Primordial Heir: Nine Stars

As soon as he closed his eyes beside his lover, the darkness behind his lids swirled and thickened, pulling him under. Another dream. Another journey.

He found himself standing on a plateau, the ground soft and spongy beneath his feet. Muddy puddles dotted the land, their surfaces still trembling as if the rain had only just stopped. The air was heavy, thick with the scent of wet earth and something older—something like forgotten time. Bits of greenery pushed through the soil here and there, fragile shoots that seemed to glow faintly in the dim light. Old trees surrounded the plateau, their branches so long they curved downward, brushing the ground like the tentacles of ancient, sleeping beasts. Their bark was dark, slick with moisture, and their leaves whispered without wind.

Nero’s mind was fuzzy, clouded, incapable of forming any rational thought. He tried to remember why he was here, how he had arrived, but the answers slipped away like water through fingers. He was a puppet on a string—or perhaps he had walked this path before, in another life, another dream. His body began to move on its own, marching forward with a certainty that did not belong to him.

Weirdly enough, his movements were precise, almost mechanical, as if carefully programmed beforehand. His feet avoided the puddles of mud without conscious thought, stepping on patches of grass or bare earth. Not once did he sink. Not once did he stumble. He walked on and on, crossing nascent blades of grass that bent under his weight but did not break, stepping over the massive yet soft bodies of collapsed tree trunks that had fallen ages ago. Moss covered them, thick and green, and tiny mushrooms grew in clusters along their sides.

Time seemed meaningless here. There was no sun, no moon, no stars to mark its passage. The sky remained a perpetual, unchanging dimness, like twilight on a cloudy day. Gradually, Nero’s sense of distance began to fade as well. Were he walking miles? Or merely circling the same patch of earth? He could not tell.

From time to time, he encountered enormous boulders that towered like small hills on the ground. Their surfaces were scarred with runes too worn to read, too old to understand. These boulders became landmarks, giving him a faint sense of progression. He would pass one, walk for what felt like an hour, then pass another. The landscape changed slowly—the trees grew taller, the mud gave way to rocky soil, the air grew colder.

But the sky remained dim. No hints of dawn or dusk. No passage of time at all.

He continued walking in that mindless manner for an unknowable amount of time. Minutes, hours, days—they all blurred together into a single, endless moment. His body did not tire. His mind did not clear. He simply moved forward, driven by some invisible force.

Eventually, he arrived in the depths of a cluster of mountains. The peaks rose around him like sleeping giants, their slopes shrouded in mist. The path narrowed, winding between sheer cliffs of dark stone. Water trickled down the rock faces, forming small streams that glittered in the dim light.

At the end of the path, beneath the shadow of a cliff so high he could not see its top, he found himself standing before a woman.

She sat upon a golden throne, its surface carved with images of stars and serpents and things he could not name. Her hair was long, impossibly long, cascading down her shoulders and pooling on the ground like a river of deep blue silk. It was the most beautiful hair he had ever seen—no word could describe its color, its texture, its otherworldly sheen. Her features were delicate, ageless, and her beauty was beyond human, beyond mortal, beyond anything he had ever imagined.

She wore a gown of pale silver that shimmered with an inner light, and her hands rested on the arms of the throne, pale and slender, tipped with nails like polished moonstone.

The blue-haired woman slowly opened her eyes.

Her irises were mysterious—deep and swirling, like the heart of a glacier, like the depths of an ocean trench. When they fixed upon Nero, he felt as if his head had been plunged into icy water, a shock so cold it burned. His senses returned to him in a rush. The fog in his mind cleared. He regained control over his body, his limbs, his breath.

He stood before her, no longer a puppet. He was himself.

A strange familiarity washed over him. He had never seen this woman before, yet something about her reminded him of someone close. The curve of her jaw. The set of her lips. The way her hair caught the light. It nagged at him, a memory just out of reach.

”I never thought someone would be able to find me here.”

Her voice was cool, feminine, barely above a whisper. There was hardly any fluctuation in her tone, but her words carried surprise—genuine surprise, as if such a thing had not happened in a very long time.

She studied him, her mysterious eyes tracing his features, his build, the color of his hair. Then her expression shifted, shock replacing surprise.

”A child bearing my bloodline?”

She leaned forward slightly, her gown rustling. A strand of blue hair slipped over her shoulder. She raised a hand, and Nero felt an invisible force brush against his cheek—not touching, but feeling. Testing.

”Oh? You must be her descendant.” A soft, amused sound escaped her lips. ”Fufufu! To think a boy would come here. It has never happened before. Always the daughters. Always the women.” She tilted her head, her eyes glittering. ”Interesting. Very interesting.”

Nero opened his mouth to speak, to ask the thousand questions burning in his mind, but she raised a finger, silencing him.

”Go back, child. It is not the time yet. You are not strong enough. Not nearly strong enough.” Her gaze softened, just a fraction.

”Once you are stronger, you may come to the village. There, you will learn more about your origin—about your mother’s side. About what flows in your veins.”

To the disappearing Nero’s soul she sent something which got assimilated with something deeper, there was a snapping sound in his inner world, his body then began to change slowly without his knowledge.

The village. His mother had spoken of it, once, in the final months of her life. A place hidden from the world, where her people had lived for millennia. She had made him promise to find it when he was ready, when he was strong enough to survive the truths it held.

Nero wanted to ask more. He wanted to demand answers. But his consciousness was already slipping, gently pushed away by a force he could not resist. He felt himself floating, drifting, the woman and her golden throne growing distant.

Before the darkness swallowed him, he heard her sigh. It was a heavy sound, burdened with centuries.

”To think our bloodline would link to that.” A pause. ”The time has come. The end is here, it seems.”

Then nothing.

Nero woke with a gasp, his body drenched in cold sweat. The sheets were tangled around his legs. Beside him, Khione slept on, her breathing slow and peaceful, unaware of his journey.

He lay still, staring at the ceiling, trying to grasp the fading fragments of the dream. The woman. The throne. The village. But the details slipped away, dissolving like mist in sunlight. Only the core remained: he was not strong enough. He needed to grow. He needed to find that village.

His mother’s promise echoed in his heart. She had made him swear to seek out her homeland once he had the strength. He had not forgotten. He would not fail.

He turned his head and looked at Khione, her white hair spread across the pillow, her face soft in sleep. She was his anchor, his reason. For her, he would become strong enough.

The dream faded. But the resolve remained.