It was a gaunt and pale face, tinged with yellow, its skin wrinkled and sagging; the only bright thing in that image—if one could even call it bright—were the eyes.They were covered by a milky-white film, and in their stillness and apparent death, they seemed to hide unspeakable and terrifying things.

This was what stood before me: my reflection in a mirror of Amar.

A grin spread across the entity that stood before me, its mouth pulled taut as if by iron threads, slowly revealing rotten teeth and others plated in gold.

You may wonder who I am, oh spectators of the mirror. I would answer you with a name, but I no longer have one.My dead body does not deserve a name. Once, I had one, and with it many titles and epithets, but now I am something else, and a name no longer serves me.

I am here in the tallest tower the world has ever seen, built by my will and the will of my former colleagues. The Tower of Astubar, situated at the beating heart of this world—and it was so because it was my tower. But setting aside my past achievements and the milestones of my long life, let us return to the present.

Gray and ominous, the ancient white tower loomed over the world. The white marble and gleaming metals had vanished from its surface, leaving only sand and decay to accompany this divine finger rising above the cemetery of cities and towers at its feet.But if you observe more closely, my dark observers—silent and hidden though you are—I am certain that someone beyond this mirror listens to me. You may see beings moving among the rubble and debris of what was once called Virigon.They are my servants and slaves, always them. Those who obeyed my orders in life continue to do so even in death. They are my army, my experiments, and my family.

I imagine you are curious to know how all this came to pass; and I must say, it is a rather amusing story, at least to me now.

Once, in a time both near and distant, I was Astubar. Not to boast, but I was the greatest archmage, the president of the Global Association of Magic and Research. Even the other four archmages were incomparable to me in knowledge and power. There was no being in the world superior to me. So, naturally, after taming a world, what was left for me? The stars and the infinite void, of course.

Projects and experiments, decades of time, and endless resources and lives led us to the creation of the Vilitrium.It was a kind of ship and space station, designed to allow us to leave the atmosphere of this world and open the possibility of exploring the secrets hidden by the dark celestial vault.

Finally, the seventh-generation Vilitrium seemed free of flaws and capable of fulfilling its role as a research institute, a spacecraft, and a base to sustain life within it indefinitely. Requirements that may seem simple and basic, but in practice, they were anything but.

It had the shape of a massive pyramid, covered in heavy gold infused with the dust of precious stones, capable of insulating mana, temperature, and other possible interferences.

Amid the beautiful, shimmering gold plates were components of cold, dark black steel, providing the main structure of the Vilitrium—the lightest and strongest steel in the world, refined and tempered through processes that required the study of the greatest minds on the planet. But these are only small details of our most ambitious creation. The cost in lives and materials was immeasurable, but progress demanded it.

Finally, the opportune moment arrived. Everything was complete, and all tests were successful. All that remained was to see my son soar into the sky and tear through the stars.

The night before the test, I organized a feast in my beloved tower. For one evening, we abandoned ourselves to intoxicating and joyous human emotions. For one night, we were no longer cold and rational beings; we were like children reveling in their new toy, from myself and my four peers to the grand mages and the golden cloaks.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

The following morning, Druston the archmage was designated to lead the test aboard the Vilitrium. Alongside him, other members of the project boarded—several grand mages and countless golden cloaks.

Meanwhile, I and the other archmages stood atop my namesake tower, observing the operation unfold.The Vilitrium7, fighting against gravity, rose from the desert, lifting sand and rocks into the wind. Its six brothers, skeletons of steel and gold, lay abandoned in the sand, silent witnesses to how far we had come. From above, I watched it move further and further away until I had to tilt my head back to see it, as if in a sacred ritual, a prayer to a god, where one kneels and raises their eyes to the sky, awaiting a divine miracle.

The miracle was accomplished.

My creation had left the atmosphere and entered the infinite.

But what I deemed a miracle was nothing compared to a true one.

The Vilitrium began to glow.

In our joy, we hardly noticed—indeed, it seemed as though the stars themselves were celebrating with us. Perhaps they were, but we were not ready to dance with them.

I watched it grow brighter and brighter. The sun seemed to have extinguished, and night had fallen upon the world. Only the increasingly intense, silvery light of the Vilitrium was imprinted in my eyes.The stars of deep space grew closer, slowly filling the sky.

Then I saw it. I felt it. It called to me and pulled me.

It was a silver eye, with my son at its center as the pupil, and the stars slowly occupying everything.

There was no more darkness or void, only light and fullness.For a moment, I felt fear, but then a blissful lightness overwhelmed me.

It watched me, and I watched it. With every eternal second, I felt as though I were expanding, rising into the sky like a giant of clouds. My mind absorbed and fed, growing and flying ever higher.

Then came a sharp pain, a tearing. I could no longer continue to grow and consume. But it fed me forcibly. I could not stop it, and my mind could not contain it all.

Just as quickly as I reached the sky, I was cast back into the dust. My body was no longer my body. I no longer felt it—or rather, I felt everything too much. Voices were everywhere, in my head and in the world. Screams and whispers, secrets and pain, near and far—all were mixed, and my senses overwhelmed. I was full, bursting.

Then, in that growing chaos, I heard it. It was a whisper of silence, a vision of nothing, a sound of absence.

How I loved it from the first instant. In that stormy sea, it was my salvation, my refuge. I listened to its non-words and watched as the darkness slowly swallowed the stars once more. Thus, I wrapped myself in its black cloak, which protects from all things. Silence made its way into me, and with it came the name of my savior.It was the Blind Ignorant, the Black Herald.

Suddenly, I found myself immersed in the abyss, at the farthest point I had wished to reach. And comically—oh yes, it is truly amusing—my salvation was ignorance. I, who swore to seek and uncover secrets and truths, found myself wrapped in the black cloak, nearly annihilated by the very thing I had tried with all my means to grasp.

Such knowledge is not meant for human minds. I learned of its existence in the madness and chaos that had filled my mind. It was the Silver Herald, the one who sees and knows all, the bearer of knowledge and madness, the Eternal Eye.

Well, my tragedy and comedy have concluded. Now I am here in this world, atop the tower that bears my old name, for I am now a child of ignorance.

I have no name because I am not. I have forgotten the truth so completely that I no longer know death, and so it no longer knows me. Here, I command the corpses of my old friends, who once dreamed of the stars with me. Here, I order them and lead them to spread the black cloak of my lord across the world and all lands. For the only salvation is the death that is not known, and ignorance will bring the purest joy.

May life rejoice at your arrival, for you will envelop them in your empty cloak.

You who wither the stars and reach all.You are salvation because you free us from the world that chains us.

Black Herald, Babbler of Ignorance, you are the void that welcomes us. And those who fear and hate you will love you even more, for when they grasp your tattered cloak, they will never let go.