04/11/2026
As Star and Scale landed in a small plains region along the northern edge of the Silsiluma Mountain Range, Elowyn was pulled into another vision with Gift, causing her to plummet from the sky, being saved by some quick thinking from Zeb.
Within the vision, Elowyn saw through Gift's eyes as he fought Lot in the underwater city of Thalassa, eventually draining him with the Divinaxiom at the cost of some lives and the city's partial destruction. The second Constellation War was obviously well underway.
Elowyn was also able to discern that this connection with Gift was an enhanced version of the Dream Tether, and for some reason, the connection between her and Gift was strong enough to allow that connection to flourish.
The group found themselves in the Boot Hills of Waning, a region that was just outside Jawhara. In order to cross into the desert region of Vault, they'd need to pass through the mountains separating the regions.
Throughout the Boot Hills, the group found large pieces of shrapnel leftover from some ancient explosion. The metal had peculiar properties, and they were able to discern that it was slow to rust and had been buried into the soil in the Boot Hills for thousands of years.
Eden investigated one of these pieces of metal and felt an immediate draw to it and all the pieces like it. She communed with it, and while it did not consciously or otherwise commune back, it reverberated with the attention she was focusing on it, causing it to shed its rust.
As the group explored, a group of riders approached, lead by a woman named Celeste. The riders found Eden deep in meditation and joined her. When Zeb attempted to stop her, Celeste instead invited him in, and the three communed together, their power channeling through one another.
When Eden finished, Celeste introduced herself and the riders, plainspeople who called the Boot Hills home.
Celeste teared up when she first saw Elowyn, though it was unclear why. She soon invited the group back to her people's camp, which was a few days ride at the foot of the mountains.
While some of Star and Scale enjoyed the local hot springs, Elowyn joined Celeste in her tent and saw the woman had maps of the stars arrayed throughout, though they were constellations seen from the vantage points of a different planet.
Celeste explained she was from a world called Rydia, which happened to be the same planet Jericho called home, the man who had made Gift. Celeste had come to Vault a very long time ago, and now considered it her true home.
Meanwhile, Seed asked Garrick is he was evil for taking a life, and if the consideration of taking another to continue his improvement was equally as evil. Garrick comforted Seed, and said he'd help Seed navigate the future.
That evening there was a boar roast and Celeste gathered the plainspeople together for a telling of one of their ancient tales; a tale which the group knew was not at all a fiction.
Celeste spoke of the Maritus Movement, a group of planets that used to be one complete world before a cataclysmic event shattered them into a cosmic array that orbited the three moons.
She also spoke on the aethereal connection between the world that acted as a passage between them. Celeste revealed herself to be an ancient silver dragon, and told the story of how her and her brothers and sisters made White Gates on each world to allow passage between them. But it soon became clear that passage needed to be barred to some, so they also made the Dragon Stones and designated a Watcher in each world who would pass them out to those they saw fit to possess the ability to traverse between and create new worlds.
Celeste also explained that Jericho had forced the Constellation War on Vault by helping to replicate more Dragon Stones on a world called Volan, which connected to Vault, making the gods of the multiverse finally concerned enough to take action against a growing stable of creation gods.
Gift was meant to come and clean up the remnants of that war, but arrived far too late.
Celeste told Zeb that his pursuit of Lubomir was a righteous cause, but he needed to be ready for when the time came. To that end, she asked him to seek a man in the mountains named Darna, the Distant, a man who also had connections to Omnia.
The group left the next morning, and Zeb found Darna's cave.
Within, Zeb learned Darna was a sniper who used an arcane rifle, and Omnia had asked him to shoot a falling star last year, which the group understood to be Gift, finally understanding what the event was that separated Gift from the Divinaxiom.
Darna also said he was being kept hidden for when Omnia needed him again, this time to shoot her in the event that certain things came to pass.
While Zeb and Darna bonded over their shared manipulation by Omnia, Darna showed Zeb that he had dozens of draconic creatured chained within the cave, and used their blood to keep himself young and immortal.
Zeb couldnt condone such an act, and fought against and slew Darna, releasing all the draconic creatures in captivity.
Among those freed was a crippled baby black dragon who seemed hesitant to leave, but did after prompting.
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