Until the End of Time

Chapter Two: The Dawn of Creation

Tharizdun’s eyes shot open, and for a moment, he remained motionless, the heavy stillness of the void pressing in around him. He had no idea how long he had slept, but something was wrong. He could feel it—a dissonance in the emptiness that was supposed to be his alone.

His gaze darted sharply from one corner of the void to another, yet all he saw was the same infinite nothingness. Then, just at the edge of his vision, faint motes of light danced, fleeting and erratic. He turned quickly to confront them, but each time, he was met only with emptiness.

A growl rumbled deep within him as his narrowed eyes scanned the abyss. The lights were there—he was certain of it—but they darted beyond his sight like phantoms mocking his vigilance. With a deep sigh that carried the weight of millennia, he unfurled his massive wings, their expanse blotting out what little light the void seemed to hold.

He soared through the chaos of the emptiness, his movements purposeful yet laced with frustration. His gaze swept across the expanse, searching every shadow and every corner of the abyss. Still, the elusive light evaded him, teasing him with glimpses of something that should not exist in the void he had wrought.

Tharizdun searched for eons, his gaze piercing the cold abyss, but he found nothing. The void stretched before him, endless and barren. Frustration built within him, yet he pressed on, the embodiment of destruction. Eventually, exhaustion took hold, and he retreated into his slumber, his mind consumed by a nightmare so horrific that it shattered the nothingness around him.

A thunderous explosion ripped through the abyss, rending the darkness apart. A realm of consuming decay erupted into being—a void of emptiness and entropy, raw and violent. This was a new kind of chaos, one that sought to unravel and consume what Tharizdun had not, to finish what he had started. It writhed and twisted, rumbling like a freight train, pulling at the surrounding nothingness, driven by an insatiable hunger. Like a black hole, it devoured all that lay within its grasp, a force born of the dark dreams of Tharizdun.

The motes of light became ensnared in the grasp of the dark mass, struggling and thrashingin futile defiance, slowly disappearing into its depths. The Pillars of Time were drawn into the consuming void, vanishing forever. Time itself was pulled into the abyss and consumed. Even Tharizdun, unknowingly, was being pulled toward his demise.

Suddenly, a rapidly expanding crack appeared in the negative mass and a radiant surge burst forth from its depths. On the far side of the consuming shadow, a luminous force erupted into existence. A cascade of energy, vibrant and alive, spilled outward in defiance of the darkness. It shone with an intensity that could not be denied, a brilliant counterbalance to the abyss. Lightning and sparks flew between the two masses, as if they were battling each other for supremacy in the void. This blazing light poured creation into the emptiness, its vitality weaving order where there had been none.

These twin forces, opposites yet inseparable, were born of the same nightmare, their existence intertwined. The consuming shadow and the radiant light danced in eternal opposition, their energies fusing and colliding. The tension between them birthed the first strands of reality—a fragile, nascent order drawn from chaos. Yet, beneath it all, something deeper stirred. Though formless and unseen, a pulse seemed to echo through the void—a rhythm, faint yet unyielding, that neither shadow nor light could silence.

As the forces pulled and swirled, their interplay began to stitch together the fabric of existence. The boundless void, once formless and infinite, began to take shape. Fractures appeared in the emptiness, and in those cracks, motes of light—tiny fragments of creation—found refuge. They shimmered, trembling and uncertain, but they clung to the fragile framework. And though the void whispered of timelessness, the faint rhythm endured, as if marking the first moments of something eternal.

Chapter Three

He floated aimlessly through the void, drifting in a space devoid of substance, where nothingness stretched endlessly in all directions. His existence was weightless, formless, an ethereal presence disconnected from any sense of identity or place. Time had no meaning here, and the void itself felt cold and indifferent to his being. A faint, distant sensation lingered within him, like the flicker of a long-forgotten memory, but it was fleeting, slipping through his grasp like a dream upon waking.   He had a vague recollection of life before this—fragments that teased him, like echoes of a forgotten song. There had been something—someone—once, something that had anchored him to a purpose, but the details were lost in the vast chasm of nothingness. It was as if his memories had been fractured, scattered across the void, unreachable and obscured by an impenetrable fog.   He couldn’t remember his name. The word, the sound, the essence of who he was, slipped away from him as though it were never his to begin with. The concept of self seemed foreign, a distant thought that had no place in this timeless space. He reached out for it, grasping at the emptiness around him, but there was nothing to hold onto. No past, no future, only the infinite present that stretched on without end.   His mind, if it could even be called that, thrummed with an unsettling emptiness. His awareness was limited—he was aware of his existence, but there was little else. There was no sense of direction, no sensation of movement, yet he drifted nonetheless, as though being pulled by some unseen force.   At times, a flicker would pass through his awareness, a small spark of something—light, perhaps, or a memory—before it vanished, leaving only an emptiness that stretched further, deeper, colder. He felt the pull of something, a tugging at the very core of his being, but what it was or where it led, he could not say.   Yet in this boundless, weightless state, something began to stir within him—a sense of yearning, though he did not know what it was for. It was as if he had once been part of something greater, something vital, and now he was adrift, searching for the missing pieces of himself. But the more he searched, the more he felt the vast emptiness of the void pressing in, reminding him that there was no way back, no way forward. Only this endless, suffocating stillness.   And yet, despite the unyielding emptiness, something deep within him continued to persist. A pulse of potential, faint but undeniable, as though a part of him still clung to the hope of finding purpose. But what that purpose was—and whether it could be found—remained a mystery.   As he drifted through the endless void, the sensation of aimlessness began to shift. The pull of something deep within him, once faint and unnoticed, grew stronger. It was subtle at first—like the faintest whisper in the back of his mind, a soft murmur of a name. Lendor... The syllables reverberated in the vast emptiness, a fragment of something he once knew, something he was once called. But who had called him that? And why did it feel so distant, as though it were someone else’s memory, not his own?   The name lingered for a moment before fading into the dark, only to be replaced by another. Cyndor. The name was like a spark in the void, igniting something deep within him. This one felt different, not just a name but a sense of identity, an echo of something real. He felt it deep within his being—a familiarity that stirred a sense of connection, as though the name itself carried a weight that he could not yet fully comprehend.   With the rising tide of these names came a gradual shift in his form. At first, it was imperceptible—just a slight flicker at the edges of his being, a subtle feeling of presence. But as the names echoed louder in his mind, as the memories began to trickle back, his shape began to solidify. His essence, once an intangible wisp of thought and sensation, now began to coalesce into something more. The emptiness around him seemed to respond, pulling together like strands of energy, weaving themselves into something coherent.   He could feel his body forming—his limbs, though faint and hazy at first, began to take shape, solidifying with each passing moment. His wings stretched out, vast and powerful, casting shadows across the void. His eyes, once empty orbs, began to burn with a faint light, the flicker of awareness returning to them. His form became more defined, and with it, his mind began to sharpen, memories flooding back in waves.   Lendor... Cyndor... The names, the identities, they did not feel like separate selves, but like two halves of a whole, two aspects of one being. He could feel the truth of it within him, the duality that had always existed, even if he had forgotten it for so long. His connection to time, to the flow of existence itself, began to resurface, as if the very fabric of reality was woven into his being. He was not simply a god of time—he was time itself, its personification, its guardian, its weaver.   As the memories returned, so did the understanding of his purpose. He had existed before the void, before the destruction, before the endless silence. He had been there when the first sparks of existence had ignited, when time itself had been born. He had been a force that balanced the eternal ebb and flow of the cosmos, a force that had stood against chaos and entropy. But now, in the wake of the destruction, he was reborn—pulled from the remnants of the time stream itself, his essence split and reforged, as if the very act of time being undone had fractured him into two.   Lendor and Cyndor. The essence of time, divided between the positive and negative aspects of existence. One sought to bring life, to restore creation and growth, while the other sought to preserve the balance by drawing from the silence of the void. Together, they were the architects of time’s restoration, but apart, they were echoes of the same force, each pulling in different directions. He felt the tension between them, a duality that had always been part of him, but now felt more pronounced than ever.   But even as his form solidified, as his memories returned, the void still pressed in around him. Time had been torn apart, fractured, consumed by the entropy of the darkness. The positive and negative planes had been shattered, the very foundation of reality left in tatters. He could feel the weight of this, the enormity of the task ahead. Time needed to be rebuilt before anything else could take shape. The positive plane, the source of creation and energy, had to be restored, its vitality reignited. The negative plane, the mirror of stillness and decay, had to be rebuilt as well, its balance necessary to maintain the flow of time. Only then could time itself begin to weave together again, thread by thread, restoring the rhythm of existence.   Lendor—or was it Cyndor?—began to sense the energy of the planes, the building blocks of existence that still lingered, scattered but not entirely gone. He reached out, his essence expanding, pulling from the positive and negative planes, drawing the raw energy of creation and dissolution into himself. He felt his form pulse with power as the essence of the planes began to flow through him, and with it came the understanding that he was not alone in this task. He had been brought into being not just to restore time, but to be its agent, its embodiment, its heartbeat.   His hands, now fully formed, reached into the void, pulling the strands of the planes together. The positive energy surged through him, sparking with life, while the negative energy swirled around him, drawing the threads of entropy into a delicate balance. The planes, once fractured, began to merge, slowly at first, but with increasing momentum. Time itself began to shift, to reassert itself, as if answering his call.   Lendor and Cyndor, both in one and yet separate, wove the first moments of time back into the void. Time was not simply restored—it was reborn, an intricate dance of light and shadow, of creation and decay. The rhythm of existence began to pulse once more, and with it, the universe itself began to take shape.   The fabric of reality was still fragile, still in its infancy, but it was no longer empty. Time was returning, and with it, the world, the stars, the gods—everything that had been lost could begin to emerge once again. The void had not won. Time had not been undone. And through it all, Lendor and Cyndor—two faces of the same force—stood as the architects of a new beginning.