Chapter 15

Orion returned home just as the sun dipped below the hills, staining the sky with streaks of orange like a smudged oil painting. The day had been... a mess. A swirling cocktail of stress, confusion, and existential dread, garnished with a little trauma umbrella on top.

His footsteps echoed through the empty house. No Frieda. No noise. Just silence, like the walls were giving him the cold shoulder.

He walked into the kitchen, let out a slow sigh, and stared at the countertop like it had personally wronged him. "Okay," he muttered. "How hard can it be?"

He grabbed a knife. Some vegetables. A dream. And absolutely zero cooking knowledge.

The first onion he peeled fought back with the ferocity of a seasoned warrior. His eyes watered instantly. Blinking through the sting, he hacked it into chunks that looked more like failed geometry homework than anything edible.

The carrots fared no better—he peeled one with the knife backwards, dropped another on the floor, then picked it up, gave it a dramatic stare, and threw it into the pot whole.

Potatoes? He started peeling one, got bored halfway through, and chopped it like it owed him Mora. The result was a series of potato fragments that looked like someone had tried sculpting a cube with a rock.

Satisfied (read: emotionally exhausted), he dumped everything into a frying pan, poured in oil like he was trying to baptize it, and cranked the heat up to dragon's breath.

Then the spices came out.

He had no idea what half of them were. That didn't stop him. In went a heroic shake of cinnamon. A pinch of cumin. A mysterious powder labeled "For Desserts Only ❤️." He stared at it, shrugged, and added two spoonfuls. "Sweet and savory fusion," he declared. "Very avant-garde."

The pan responded with a hiss that sounded vaguely like a scream. Smoke began rising. Something in there burped.

Orion stirred with the confidence of a man who once saw someone cook on TV—once. Back in his childhood. In a dream.

By the end of it, the "meal" had taken on a greyish color, like regret mixed with sadness. It bubbled ominously. The smell? A unique blend of scorched sugar, burnt vegetables, and… betrayal.

He stared down at the bubbling horror with quiet dread.

"Cooking isn't for me, I guess," he muttered, poking it like it might bite.

Just as he reached for the trash—

CREEEEAK.

The door opened.

Just as Orion reached for the trash—

CREEEEAK.

The door swung open.

Frieda Gunnhildr stepped in, brushing wind-tangled hair out of her face. She looked... hopeful. Blushing slightly. Eyes scanning the room like she was expecting something nice. Maybe candles. Maybe warm food. Maybe a cozy evening with a dash of romantic tension.

What she got was smoke. Thick, fragrant, and mildly hostile.

She paused mid-step. Sniffed. Her face twitched.

Then she walked into the kitchen—slowly, like she was entering a crime scene.

Her eyes landed on the pan. And stayed there.

The abomination inside gave a wet, gurgling pop.

"...Orion." Her voice was soft. Cautious. Almost reverent, like she was afraid to spook the dish. "I know we haven't known each other that long, but—" she leaned in, squinted—"are you seriously trying to poison me?"

Orion blinked, halfway between embarrassment and existential crisis. "I was… experimenting."

"With what?" she asked. "The concept of mercy?"

He pointed at the pot. "Technically, it's a stir-fry."

Frieda tilted her head. "Technically, it's a war crime."

She stepped closer, peering in with a mix of fascination and horror. "Is that glitter?"

"…Might be."

"And is this—" she poked a half-submerged carrot with a fork—"raw?"

Orion crossed his arms, defensive. "It's al dente."

"It's still alive."

He groaned and dropped his forehead against the cabinet. "I tried, okay?"

Frieda laughed. Not a mocking laugh—more like the kind that slips out when something's so bad, it's art. "You get points for effort," she said, patting his back. "Negative points for culinary terrorism."

He looked at her, sheepish. "You hungry?"

She gave the pan another glance. "I was."

Then she smiled. "C'mon. Move aside. Let me show you how not to summon a demon from the pan."

------------------------------------------------------------

Somewhere beyond space, in a stillpoint untouched by time—

A rift, carved not with light, but silence, opened like a wound in the air.

From it, Seraphyx stepped through—his form radiant, but restrained, draped in threads of living frost that curled like mournful smoke. With a silent gesture, the breach closed behind him.

This place did not exist.

It was never meant to.

Here, the stars could not see. The gods could not hear.

Only She could.

And awaiting him, already gathered in wordless arrangement, stood three others:

Kaelya, the Blossom of Prana, ranked First.

A woman of serene elegance, whose breath seemed to seed galaxies of frost-lilies that bloomed and withered in a heartbeat. Her eyes, like half-lidded stars, watched everything—and judged quietly.

Morven, the Frozen Pendulum, Third.

Clad in robes spun from time-ice, he moved not, yet existed as if paused between seconds. His pendulum-staff clicked once every so often—though no one dared to count how often.

Ignarion, Crown of Silent Reign, Fifth.

Monolithic, scarred by wars the world had forgotten, his glacier-carved armor groaned under invisible weight.

"You're a bit late," Ignarion said, his voice low but steady, carrying across the stillness. "Twenty seconds."

Seraphyx smiled faintly, calm but sincere beneath the frost.

"I stayed behind to mend the rift your haste caused. The land remembers its wounds, Ignarion."

Ignarion's eyes softened. "You always take the weight on yourself. But we all play our parts."

Kaelya's lips curled in a small smile. "We're all shaped by Her design. You're the vessel, the voice. A suit of flesh She wear to interact with the World."

Seraphyx nodded, respect in his tone. "And that's a responsibility I don't take lightly."

Morven's voice was cool, distant—but not indifferent.

"Enough words. She's stirring."

Seraphyx breathed deeply.

"Where is Yandelf?"

Morven's tone didn't waver. "Resting. She preserves herself. The Frost Dragon Legion sleeps within her—one twitch and an empire could fall with her breath."

Ignarion gave a slow nod. "She carries the burden of extinction. Let the Fourth of VlastMoroz's Emblem keep her peace."

Then—

Everything stopped.

Not time. Not sound.

Everything.

Like the void itself was holding its breath.

Kaelya turned gently, her hands rising in a soft gesture. Her voice shifted—no longer teasing, but reverent.

"It's time," she said. "She isn't watching now. She's waiting."

With a movement like prayer, she raised her fingers and snapped.

The world obeyed.

Where there had been only emptiness, now rose a colossal gate—ten thousand feet tall, forged from obsidian frost. The ice groaned like stars breaking under pressure. Its surface bore no carvings, no runes. Only her sigil—a single spiral etched in eternal hoarfrost, untouched by age or flame.

The doors groaned as they opened—not like hinges, but like glaciers splitting under pressure. A sound deep and terrible, as if the void itself had been unsealed.

The four Emblems stepped inside in solemn silence, their footsteps barely making a sound, yet each step rang with significance, echoing endlessly through the vast chamber.

The room was colossal—an expanse beyond mortal comprehension. The floor stretched out like a frozen sea, its surface polished to a mirror-shine that reflected not only the Emblems but entire galaxies flickering faintly beneath the ice, as though the room sat atop the bones of the cosmos.

The walls—if they could even be called that—rose up and up, disappearing into a cold mist that obscured the ceiling. It gave the impression the room had no end, only an ascent into endless frost and shadow. Pillars wider than towers held the silence aloft, each carved with symbols too old for language—sigils that pulsed gently with cold light, not glowing but remembering.

At the center stood a solitary platform—a dais formed of obsidian and frostglass, raised three steps above the floor, as if any higher would be sacrilege. Upon it, no throne waited. No altar. Just absence—as though the mere presence of Her will had burned away anything unworthy to remain.

High above, suspended in that endless mist, hung a chandelier—vast and silent, with countless shards of starlight frozen in delicate webs of frost. It didn't shine. It hummed. The light it gave off was cold, a colorless luminance, like moonlight remembered in a dream. The ceiling it hung from could not be seen—only the feeling of distance, of vertical infinity, like staring up through miles of ocean ice.

The chamber was not designed for beings of flesh.

It was meant for Her.

A cathedral to something older than worship.

A wound in reality given shape and order.

A place where silence held dominion—and the frost itself listened.

As the Emblems approached the platform, none dared speak.

The chamber, impossibly vast, remained still.

But the silence began to... bend.

Not break. Not tremble. Just bend—like something massive had exhaled behind the veil of mist that loomed above the platform.

And then—

They opened.

Two eyes.

No glow. No flash.

Just existence.

Piercing and slitted, wide as cathedrals, sharp as judgment, and ancient as betrayal. They gazed downward from the mist like twin stars that had long since died but refused to stop burning. Cold, reptilian, calculating—like the gaze of a serpent that had watched civilizations bloom and rot for sport.

They didn't blink.

They didn't need to.

The mist parted only slightly, just enough to frame the twin orbs in a dim corona of divine frost. It was unclear if there was a face behind them, or if the eyes themselves were all that existed—a presence so enormous, so fundamental, that it no longer needed form.

Every Emblem stilled. Not out of fear.

But because to move in Her gaze was to risk unraveling.

Even Ignarion, who had split mountains with his bare hands, lowered his head.

Kaelya's lips parted slightly, her breath catching like a flower frostbitten mid-bloom.

"She sees," she whispered.

Morven's pendulum didn't swing.

It froze.

Seraphyx stepped forward slowly, the frost at his feet whispering prayers beneath every footfall. He raised his eyes—not in challenge, not in submission, but in acknowledgment.

"Mother," he said softly.