In the city of Ragunna, the Order of the Deep stands as the supreme religious and political authority, claiming to speak as the earthly voice of the Sentinel Imperator.
Founded on the tenets of Salvation, Ascension, and Unity, the Order oversees every aspect of the city—from governance and law to the regulation of Echoes, a mystical resource tightly controlled through a centralized system.
Access to Echoes is granted only through their sanction, reinforcing the Order's grip on power. Those who defy their doctrine are exiled aboard the Pilgrim's Sail.
At its helm is Primus Fenrico, ruler of Ragunna for over two decades. Once a humble seminarian, he made a bold and unprecedented claim: that he is the Imperator's Appointed Resonator. He now calls himself the "Enlightened One."
Under his rule, doctrine has become increasingly rigid. Cultural traditions like the Carnevale have been outlawed, and the once-sacred Pilgrim's Sail has been repurposed as punishment for dissent.
Though he preaches unity, his methods—steeped in fear and control—have bred silence, suspicion, and unease.
The Pilgrim's Sail, once a rite of holy devotion, now serves as a vessel of exile. Promised to lead the faithful to divine grace, it instead abandons them on Penitent's End—a blighted island cursed by the Dark Tide and guarded by the Dragon of Dirge.
Few return. Those who do form the Troupe of Fools, a quiet rebellion aiming to expose the Order's lies. Now called the "Fool's Sail," the journey has come to symbolize the Order's descent into tyranny.
And now, another voyage was near.
Chained and flanked by Acolytes of the Order, Lian walked through the streets of Ragunna.
Many watched—some with curiosity, some with pity, others with empty stares.
Despite the stares, Lian walked calmly, unbothered. Still, he disliked being paraded in chains like some public spectacle.
"Acolyte Phoebe," he called calmly.
"Yes, Mr. Da?" Phoebe replied, glancing sideways at him.
Lian raised his manacled hands, the soft clatter of metal echoed with his gesture, "Is it necessary that I be displayed like this?"
"That's—" Phoebe opened her mouth to answer, but another voice cut in sharply: "This is to enforce Order."
There was contempt in the speaker's voice.
Lian turned his gaze to the male Acolyte who had spoken. "You mentioned this was enforced by the current Primus, correct?"
The male Acolyte nodded. "It is the Enlightened One's wisdom," he said, spreading his hands in reverence.
Phoebe frowned slightly at the display but said nothing. Lian, however, spoke without hesitation. "What a tyrant."
"—!!?"
A wave of shock rippled across the Acolytes.
"Y-You… What did you just say?" the man stammered.
Lian stepped closer, causing the Acolyte instinctively backed away, unsettled by the intensity in Lian's eyes.
Leaning in, Lian whispered coldly into the Acolyte's ear: "Your Primus isn't worthy to be a footrest."
Gasps rippled. One Acolyte stepped forward, outrage twisting her face. "How dare you reduce the sacred seat of the Enlightened One to—"
Her words faltered, caught in her throat as Lian turned his gaze on her—no, on all of them.
His eyes swept across each Acolyte, including Phoebe, with chilling detachment. It wasn't just defiance—it was disdain. Like a lotus that had sprouted thorns.
In Lian's eyes, the Order and its member had been reduced to the lowest of the lowest. These so-called servants sat on thrones and demanded obedience.
'Servants,' he thought with quiet disdain. 'Then why the thrones?'
'I've seen enough to understand what the Order truly is,' Lian thought as he looked toward a towering structure in the distance.
"Mr. Da…" Phoebe began, sensing the quiet dissatisfaction behind Lian's unreadable expression.
But he simply raised a hand, cutting her off. "No need to explain."
The impression had already set deep in his mind about the Order and its Primus.
He then considered the so-called divine power the Order claimed to serve, and his verdict: 'This so called Sentinel by the name Imperator... is a Failure.'
***
The Hall of the Order was nothing short of grandiose. Echo-infused trumpets played a soundless fanfare—heard not with the ears, but with the soul.
Beneath the vaulted ceiling and the silent scrutiny of the Enlightened Jury, a single lotus stood alone—serene, composed, and unshaken by the presence of Acolytes, Resonators, and the overwhelming number of Guard Echoes.
At the head of it all stood the Primus.
Primus Fenrico carried himself with cold elegance. Tall and slender, his slick white hair and pale blue eyes gave him an otherworldly presence. A golden-yellow mask covered the left side of his face—flawlessly sculpted and eerily lifeless.
He wore a flowing white cloak with a high golden collar, fastened by a dark cord patterned with sacred symbols.
A navy-blue cape hung from his shoulders, etched in gold. Behind his head floated a metallic halo, still and radiant, like a symbol of divinity carved from artifice.
Every piece of him, from clothing to gesture, was a statement: divine authority made flesh. But to those who looked too long, the beauty curdled into something colder—an imitation of light cast by something far darker.
"Da Lian," Fenrico's voice echoed through the hall, calm yet thunderous. "Do you plead guilty?"
Lian didn't respond immediately. He simply thought, 'Seems I was right after all.'
Confirming his suspicions, he did not kept the jury waiting. "Yes," he finally answered.
Fenrico continued, "Then by the Order and the mercy of—"
But Lian cut in. "And you? Do you plead guilty?"
A stunned silence fell.
"Watch your tongue!" barked a Resonator.
Fenrico raised a hand to silence the room. "On what grounds would you brand me a Fool?"
Lian raised his chained hands. "This," he said. "Dragged through the streets like a trophy. My dignity trampled under your mercy."
"You fool," another Resonator snapped. "Be grateful we didn't drag you in like a dog."
Lian's gaze swept over them, then returned to Fenrico. His voice rang clear: "How many redemption-seekers have you humiliated like this? How many more must be broken to keep your illusion of Order?"
"Enough," growled an Acolyte. "Guards, take him to the cells!"
Echo-bound guards approached. They placed their hands on Lian, but he didn't resist. Instead, he said calmly, "I will not move until I receive an answer."
Some scoffed. Others smirked. But a moment later, Phoebe gasped.
The guards strained. The Echoes surged. But Lian did not move—rooted, still, immovable.
Like a lotus defying the tide.
"Tch," Lenore, the earlier Acolyte, snapped. "Two isn't enough? Send ten!"
Eight more came. They pulled with all their might—yet not even a strand of Lian's hair shifted.
"Answer," he repeated, causing the Resonance itself to flinch.
Fenrico finally spoke. "Many have sinned."
Lian's eyes narrowed. "What about you?"
"I am the Enlightened One," Fenrico replied, emotionless.
Lian turned, his eyes carrying no hint of satisfaction by Fenrico's answer.
"Escort me," he said, allowing the guards to move him.
As Fenrico turned away, Lian spoke once more—loud enough to echo through the grand hall: "You're useless, Primus Fenrico. Perhaps age has dulled your mind—so much you can't even recognize your own sins."
The grand doors shut with a resonant thud as Lian was escorted out. For a long moment, silence gripped the hall—not reverent, but stunned.
Acolyte Lenore was the first to break it.
"The nerve… calling the Enlightened One useless? That heretic deserves worse than the Sail."
He spat the words, but they rang hollow—more bark than certainty.
One of the younger Resonators, standing at the edge of the platform, shifted uncomfortably.
"He didn't flinch," he muttered, almost to himself. "Even the Echoes couldn't move him at first…"
Another Acolyte snapped, "That was a trick—Echoes can falter against blasphemy. His soul was probably tainted."
But doubt was a virus, and it had found its way in.
Across the dais, Phoebe remained silent, her hands folded into a prayer, her expression neutral—but her mind was storming.
"You can't even remember your own sins."
The words echoed like a curse. She glanced sideways at Fenrico, and for the first time, noticed how still he stood—his lips pursed, his eyes narrowed, as if chewing on something bitter he couldn't spit out.
No denial. No rage. No rebuttal.
Just silence.
And silence, in the Hall of the Order where trumpets of mercy played, was ominous.
***
Shatter.
Fenrico stood before a tall, fractured mirror—its web of cracks slicing across his reflection like veins of quiet ruin.
One hand rested on the edge of the altar beside him, the other limp at his side. The golden-yellow mask on his face caught the low lamplight, glinting like a false sun.
His uncovered eye twitched.
"Useless," he murmured, tasting the word like ash. "A lotus with thorns dares to speak so boldly…"
His fingers tightened around the altar's edge until his knuckles drained of color. For a moment, his composed frame vibrated with restrained fury. "How dare… him."
A beat of silence. He breathed once. Then again. Slowly. His voice returned, smooth as ever, but lower. Tighter. "Double the guard on his cell. No visitors. No conversation. Silence the chatter in the halls—no more talk of this incident."
"Yes Primus."
Fenrico gazed into the shattered mirror. His reflections stared back—splintered and uneven.
For all his preaching of unity, there was none here. No singular soul. Only fragments. Each one a piece of what he once was—or what he had chosen to become.
***
Somewhere deep within the Order's sanctum lay the Acolyte Dormitory—where aspiring disciples studied, preached, and recited doctrine in perfect chorus.
All but one.
Phoebe sat alone, the silence of the chamber heavy as stone. Her fingers absently traced the edge of a folded slip of parchment tucked into her sleeve—a single page of scripture.
Lian had only glanced at it once, but his words still echoed: "You might want to read this part carefully."
She unfolded it. And before her lay his answer: 'No servant who seeks a throne is free of the burden of pride.'
Phoebe's heart quickened as she realized what had made Lian so scornful—the Order's hunger for power replacing the guidance it once promised.
Phoebe stared at the line for a long moment.
Then, with a sudden resolve, she crumpled the paper and held it over a flickering candle flame. The edges curled and blackened as the scripture burned.
Her hands clasped—not in prayer for the people, but for one soul alone: "May the Sentinel be merciful upon Mr. Da Lian."
***
The following day, Lian was escorted to a sea shore at the edge of Ragunna where the sea murmured in grey stillness, its waves too soft for the weight that hung in the air.
A crowd had gathered on the stone promenade by the shore—acolytes in white, robed officials of the Order, and common citizens drawn by curiosity, fear, or silent dissent.
Primus Fenrico stood at the edge of the platform, his presence commanding even without motion. Sunlight caught the golden-yellow half-mask on his face, casting a blinding sheen. His cloak trailed like a monarch's banner in the sea breeze.
He raised his hand. Silence followed.
"Citizens of Ragunna," Fenrico began, voice smooth and sharp like a blade sheathed in velvet. "The Order of the Deep stands not for cruelty, but for balance. Not for vengeance, but for justice."
Lian stood shackled just beyond the platform, guarded by Echoes. His gaze drifted over the crowd—blank faces, some afraid, some enthralled. And then, his eyes settled on Fenrico.
The Primus continued, "One man's defiance cannot be allowed to spread disorder. He spoke not only against me—but against the Sentinel's will. And yet, we offer him mercy. The Pilgrim's Sail awaits—not as punishment, but as a path to reflection."
A myriad of emotions rippled through the gathered crowd—some gazed at Primus Fenrico with apathy, others with thinly veiled disgust. A few pitied Lian. Most remained impassive, their faces masks of silent compliance.
"May the Sentinel be graceful," Fenrico intoned, lifting his hand in mock benediction as Lian was led toward the boat waiting to carry him to exile aboard the Pilgrim's Sail.
But then—like déjà vu—Lian's body did not move. The Echo-bound guards strained but could not shift him an inch.
"Still defiant?" Fenrico scorned, tone sharp as splintered ice.
Lian's lips curled—not into a smile, but into something colder. Something done.
Mercy? Reflection?
He could tolerate lies whispered in corridors, among clergy. But lies shouted from thrones?
No more.
Fenrico's final words and the muted response of the people—their weary silence, their complicity—ignited something final in Lian's chest.
This peace was nothing but submission.
And peace like that had to be destroyed.
The last thread of tolerance snapped.
Lian stood tall, unyielding, his gaze locked on Fenrico. "You don't offer mercy," he said, calm but cutting. "You offer exile with a sermon wrapped around it."
Gasps burst like dropped glass among the crowd. The guards hesitated.
Lian stepped forward. Chains clinked—softly, ominously. "You call this justice. I call it cowardice with a crown."
The spell was broken.
Officials surged forward. Fenrico raised a hand to halt them, cloaked in cold authority. "This display," he said coolly, "is why he must go."
Lian didn't flinch. His eyes drifted up to the massive banner behind Fenrico—the carved likeness of the Sentinel's ever-watchful eye.
And then he said, somber and impartially: "Eyes blind by design see no heresy."
Suddenly—he was no longer among the guards.
He stood before the Primus.
Fenrico flinched, startled by the speed.
"Guards! Get him!" a panicked voice shouted from the Order's ranks.
But Lian was finished with mercy. His voice rang out like the strike of a bell: "Wuther Waves."
At once, a silence fell—not of fear, but of suppression. All around, every Echo, every Resonator present, froze in place. The Resonance they once commanded now betrayed them.
Invisible threads snapped taut across the gathering. Power stilled. Even the wind dared not whisper.
They could not move. They could not call upon the Echoes. The air hung heavy—held in place by something far greater than them.
Forte: Harmonics
Once belonging to the vanished mechanical marvel of legend, Harmonics is the rare Forte said to embody the very principle of string theory—translated into the living world of Resonance.
At its core lies a truth few dare comprehend: that all things, from the smallest whisper to the deepest echo, are woven from invisible strings of Resonance. Those who can perceive these threads… can pluck, bind, or sever them at will.
This was the Resonator Da Lian's Forte ability.
And now, he stood with a clam of dignified lotus inches away form the Primus. But he did not strike Fenrico. He didn't need to.
"Mud," he murmured, glancing at the Primus with a flicker of disdain, "is unworthy of a lotus's touch."
He turned to the crowd—Acolytes, Resonators, citizens alike—and raised his voice. "How many lies have you accepted without question?"
His gaze swept over them—cutting, cold. "Cowards of Ragunna."
Da Lian's call prompted every coward to look up.
"You know what is the greatest sin you've committed?" he asked, voice like a disturbed ripple in a pond.
"You surrendered your power. You dishonored your sovereignty. And in doing so, you betrayed yourselves." He paused, breath steady, chains swaying faintly with his movement.
"But I," he declared, "I respect the power I was born with." His gaze drifted to his mangled hands which had unjustly taken lives of humans and Tacet Discords. "And because of that, I will not act in rage or rebellion."
He looked straight at Fenrico. "I will go on this pilgrimage. I have given my word."
His gaze then shifted, just once, to Phoebe. Their eyes met. She didn't speak, couldn't move—but in that single moment, a shiver passed through her soul.
Something dark stirred beneath those lotus eyes—like still petals concealing a pond of secrets. A serenity so composed, it seemed divine—yet what lay beneath was not peace, but insurmountable depth.
Lian turned again to the crowd, voice quieter, but colder than ever: "But if this so-called 'journey of purification'—this glorified exile—offers no truth… no reflection…"
He paused. "Then know this—every one of you who stood silent and let this rot fester..." He took a breath, and then promised. "I will dig your graves myself."
A heavy silence settled over the crowd, broken only by the toll of a distant bell.
Gong. Gong.
The midday bell echoed through the city—it was time.
Lian now appeared on his supposed boat, chains unfastened, the tide pulling him toward the Pilgrimage. His presence, once heavy with suppression, lifted from the shore like a long shadow retreating.
Some watched with awe. Others with fear. A few, with bitter discontent.
And Lian? He simply gazed back at them with a mischievous, almost childlike smile.
His eyes, softened with unexpected endearment, betraying a truth deeper than duty: for all its flaws, this—Rinascita—was his homeland. And like anyone preparing to leave something familiar behind, he, too, felt that quiet ache.
Then, with a carefree kick to the dock and a wave that felt too light for the weight of his departure, he called out: "Toodeloo."
To be continued...