Above the world of mortals, beyond the reach of EarthKeepers and HeavenKeepers alike, lies a realm forged in the breath of creation .. the Duality Realm. Draped in endless skies and drifting clouds of gold and violet, the land floats upon titanic islands of stone, suspended between the winds of destiny and the storms of judgment.
Here, only the most powerful are allowed to tread ..the Duality, and the HeavenKeepers who serve them.
And yet, on this sacred soil, chaos erupted.
A man in flowing white robes, soaked with sweat and streaked with blood, darted across a narrow stone bridge hanging between cloud-bathed cliffs. Behind him, five guards in ornate eastern armor pursued with relentless speed, their spiritual auras lighting the clouds beneath their feet like heavenly lanterns.
"Stop, Ling Xuan!" one of them shouted, his voice rippling through the realm like thunder.
Ling Xuan didn't look back. His long, raven-black hair fluttered behind him, and his breath came harsh and ragged. He clutched a worn, ancient scroll in one hand, a scroll humming with forbidden power. The markings on its casing flickered in and out of visibility, like the whisper of something too ancient to be named.
He had stolen it. He knew the punishment. But he no longer cared. The truth contained within the scroll had burned its way into his soul.
He reached the end of the bridge... a jagged cliff overlooking an endless sea of clouds. The wind howled as if protesting his path.
Trapped.
Before he could react, a presence shimmered into being in front of him. A man stepped from the air itself, dressed in robes darker than night, edged with gold filigree that caught the light of the floating lantern-suns above.
His hair was like obsidian silk, eyes ageless and heavy with the weight of cosmic balance. He, too, appeared young, barely older than Ling Xuan .. but the gravity of his presence was overwhelming. He radiated divine authority, his aura stretching for miles, pressing on all who could feel it.
"Ling Xuan..." the man said, arms folded within his voluminous sleeves. His voice was calm, yet each word struck the soul like a temple bell. "Give me the scroll."
Ling Xuan took a step back, toes nearly over the edge. Pebbles dropped into the clouds below, vanishing into infinity. "Never!" he barked, defiance and despair mixing in his voice.
The other man's gaze didn't waver. "Why do you run?" he asked. "You cannot vanish like the others. Your HeavenKeeper's crest was stripped long ago."
Ling Xuan laughed bitterly. "Then let me fall as a man... not as a slave."
Behind him, the five guards surged forward, their blades drawn and imbued with blinding light. But the black-robed man .. the one whose name was feared even among the HeavenKeepers ....raised a hand. The guards stopped mid-stride.
It was too late.
Ling Xuan turned and leapt from the cliff.
Gasps echoed behind him as his body tumbled downward, the scroll clutched tightly to his chest.
But the dark-robed man was already there, his body materializing mid-air beside the falling rebel.
He reached for the scroll, fingers brushing against the ancient silk. Their hands locked. A silent struggle ensued ... one fighting for redemption, the other for order.
"You don't understand what's in this scroll," Ling Xuan snarled, his voice hoarse. "You never did!"
"I understand too well," the man replied grimly. "That's why it must not fall into mortal hands."
"This needs to be hidden Ling Xuan" he added.
"You all should have thought of that before denying me of my abilities" Ling Xuan replied.
In their brief grapple, the Ling Xuan twisted violently and shoved his attacker away. But his force twisted his own body..his back hit the jagged edge of the cliff.
His head cracked against the coarse stone.
Blood sprayed into the wind.
His eyes widened ..and then dimmed.
He was dead.
The scroll slipped from his fingers, drifting from his limp grasp like a dying leaf on the wind.
"No!" the dark-robed man screamed, diving after it.
But the mist thickened, clouds churned violently, swallowing the scroll whole. No trace. No aura. No glow.
Gone.
He hovered in mid-air, heart pounding, scanning desperately through the clouds with senses honed across millennia. But there was nothing. The scroll had vanished from even his perception.
---
Somewhere far below, in a forgotten land, the world spun quietly within its own cage.
The island was massive, its landscape etched by time and survival. Walled by colossal stone barriers that stretched to the heavens, the inhabitants knew nothing of how they had arrived, nor the true name of the land they now lived upon.
Its soil was fertile but scarred, rich yet wary, as if remembering the pain of a great event long past.
Children played in hidden valleys, fishers cast nets into misty lakes, and old men recited proverbs they no longer understood. Their lives were ordinary. But their pasts had been stolen.
In a quiet garden on the eastern end of the settlement, a boy stood with his face tilted to the sky.
He was seventeen. His name was Lei Wei.
The sun above cast light through breaks in the cloud, illuminating his pale robe and sharp, thoughtful eyes. His hair was tied loosely, his posture relaxed, but his mind wandered often ..... too often, Ren would say.
He felt something that day .... an ache in the air, a shift in the stillness.
And then... something struck his head. Not hard, but solid enough to make him stagger.
He looked down.
An ancient scroll lay at his feet.
Unmarked. Unopened. Undeniably old.
The wind whispered.
The world held its breath.
It fell on a seventeen-year-old boy, Lei Wei.
Of all places in the world, a scroll from the Duality Realm, landed in a forgotten island with people of lost memories.
Of all people in the island, it landed in front of an inquisitive teenager, a boy who believes the island isn't what is left, a boy who wanted to know about this world.
It landed on the head of a seventeen year old, Le Wei.