first. Luna swallowed hard and followed, her features settling into grim resolve.

Passing through the ring felt nothing like crossing planes. No agony clawed at her essence, no tearing at the edges of her soul. Instead, it was deceptively smooth—like walking into another chamber.

'Only that this chamber has poisoned air.'

She coughed as soon as she emerged. The air here was thin and sharp, each breath rasping through her throat as though the mountains themselves rejected her presence. Still, she adjusted quickly; she had learned to endure worse.

Then the wind struck. A savage blast slammed into her with enough force to nearly lift her off her feet. Her hair lashed across her face in wild strands, blinding her as her eyes stung with tears.

And yet none of that mattered—because what lay before her stole the breath she struggled to draw.

They stood on a perilous path clinging to the mountain like a thread pulled taut across infinity. To one side loomed sheer cliffs, to the other stretched a chasm so deep it seemed bottomless. Jagged spires of stone clawed upward through the endless sea of clouds, like the bones of ancient titans still resisting their burial.

Above, the sun poured golden fire across the peaks, but its light could not soften the overwhelming presence of the mountains—they radiated an almost divine pressure, as if the peaks themselves remembered the age of the gods.

"We should hurry."

Ginyu's voice cut through the storm like steel. He stood as if the gale did not exist—his robe hanging still, his long hair unmoving. The wind obeyed him, not the other way around.

"Where are we?" she shouted, forcing her voice past the roar.

"The Grand Northern Mountains," he answered evenly. "We walk to the Kingdom of the Wind Dragons."

Her eyes widened. "Wind Dragons?"

Ginyu chuckled as he strode ahead, unbothered by the abyss at his side. "Yes. This was their realm before the battle against the Creator tore their dominion apart."

'Did he just mention the Creator so casually?'

Luna's chest tightened at the name. She felt a flicker of emotioncuriosity, awe, fear—but quickly forced it down. Of course, the high members of this place would know the Truth. Like her, they were cursed with it.

"You know about the Creator?" she asked.

"Yes," Ginyu replied without pause, his tone as calm as if he spoke of weather. "The gods did their best to erase all records, but truth resists silence. The dragons were his allies. They were born from his blood when it touched the earth. And like humans, they were mortal—yet their power stood close to the divine."

"Is that why the gods are not allowed here?"

He inclined his head.

"The dragons hated them. The betrayal cut deeper than any wound. So, in retaliation for their maker, they gathered their armies and stormed the Divine Realm. That war became known as the Second Great Battle. It was during that battle when the Heart Goddess herself was bitten by a dragon who wielded an odd Domain no god could endure."

The path beneath them narrowed to the width of a blade, each step demanding precision. The air howled and clawed at their balance, yet Luna found herself slowing—not from fear but from wonder. Clouds coiled below like titanic serpents, their edges laced with sunlight.

"What was that concept?" she asked, her voice low.

'To think something other than Black Ether could wound a god…'

The idea left her throat dry. Perhaps there was a way to harm the servants without achieving impossible strength.

"I don't know." His bluntness cut the thought in half. "Only that it belonged to the Dragon King. Perhaps a gift from his father."

"Wow. How disappointing," she muttered, half to herself.

Still, she couldn't deny the awe seeping into her bones. Dragons had always been stories to her—shadows and legends carried over from the old world. In her lifetime, she had only seen two. Both had come from the Void as Soul Beasts: Mao Feng's Ice Dragon, and Kaigen himself, reborn as a Wind Dragon.

And if this place truly was the home of the Wind Dragons… then perhaps Kaigen walked as the last of his kind.

"What happened to the dragons then?" Luna bothered to ask, still shouting to be heard.

"Hehe, the dragons were wiped out after that war. The Heavenly Supreme ordered the death of all the creator's children, as they might've led to another war. The Titans were unkillable, so the death god sent them to his Shadow Prison."

'I now know why I feel terrible whenever I step into the shadow world.'

Luna trailed behind Ginyu for about thirty more minutes in silence. They did not break off from the small path and continued to rise as they followed it along one of the peaks.

'This place was built by dragons?'

Luna's gaze lingered on the mountainside, her dark eyes bright with wonder. She had expected crude dens, vast nests of stone and bone, or cavernous halls carved into the cliffs. Instead, she found rows of stone dwellings, their walls weathered by centuries of wind yet still standing with an unyielding dignity. Even abandoned, they bore the weight of eternity.

She slowed her pace, letting the scene wash over her. The sun poured golden light across the ruins, draping the old homes in warmth, as if the mountains themselves refused to forget the dragons who once lived there. For the first time in a long while, her heart felt lighter.

Ginyu, walking a step ahead, let his eyes drift toward the forgotten homes. Though he had crossed this path countless times, the sight still pulled at him, leaving both warmth and sorrow in its wake.

"The Wind Dragons were shape-shifters," he said at last, his voice low but steady. "They wore human-like forms, much like ours. In truth, Ascender Kaigen is the perfect mirror of what they once looked like."

Luna tilted her head, her voice softened by awe. "What is this place called?"

"Aurßest," he answered.

She turned to him. "Why are you showing me this?"

"Because the Dream Lord asked me to." His black-veined eyes caught the golden light, making his face look almost carved from shadow. "The history of the universe cannot be contained, Luna. It spills forward, whether the gods wish it or not. And as the inheritor of the Heavenly Supreme, you must know it all—so you can forge a path no one else can."

He paused before adding, with quiet weight, "The other Visionaries are not as kind as the Dream Lord. They do not want the truth. They want power, the power your lineage can grant."

"Yes…I've been meaning to ask, what exactly am I?" she turned to him. "Years ago, I discovered that the Feng lineage started from the divine realm. I also learned that my Grandfather lived for hundreds of years before losing the lineage of the Heavenly Supreme to his child and later to my father."

"...and now it exists in you," Ginyu added.

"Obviously. I thought having the lineage in me would perhaps make me strong enough to break fate, but I've seen almost no progress in two years."

Ginyu stayed silent. For several minutes, they just enjoyed the beautiful scenery ahead as if there was nothing else in the world.

"I met your father a long time ago," he broke the calm silence. "He was a fascinating lad with the power to unveil secrets and know things we shouldn't know. Some say he was a natural-born genius who discovered a way of separating someone from the false path and planned on building a Sect that would bring all the Sects in the Mortal Realm. Unfortunately, they had him killed before he could become a Visionary."

Luna's face darkened.

"Who are they?"

"I…I can't tell you yet. I am forbidden from talking about 'them'. But know that the Heavenly Supreme's lineage is only meant to push you further in your ascension. You are different from every cultivator because you feel this world differently. You see, while humans watched gods perform miracles and mimicked what they saw to create what we call True Sorcery." He stretched out his arm, and the wind slowed down.

Then, he continued, "You, however, are not mimicking. You're changing the rules to fit yourself, a gift developed from your lineage. One might say that you are the first human who might be capable of what the divine could do."

Luna frowned at his words.

"I don't understand," she admitted. She knew little to nothing about the lineages passed down to her because Fire Keepers discovered the Sun god's lineage too late.

"While facing the Nightmare, you used White Lightning through the elemental catcher. Am I right?"

Luna recalled the memory of her first serious battle here and nodded. "I did."

"We examined the elemental catcher and discovered it's not supposed to hold that much power. If it did, Anna would've paid the price as the anchor. What you didn't notice is that in the heat of that battle, you changed the rules of that artifact and called upon very powerful lightning. The Dream Lord predicted that power when we saw you fight Victor for the first time."

'How long have these people been watching me?' she asked herself.

This made her wonder just how strong Lord Aaron Phillips was. He was present during the Crimson Tower, but no one noticed his presence or power at all. It was a terrifying thought that a Visionary like him could've ended her life several times if he wanted to.

She could've asked what his ability was, but no loyal servant like Ginyu would share such an important detail–especially one that can harm his master.

Anyway, learning that she was somewhat of a rule breaker was unexpected. Now she understood what the Nightmare meant during their fight. She had swept those words to the corner of my mind because she was too focused on the main battle to think of anything else.

'My Domain has something to do with Twisting the rules.'

Before this conversation, Luna expected her Domain to circle something like Balance. It was only now that she realized how shortsighted she was. The Heavenly Supreme had power over balance and still lost to the servants. In other words, they already had a way to defeat someone with control over the concept of Balance.

She gazed at the horizon while her mind drifted into a sea of thought. Then, within her Soul Gate, something began to stir as she thought deeper about what exactly her Domain was.

The Wind siezed and the world seemed to hold its breath. That's when she felt it–her Domain was reaching out to her. But what was its name?

Ginyu felt the change too. His face didn't change, but his body language said otherwise.

Luna shifted her gaze to him and smirked: "I can feel my domain. I'm close."

Ginyu's eyes shifted back to normal. He exhaled sharply, the sound heavy, almost weary, before summoning his forged weapon. The sword had the weird shape of a curving bronze sword that gleamed with a strange, muted light.

"Lunaris Feng," he declared, his voice carrying the weight of command. "Because you showed signs of awakening a second gate, your training to achieve the Saint Rank begins now."

The moment the words left his mouth, the ground beneath Luna shuddered. At first it was subtle, like the stir of something deep underground, but then it grew violent, the trembling rising in waves as though the mountain itself was alive and restless.

"It's here," Ginyu said, his grip tightening on the bronze blade.

Luna's head snapped upward, her dark eyes drawn to the heavens. The clouds twisted and scattered, torn apart by an immense shadow looming ahead of them.

Her breath caught.

A colossal silhouette in the shape of a human, taller than the mountains themselves, appeared. Its vast hand brushed the sky, sweeping clouds aside like smoke before curling around a jagged peak. With effortless force, it tore the mountain free, pushing it aside as though it were nothing more than a stone in its path.

The world quaked beneath its presence

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