Epilogue
In the earliest age, when the First People walked in harmony with the land, their voices were woven into the wind, and their magic rose from the pulse beneath their feet.
Forests bent to their song, rivers shifted at their touch, and the spirits of root and stone answered them freely.
The world knew no grief, and thus no shadow.
Until the first death.
The ancient songs do not speak his name. They call him only the Beloved, for he was cherished by all who knew him. His passing shattered the innocence of the First Age, and mourning , fierce, raw, untampered, entered the world for the first time.
His love wept for him; her grief was not the quiet sorrow of later ages. It was a cry so powerful it cracked the stillness of creation. Her tears fell upon the earth, and the land, unaccustomed to such anguish, twisted beneath the force of it.
From that wound in the soil, something rose.
A being shaped not by birth, but by loss. Not by love, but by the hollow echo left behind.
The elves named him Aelthrys, The First Hunger. The God of Avarice. The Hollow Sovereign beneath the roots of the world.
He was beautiful in the way storms are beautiful: vast, terrible, almost impossible to run from. His eyes held the reflection of the Beloved’s memory, and his voice carried the echo of his song. But he was empty.
Aelthrys hungered not for food nor dominion, but for the impossible — to fill the void left by the first loss. He devoured forests to feel rooted. He swallowed rivers to feel whole. He consumed the light to feel warmth.
Yet nothing eased the ache.
And so, his hunger grew.
The First People rose against him, binding their magic with blood and sacrifice. They imprisoned the Old God beneath the roots of the world, sealing him in darkness where no light could reach him.
But the seal was made in haste, it was never meant to last forever.
A bearer of the bloodline shall stand before the Old God. The sword will strike the ancient one down, or the world shall suffer beneath the First Hunger. All fates rest in the fire’s choice.
A hooded figure stood in the shadows of a forgotten chamber, the tome open beneath a single guttering candle. The flame cast long, trembling lines across the page, illuminating the prophecy as though the words themselves breathed.
The figure read it once. Then again. Then a third time, slower, as if tasting each syllable.
A low sound escaped them — not quite a laugh, not quite a snarl. Something bitter. Something knowing.
Their gloved hand drifted to the dagger at their belt.
The candle flickered.
And with a sudden, violent motion, the blade slammed down through the tome, punching through parchment and leather with a crack that echoed off the stone walls. The pages tore beneath the force; the ancient script split as the dagger quivered in place.
The hooded figure leaned over the ruined tome, his face distorted and hidden by the shadows casted by the light and blew out the candle.
The prophecy was not broken, yet.
But the world soon would be.
He would bring order to the chaos.