The Fatebound Monarch

"Did you sleep well, Anna?" Yabin Noctvelle questioned with a playful smile stretched across her lips.

Hearing her question, Anna turned her head away in embarrassment as she remembered what had happened when the saintess had sent her familiar to her.

"Y-yes, I did."

Yabin nodded at her answer and opened her lips to speak; her face turned less playful as it was time to begin the lecture. It was time to learn the runes.

Anieal looked at her with serious eyes, waiting for her next words… the runes interested her quite a lot after all. She, however, had not expected the next question.

Yabin's voice echoed within the empty chamber as she questioned.

"Where do you think the runes come from?"

Anna frowned at the question and thought of an answer.

'Did we not learn it by ourselves?'

Still frowning, she looked at the night seer and shook her head.

Yabin smiled and began to pace the empty chamber as she answered.

"The runes… we learned about them from the banishead realm."

"The banished realm?" Anna asked with wide eyes.

Yabin gave her a slight nod and continued.

"The people of the past era had entered the rift to search for not just power but also knowledge, and their hunger led to us humans obtaining the knowledge of 'Rune Scribing'. Without them daring to tread the unknown, we would not have what we consider the known."

The words resounded in Anna's mind as if she had recited a holy verse.

'Without treading the unknown, we would have no known.' Anna repeated in her mind as a question was born.

"Why would they do that?" she questioned. Even if they had hunger for power or knowledge, their actions still seemed forced, considering how much the runes were developed within the current era, even though we had already lost most of the knowledge of the past era.

Yabin smiled at her question and asked her own.

"Why do you think we called ourselves Midnighters?"

Anna frowned at the question… it was common knowledge after all.

"Because we can only use our full power at midnight?"

Yabin shook her head and answered, her face turning serious as she spoke.

"No… we called ourselves Midnighter because star essence only flows at the fixed six hours, and those hours align with the midnight of us humans. The moon is present all the time after all, if it is day at some part of the world, the opposite part would have night… and what about the parts which have nights as long as months?"

Anna's frown deepened the more she heard… scientifically, the words said by the saintess of the tower of night were correct; however, they were talking about fantastical forces, and they do not have to be scientific.

Seeing her frown, the saintess continued.

"We were not always called midnigthers… at one point, we were called awakeneds… the flow of star essence was ever present and… we could use our full power all the time, but… the curse of the dream rifts spread to our world like wildfire and to save ourselves from becoming the feed of banished realm… the awakeneds of the past decided to hide our world from the banished realm, they covered our world in a fog that protects us but at the same time it limits us from reaching above assimilation with usual methods."

"Our shield became our chain, but we can not break those chains as we are haunted by a curse which needs a shield."

Anna's expression turned dark as she contemplated the things she had heard from the saintess.

'Our shield became our chain…' Anna repeated in her mind as those words aligned with her own life… her trait was her shield, her weapon, but it was also a curse, a chain binding her to something unknown, but now she knew that to know one must tread the unknown.

Seeing the thoughtful look on Anna's face, Yabin's eyes glinted with something cracfty as if she had achieved what she wanted all along.

'I will make sure you do not flatter in your path, Anna.' Her eyes turned near obsessive at the end. The obsession, however, was not towards Anna but something else… something much profound.

The night seer clapped her hands, and the sound of it echoed within the empty room like thunderstrike. Anna came out of her thoughts by that sound and looked at Yabin, waiting for her to continue.

"As the curse of dream rifts spread, the more awakeneds began to venture into them and in doing so they fulfilled their hunger for power and knowledge… it all began from survival until it became a necessity and at last we had to reach out to the fog."

Anna nodded… she finally got answers to the questions plaguing her. The people or awakeneds of the past didn't venture to the banished realm to become powerful or to gain knowledge… no, they went there because entering a rift closes it… blocking it from spreading corruption to the world, and because there were just too many of them… runes and other knowledge began to advance by itself.

When they finally found a way to stop or at least decrease the dream rifts spawning across the world, they chose to chain themselves… survival led them to chain themselves, and now midnigthers wear those chains as some kind of jewellery by calling themselves blessed while they are actually cursed.

A heavy sigh left her lips as those heavy thoughts filled her mind… She had come to learn about the runes, but she had found out about something much deeper, something that would change her very perception of the world.

"I did think I would be telling you all of this today…" Yabin spoke with a bittersweet smile.

Anna smiled and replied.

"It is fine, master… I had to know that one day or another."

Yabin smiled at her as she lifted her open palm, and black flame began to cover it. Soon, a jade bow filled with night sky liquid appeared in her hand.

"Let us begin the lecture then."