Pain. An insistent, grinding agony tore through Kaelen Ashwood’s skull. A gaudy, fragmented dreamscape, filled with whispered geometries and the hum of unseen clockwork, ripped apart. He registered an abnormal throbbing, a merciless pole-whip against his temples, each blow twisting a sharp, cold spike deeper into his mind. Raw anguish held him. In his stupor, Kaelen attempted movement—to turn, to lift his head, to sit. His limbs refused, unresponsive as carved obsidian. A heavy, unfamiliar paralysis bound him. Still entangled in sleep, it seemed. Still lost in the dream’s sticky embrace. Perhaps the next scene would present a cruel mimicry of waking, only to reveal deeper slumber’s grasp. Kaelen, familiar with the treacherous currents of the subconscious, strained for lucidity. He focused his will, pushing against the encroaching darkness, the swirling confusion. He craved escape from these spectral bonds. Yet, his resolve felt ephemeral, a wisp of smoke caught in a storm. Thoughts refused anchor, scattering like dust motes in a shaft of sun. He fought for control, for introspection, but distraction claimed him with relentless efficiency. Why this sudden, excruciating ache? An unbearable pressure, relentlessly building. Could some internal rupture have occurred? A vessel burst within the delicate confines of his cranium? Damnation, a grim premonition flared. Was this the onset of an abrupt, unceremonious end? Wake. Now. The demand reverberated through his inner void. Strangely, the intensity of the pain shifted. A duller, pervasive throb now, like a rusty blade slowly, methodically carving through brain tissue. Sleep remained an impossible luxury. How could he face the Cogsworn Archives tomorrow, his mind thus ravaged? The thought, absurdly, pricked at him. Why concern himself with such trivialities? This pain was undeniable, a brutal reality. Taking leave was the only rational course. Let the Archivist-Primus grumble. His absence was justified. Contemplating this small rebellion, a faint, dark humor surfaced. A day salvaged. A perverse victory against the relentless march of duty. The persistent throbbing pain fueled Kaelen, slowly coalescing his fragmented will. He felt a sliver of strength return, enough to arch his back, to prise open his eyes. He finally broke free from the dream’s suffocating grip. Vision blurred, then cleared. A faint crimson wash coated everything. Before him, a study desk of dark, burled timber loomed. A notebook lay open at its center, coarse, yellowed pages bearing a title in strange, deep black glyphs that seemed to writhe. To the notebook’s left, a neat stack of eight volumes stood sentinel. The wall beyond them featured gray-white conduits, against which an archaic Luminal-lamp was affixed. This lamp, sized roughly like a man’s head, boasted a classical Arkanian design—transparent glass encased by an exterior grid of blackened electrum. Diagonally beneath the lamp, a dark inkwell pulsed with the same pale crimson glow. Its embossed surface showed a blurred, unsettling pattern, hinting at something winged and ancient. Fronting the inkwell, to the notebook’s right, rested a deep-hued stylus. Its perfectly circular body ended in a tip that shimmered faintly. Nearby, its cap lay beside a brass-gleaming automat-pistol. An automat-pistol? This heavy firearm seemed impossibly out of place. Kaelen’s breath hitched. The objects before him were utterly alien. This was not his customary dwelling, not his study within the Luminal Spires Academy. Amidst shock and profound disorientation, he noticed the crimson 'veil' upon the desk, the notebook, the inkwell, and the automat-pistol. The light filtering through the window painted the room in hues of clotted blood. Subconsciously, Kaelen’s gaze lifted, tracing the trajectory of the strange illumination. High above, against the backdrop of a velvet-black sky, hung a monstrous crimson orb. Not Arkanos’s familiar, silvered satellite, but a wounded eye, silently weeping red light. This was… incomprehensible. Pain flared. Kaelen pushed himself fully upright, a tremor running through his frame. He spun, his eyes frantically cataloging his surroundings. This chamber was small. A brown door on each opposing wall. Near one wall, a low, simple wooden bed. Between the bed and the left-hand door, a cabinet stood, its twin doors agape, five shallow drawers beneath. Adjacent to the cabinet, the same gray-white conduit ran at chest height. It fed into a peculiar mechanical apparatus, its internal gears and bearings brazenly exposed, constantly whirring with faint, high-pitched clicks. Crude cooking implements—items resembling ancient cinders-stoves, a dented soup pot, an iron skillet—clustered in the room’s right corner, near the study table. Across from the right door, a tall looking-glass stood. Its reflective surface bore two distinct cracks, its base a simple, unadorned timber. As Kaelen swept his gaze across the room, his eyes caught his own reflection. Not his reflection, not truly. This new self. Dark hair, eyes of deep brown, a simple linen tunic draping a slender frame. Features average, yet with a pronounced, scholarly cast. An unfamiliar face stared back. This… Kaelen inhaled sharply. A wave of helpless, disorienting conjectures washed over him. The ancient Arkanian automat-pistol, the impossible crimson moon—they converged on a single, horrifying conclusion. Could he have… traversed? He found the term absurd, yet chillingly apt. His mind, nurtured by the speculative chronologies found in forbidden archives, had often entertained such theoretical displacement. To face it, however, rendered him momentarily speechless. This was the cold, visceral reality of abstract fantasy. Kaelen internally chastised his momentary lapse, even as his mind began frantically to salvage a semblance of order from chaos. His headache, a persistent, gnawing presence, kept his thoughts sharp, his awareness painfully acute. Had the pain not been so authentic, he might have dismissed this as a particularly vivid nightmare. Calm. He repeated the command internally. Calmness. Kaelen drew several deep, shuddering breaths, willing the rising tide of panic to recede. In that fragile moment of stillness, as his consciousness steadied, memories began to surface. Not his own, but another’s. They seeped into his awareness, coalescing with alarming clarity. Silas Vane. A citizen of Arkanos, residing in the District of Cogsworn. A recent graduate of the Luminal Spires Academy, specializing in Temporal Semiotics. His father, a sergeant in the Automaton Guard, sacrificed during the Luminal Reclamation efforts. Bereavement funds secured Silas’s attendance at a reputable Aetherial Preparatory, laying the groundwork for his admission to the Academy. His mother, a devout follower of the Nullity Weaver, passed the year Silas gained acceptance to the Luminal Spires Academy. He had an elder brother and a younger sister. They shared a modest two-room dwelling. Their family possessed little wealth. Indeed, their situation could be described as precarious. Support rested solely on the elder brother, who worked as a clerk for an inter-district alchemical trade consortium. As a Temporal Semiotics graduate, Silas possessed mastery of the Elder Script of Chronos—believed to be the progenitor of all Arkanian languages—along with knowledge of the Abyssal Canticles, frequently encountered in forgotten crypts and texts pertaining to forbidden invocations. Abyssal Canticles? Kaelen’s mind stirred. He instinctively reached for his throbbing temples, his gaze drawn back to the desk, to the opened notebook. The foreign glyphs on the yellowed paper shifted. From strange, they became alien, then vaguely familiar. Finally, they resolved into something readable. It was text written in Abyssal Canticles. Dark ink spelled out a single, chilling declaration: “All will cease, including I.” A hiss escaped Kaelen’s lips. An inexplicable terror seized him. He instinctively recoiled, desperate to widen the distance between himself and the notebook, between himself and the grim pronouncement. Weakened, he stumbled, nearly falling. His hands shot out, scrabbling for the edge of the desk. The air around him seemed to churn, carrying faint, disembodied murmurings—like the half-heard tales of ancient, unspeakable things whispered by elders in the deepest night. He shook his head, willing the auditory hallucination to dissipate. Kaelen regained his precarious balance, tearing his gaze from the notebook as he gasped for air. His eyes landed, this time, on the gleaming brass automat-pistol. A sudden, piercing question cut through his dread. Given Silas’s impoverished family circumstances, how could he possibly possess an automat-pistol? Such an item was a luxury, a symbol of power, not an academic’s tool. Kaelen’s brow furrowed in deep thought. In that moment, a splotch of raw crimson caught his eye. On the desk’s timber surface, beside his hand, a handprint glowed. Deeper in hue than the moonlight, thicker than the 'veil' that coated the room. A handprint of blood. “Blood?” Kaelen subconsciously flipped his right hand, the one that had clutched the desk’s edge. He stared. His palm, his fingers—they were drenched. Simultaneously, the throbbing pain in his head intensified, a relentless percussion. Though slightly diminished, it persisted, an unceasing, agonizing rhythm. Had he sustained some grievous head trauma? He wondered, a sickening dread coiling in his gut. Kaelen turned, his movements stiff, and walked towards the cracked dressing mirror. A few hesitant steps, and the black-haired, medium-built figure with brown eyes appeared clearly before him. An undeniable scholarly air clung to the reflection. This was the current him. Silas Vane. Kaelen stood frozen for a beat. The dim, crimson-filtered light obscured details. He advanced, closing the distance until he stood barely a step from the mirror’s fractured surface. Using the unsettling crimson light as his only illumination, he turned his head, examining the side of his forehead. A clear, horrifying reflection materialized. His temple bore a grotesque, mangled wound. Its edges were seared, darkened as if by some arcane combustion. Blood matted the surrounding flesh, and within the wound itself, grayish-white cerebral matter squirmed with an almost imperceptible, sickening pulse.

Chapter 1 - Crimson Reverie