The air in the vaulted chamber hung heavy with the scent of smoldering incense and aged straws. Sunlight filtered through the gaps with drawings depicting the Five Sacred Sigils—twin serpents coiled around a mountain, a crown of roots, and a star-strewn void—casting fractured emerald and gold light across the stained soil. The Aelvarian's throne, carved from the petrified trunk of the First Tree, loomed like a skeletal hand, its gnarled roots snaking into cracks in the floor.
He was no mere ruler—he was a relic. His once-gilded armor, now dulled and pitted, clung to a frame gaunt from decades of war. Silver hair, streaked with ash, fell to his shoulders, and his eyes burned like molten iron. When he slammed his fist on the throne's arm, sigils etched into the wood flared crimson, pulsing in time with his ragged breaths.
