The simulated night had finally settled over Ashen Prime.
Ethan stood barefoot on the smooth carpeted floor of his suite, slowly undoing the reinforced clasps of his jacket. The city glowed faintly below the dome, its lights scattered like constellations across the vertical tiers and transit lines. It was quiet now, at least from this high up, where even the sound of people seemed to fade into silence.
He peeled off the last layers of his gear, folding the neatly tailored clothing with practiced care and setting it on a nearby chair. The outfit was part of a large wardrobe he'd picked up from the ultra-mall in Valeris City before leaving Kynara. Functional, apparently stylish, and built for durability in mixed environments. The fabric still held a faint scent of desert air and fresh synth-thread, untouched by the grime of travel. He reached for the dark sleepwear provided by the suite's automated closet and slipped it on, exhaling as the smart-fiber material adjusted instantly to his body temperature and posture.
The tension of the day was beginning to ease from his body. Not gone, never entirely gone, but softer now.
Some of the tension slipping from his body wasn't just from the comfort of the room. It was the slow release of strain built up during the journey. Piloting a starship for the first time, even with Iris guiding him, had demanded focus and discipline he hadn't realized he was holding onto. The thrill had masked it all this time, but now, alone and still in somewhere other than his ship, the fatigue crept in like gravity finally catching up.
He moved to the middle of the room, lowered himself onto the padded meditation mat near the wall, and exhaled.
Meditation had become a ritual ever since he bonded with the Astral Slayer.
At first, it had been a way to cope with the pressure, a tool to calm his mind after missions. But ever since that moment in the Kynaran desert, when he'd found the dagger buried in forgotten ruins, guided there by a cryptic old man who disappeared as mysteriously as he arrived...something had shifted.
The blade had changed him.
Or maybe it had just unlocked something that had always been there.
He closed his eyes.
Slowed his breathing.
Focused inward.
The air in the suite was still, only disturbed by the faint thrum of the climate system and the occasional blink of soft light across the wall interface.
But in his mind, the energy stirred.
It started as a flicker, like the echo of static at the edge of consciousness. Then it deepened into a pulse, slow and rhythmic, resonating with something deep within his chest. It wasn't painful. It wasn't overwhelming. It was… connected. A familiar vibration he felt not just with his body, but with whatever his mind had become since arriving in this new universe.
Then came the presence.
It always came.
A blurry figure, shrouded in dream-smoke and memory haze, began to form behind the veil of his eyelids. Not fully shaped. Not fully there. Like a silhouette made from fog and old starlight. He could never quite make out their features. only their aura, which pulsed with something ancient, something powerful.
Something that knew him.
It rarely spoke and when it did, the words came as incoherent echoes, fragmented and distant, like whispers filtered through layers of static and time. It never moved closer, never fully took shape. But it always appeared when he merged his own psychic energy with the residual imprint of the Astral Slayer...even when the blade wasn't physically near. Even now, locked away in the small secure vault aboard the Obsidian Wraith, he could still feel it. A subtle hum in his aura. A presence that lingered, just beneath the surface of his thoughts.
The Slayer's energy clung to him, like an echo etched into his soul.
He inhaled through his nose and opened his eyes.
The room was still the same.
Elegant. Warm. Artificial.
But his skin still tingled faintly with residual energy as if the blade had passed through him again, whispering truths in a language he didn't yet know how to hear.
He stood slowly and walked to the window.
What was this blade, really?
Its molecular structure had registered as a hybrid composite. Some parts Federation could classify, others... unknown. The symbols etched into its surface resisted translation. No language database recognized them. Not Iris. Not the Guild's archives. Not even the private data feeds he'd paid to access under encrypted channels.
And that figure...that woman, if he dared to believe the shape was real, always hovered at the edge of clarity.
Could she be the traitor from the Astral Race mentioned in the fragmented whispers? The one who, according to unverified lore from the mysterious old man, had betrayed her own kind to liberate the subjugated races during some ancient galactic upheaval long before the Federation even existed?
Could the dagger have once belonged to her?
Was it calling to him because she had chosen him… or because it had simply waited long enough?
His thoughts spiraled outward.
Was I meant to come here?
To awaken this power inside me? To find that blade buried in forgotten ruins halfway across a galaxy that doesn't even know what Earth is?
He didn't know.
Not yet.
But he knew that understanding the Astral Slayer, unlocking its secrets, was also the key to understanding himself. His psychic abilities, though undeniably real, were still instinctive. Raw. Unrefined potential waiting to be shaped. So far, they allowed him to moderately enhance his strength, stamina, speed, and reflexes, but nothing close to what he glimpsed during that final clash with Drakor Krenna.
Back then, it wasn't training or technique that saved him. It had been will, and something deeper. The Slayer had drawn on more than just his own reserves. It had tapped into the ambient psychic energy of the planet itself, the collective essence of Kynara and its people, channeling it through him in a surge of power that let him transcend the monstrous, celestial-like form that Krenna had become. For one fleeting moment, he had wielded something greater and it had changed everything.
That wouldn't be enough forever.
If he wanted to survive whatever was coming… he needed more.
He needed training and control.
And control would also come with knowledge.
He'd already begun forming a mental list of possibilities:
A rogue researcher working outside the Federation's information filters, buried in a hidden base in some remote moon with data caches no one was meant to access.
An independent scholar, the kind who traded in half-buried truths and forbidden histories. Someone who cared more about knowledge than protocol.
Or perhaps a black-market historian, the elusive type Iris had once referenced in passing. Operatives who drifted along the edge of legality, sometimes tied to the Memory Markets of the distant Arctov Sector, where ancient relics and erased truths were bought and sold like rare gemstones.
Anything that could decode those symbols.
Anything that could give him a name for the presence that appeared each time he closed his eyes.
His breath fogged the window slightly as he exhaled.
Ashen Prime's simulated sky was at full night mode now. The dome overhead displayed a sprawling starfield, carefully rendered to resemble real constellations visible from Federation Core Galactic Sectors. But not Earth. Never Earth. Those constellations didn't exist here.
Below, a few aerial drones zipped quietly across the horizon, blinking blue and white as they swept the sky for traffic irregularities.
Ethan leaned against the frame, arms folded loosely, shirt half-unzipped from where he'd left it after meditating.
It was beautiful.
And artificial.
Like everything here.
Tomorrow, he'd temporarily return to the game of power and precision. Back into the political ring, where Krell waited with his calm demeanor and well-structured plans.
But for now?
Now, he was just a man in a quiet room… staring out at a sky that wasn't real…
…while thinking about a weapon that might be older than most of the galaxy's nations.
And wondering why it had chosen him.