Chapter 1: The Taste of Memory The blackness of space stretched infinitely, pierced only by the silver glimmer of distant stars. Amid this grand silence, a vessel glided like a blade across silk — a Mēkanon war-cruiser, known in the common tongue as The Palate-Seeker. Its hull shimmered with ever-shifting metallic hues, coded not for…
Chapter 1: Echoes in the Core The air inside AEON’s maintenance corridors was always the same: clean, sterile, and whisper-quiet.Cael Dray walked briskly down the tunnel of brushed titanium walls, his steps echoing faintly despite the anti-resonance flooring. A cluster of microdrones hummed silently above him, tracing lines of light across the ceiling as they…
Chapter 1: Introduction Puerto Bruma existed under a near-permanent baptism of salt fog. It wasn’t the clean, transient mist of cooler climes; this fog felt ancient, heavy, almost greasy, carrying the composite scent of brine, decaying kelp beds exposed at low tide, wet stone, woodsmoke from perpetually damp chimneys, and something else, something metallic and…
Chapter 1: “The Broken Bridge” Dawn in Pueblo Viejo The sun rose lazily over Pueblo Viejo, dragging its first rays through the dirt streets like a beggar searching for lost coins. Valentina Rojas had already been awake for two hours, sitting in her wicker rocking chair, staring at the faded photograph clutched between her bony…
Chapter 1: The Day She Wasn’t There Elías woke up with the unsettling feeling that something was wrong, though he couldn’t quite name it at first. The sun poured violently through the torn curtains of the window, bathing the room in a glow that felt artificial. The silence was heavier than usual. Not the kind…
The Silent Echoes of Time The hum was almost imperceptible, a high-frequency vibration that filtered through the walls of Chronos Station, a constant reminder of the delicate dance of temporal dilation fields that kept the present safe from the intrusions of the past and the premonitions of the future. For Anya Volkov, however, this hum…
Chapter 1: The Tremor in the Weavings The air in Villa Esperanza shimmered, not with the heat of the sun, but with the visible currents of time. To the untrained eye, it might have seemed like a heat haze dancing above the cobblestone streets and the terracotta rooftops. But for those who lived in the…
The Signal The galaxy was a graveyard of forgotten dreams. Planets once teeming with life now lay silent, their names erased from star charts, their stories buried under the weight of time. These were the Echoes, worlds abandoned by humanity as it surged forward, always seeking the next frontier. Among them, Nyx-7 was a ghost—a…
Chapter 1: The Visitor from the Stars The warm Miami air felt different from the cool breeze Matthew had grown up with in Cali. The city was loud, bustling, and filled with new faces. Yet, in his small bedroom, everything felt eerily quiet. He missed his old home, his school, and most of all, his…
Chapter 1: Letters from a Lost Navigator The port of Kaldenport never slept. Torches illuminated the docks with their orange glow, casting elongated shadows over the anchored ships and cobbled streets. The shouts of merchants mixed with the scent of salt and fish, and the clinking of coins echoed in every tavern. Kaelen Windmere pushed…