AUTHOR'S NOTE: I want to remind anyone who wasn't read the synopsis for some reason. This is a passion project and updates will likely be slow. This is also a first draft of an actual book that I plan on publishing normally eventually. Nothing is meant to be perfect, but I would like all of the feedback possible.
A man, broken, hazy, lost. 'Is there meaning to life?' he thought to himself. Did he even know the meaning? How did he know the language? What were these thoughts he was thinking and how was he thinking them? A man who knew nothing, had nothing, and was in every sense of the word, lost. He lay dormant in a dark room for most of his life, seeing nothing—not even knowing what darkness was. Time was of no use and, quite frankly, foreign to someone who never had a moment of doing anything. But for some reason, the only thing he knew was language, as if it had been implanted in his head from the day he was born. He only knew basic words as well as words of things he had experienced and the word he knew best was darkness. Dawn Eldra was his name.
Had he lost his memories? Had he always been like this? Who knew? Dawn sprouted upward like a sunflower looking for the sun. His skin was as dark as a black hole, but it glowed softly from within. His eyes and hair shimmered as if the sun itself had descended upon them. The mask on his face stood out against his striking features. The captivating scarlet red and orange contrasted his skin greatly, and the black of his mask reflected the feel of his own skin. His mask looked almost ancestral. He was a stranger to the look of his person, but he could feel his mask. Dawn had only known pain and despair his entire life. He relied on his senses to navigate the void, although he could produce sound himself, this desolate black space had no sound. He'd grown familiar with this nothingness he lived in. He'd even gone as far as tasting the ground to learn the terrain. Each lick tasted as the last. Each day he wandered more and more, stumbling upon a new feel. The dirt of this void was different, special. The urge to punch this dirt overcame his senses whenever he became despaired. He battered the ground so much with much emphasis, wondering if it would break his hand.
Dawn was by no means human; his senses were extraordinary, and he would regenerate insanely fast. Dawn would strike the ground many times over: at least a couple times a day. He repeated this until he could regenerate more and more, and he would strike more and more. But all of it seemed useless. Every day he would walk and run miles upon miles, trying to escape this desolate land. His willpower was great, and it would take him until he fully exerted his energy to stop for the time being. He did this for years: from the time he was 5 to the time he was 15, but now he was truly tired. He didn't really have a true perception of time, but he knew how many times he had taken a breath, how many times he had gotten tired, how many times he had struck the ground, how many times his heart had beaten. He knew he had done this for long enough. So, he asked himself the question, 'Is there meaning to life?' It was truly strange — how had he known the meaning of the word 'meaning'? It was something he had never experienced. After all, he had been doing the same, seemingly meaningless things for the past 10 years. This is what it looks like for the world of The Last Noctherian.
Dawn suddenly felt a surge of anger. Why was he doing this? Why was he struggling? Why was he lost? Why was he lonely? He didn't like any of it. He was on the verge of being fully broken. His eyes had a darkness to them now, devoid of any hope, any joy, any happiness. Devoid of that reflective shine his eyes would have.
"Your trial is now over," a kind of robotic voice said aloud.
Startled, Dawn got up in an instant. He was scared, his heart was beating out of his chest, yet he felt uncompromised joy. The sound of someone else's voice was something so foreign, but exhilarating.
'Who are you? What do you mean by trial?' he asked, but he got no response.
Instead, the ground started shaking. He reached for a stable surface as an oval gate appeared in front of him, and an insignia appeared on his hand. It had a symbol, and right above it appeared the word "EMPEROR."
"Congratulations, Dawn Eldra! You have endured the Ruins of Willpower for an entire 10 years, 4 months, and 12 days! That is the longest in history," the voice said. Dawn had an understanding of something usually just by hearing a word or experiencing it, but he had no clue what ruins were.
"What are ruins? Who are you?" he asked.
"You have 10 seconds to leave, or you will be annihilated."
'Huh, leave where?' he asked confusingly. The voice chuckled to itself, as if forgetting something. In the blink of an eye, illumination covered the room.
'It was so… beautiful.' He understood that word. He even almost started crying. He knew what he was seeing for sight had appeared in his head, but he just couldn't believe it. He couldn't begin to form the words to describe the sights.
The door shone as the royal gems shimmered in the light. The gems glowed shades of gold, purple, and blue on the walls that enclosed the area. Above the threshold read "ad novam domum" as if he knew the words. Dawn knew he wasn't returning anytime soon. 'To my new home,' he mumbled to himself as he stared into the gate. He found himself inanimate as he examined the possibilities. Dawn was stunned, not only had he not known that a world existed outside of the place he was in, but experiencing a whole new sense. His fresh sense of sight stopped him in his tracks. He took a minute to take in everything he had been missing. The beauty in life he had not known. He exhaled, not realizing his breath weighed heavily in his chest. He wiped his moist face. Dawn never saw a thing, let alone something to move him to tears. The foundation was made from a toffee-colored gold marble. The place looked ethereal.
Dawn could not admire this sight for much longer, however, as the voice sounding similarly yelled, "You have three seconds to go through the portal!"
Dawn sprang into action as he jumped through the gate, leaving the place that he only knew. This saccharine moment lasted in his memories as his first home.