Arcana Wars — Volume I

  A Requiem of the Sacred Stone

  Recorded by

  Silvano Selune, within the Iron Cells of Rhapsodia

  "There are wars remembered for their victories—

  and wars remembered for what they awakened."

  They say the history of Aria is written in blood.

  I have learned it is written in silence—

  the silence between heartbeats, the silence of a vow unbroken,

  and the silence of a dawn that refuses to rise.

  I was born a Prince of the Sun.

  Tonight, I write as a student of shadow.

  They have taken my crown, my city, and the warmth of my mother’s hand.

  But they cannot take the song.

  Before the world fractured into war, it began with a single lonely note—

  in a quiet town named Crotchet.

  There was a boy.

  A mercenary with a weary sword and a heavier heart,

  carrying a blue ribbon and a name he did not yet know was prophecy—

  Themis.

  He believed himself a wanderer, a blade for hire.

  Yet the Moon had watched him long before he learned to look back.

  He was the first thread.

  Then came the others—

  not companions, but instruments of a gathering symphony.

  Seraphina, whose faith carried the breath of wind itself.

  Lyria, the lioness who guarded him long before she named him Captain.

  Orion, forged in regret, reborn in purpose.

  Isolde, who taught us that truth often arrives as a quiet tear.

  From the golden balconies of Melodia, I watched them rise—

  five strangers daring to stand against the choking breath of Miasma,

  the echo of a god that wished us forgotten.

  I watched spirits awaken—

  the Eagle, the Phoenix, the Lioness, and the Serpent—

  not as legends returned, but as promises remembered.

  Yet every song carries its discord.

  The greatest tragedy was not the fall of my mother’s throne,

  nor the branding of my own flesh.

  It was the shattering of the Oathbark Promise.

  Heathcliff—the brother of their hearts—

  became the blade that cut the world in two.

  The Sacred Stone lies broken now.

  Its shards scattered.

  The Moon Arcanian sleeps in exhaustion.

  And I write these words behind iron walls.

  Still—listen.

  Volume I was only the Awakening.

  The instruments have met.

  The players have found their rhythm.

  These names, these wounds, these promises—

  I set them to ink not so they may be remembered, but so they may be carried.

  No journey survives on the strength of its heroes alone.

  And though the stage is drowned in shadow,

  the first chord of resistance has already been struck.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  The Twelve Towers await—not to grant power, but to ask what remains when power is taken.

  I have seen armies march.

  I have watched Sunsteel banners rise and Rhapsodian iron grind forward without mercy.

  Yet I had never seen a soul reach for another—

  until the night the voids began to bleed into Melodia’s heart.

  We were islands then, drifting alone in terror.

  The darkness whispered that my mother was lost,

  that my sister was gone,

  that the desert would erase my name.

  A prince—reduced to a trembling flame.

  Then the Moon rose.

  Not a light that burned the eyes—

  but one that quieted the blood.

  Themis stood wrapped in silver, crowned by Luna’s celestial form,

  the stars themselves caught in his silhouette.

  And then—

  the Moonlink awakened.

  I felt it first as warmth against my ribs—

  a thread thin as spider-silk yet stronger than iron.

  Through it, I felt my sister’s resolve.

  Lyria’s unyielding anchor.

  Orion’s azure fire.

  Isolde’s cleansing tide.

  Themis did not command us.

  He held us.

  Not a general above his soldiers—

  but a bridge binding scattered hearts into a single pulse.

  In that glow, fear did not vanish.

  It simply lost the power to rule.

  I remember thinking:

  So this is what a king is meant to be—

  not a throne above, but a bond beneath.

  They believe the stolen shards have severed that connection.

  They are mistaken.

  Stone may shatter.

  Relics may fall.

  But the thread woven between souls cannot be stolen.

  Even here, in the damp silence of captivity,

  I still feel it—faint, strained, yet alive.

  Themis is coming.

  And he brings the Moon with him.

  There is one truth I must record before the guards return.

  Heathcliff.

  I remember him as the quiet shield beside Themis—

  steady, grounded, a man who understood life because he once lost everything.

  Now they name him Prince of Rhapsodia.

  Vessel of Shade.

  Architect of ruin.

  But I saw his hand tremble.

  In the final moment before the voids shattered reality,

  I saw gold flicker in his eyes—

  the color of summer fields.

  I saw the fraying threads of a blue-and-silver bracelet on his wrist—

  small, ordinary, painfully human.

  So I write not to the Shadow’s vessel—

  but to the boy beneath the Oathbark Tree.

  Heathcliff—

  if you hear this through the static of darkness:

  Do not release the thread.

  Themis does not come to end you.

  He comes to bring you home.

  We are still holding the other end.

  The torches fade.

  Iron doors close.

  Night settles.

  Yet I am not afraid.

  Somewhere, my sister wakes.

  Somewhere, our little brother rises.

  Somewhere, twelve towers wait to be lit.

  Volume I ended in shadow.

  But the moon wanes only so it may be reborn.

  Farewell—for now—to those who listen.

  We will meet again

  at the foot of the first tower.