Chương 55: Chapter 54: A Millennial Dynasty

After Kaela wiped away her tears with the back of her hand —in that brusque and familiar gesture Selena knew so well— they both resumed their path toward the estuary. The sun was beginning to reach its zenith when they arrived at the mouth of the cave, the overhead light creating a brutal contrast between the brightness of the outside and the gloom waiting for them within.

They walked through the stone corridor guided by the crackling of the torches, their steps echoing in chases of sound, until they found Elian sitting as always on his rock, waiting. But today there was a difference: the acolyte held two wooden plates in his hands, and on them, white bread with meat and vegetables, a meal that in the outside world would be worth a small fortune. Only then did he speak with his usual calm, that serenity that seemed to spring from an infinite well of patience. —I was expecting you.

He extended the plates toward them, a simple gesture of offering but one loaded with meaning. —I believe something important was holding you back, but I was certain you would return. Both took their plates. Kaela stayed with him, sitting on the stone floor with the naturalness of someone who already feels at home, while Selena headed toward Corren's office, the familiar passage opening into that chamber that was already almost a second residence.

Once she arrived, the light of the tallow lamps illuminated the master's figure. He was sitting at the coralwood desk, as always, leafing through his books with that absolute concentration, as if the rest of the world did not exist—as if the only thing that mattered in his life was knowledge. Selena cleared her throat softly. Only then did Corren emerge from his deep reading, his dark eyes taking an instant to focus on reality. Upon seeing her, the man smiled deeply, a smile that lit up his haggard features.

—Today, I have an excellent question. He touched his chin with that reflective gesture so characteristic of him, and with solemnity, he said: —Do we have free will? Selena's expression darkened. The question fell upon her like a slab, and the pain in her forehead —that constant companion of her moments of revelation— began to spread again. Rhythmic pulsations, dull hammerings that threatened to distract her.

But the words remained in her chest, accumulating like water in a dam, until she felt a fire in her heart, an urgency to express what was seething within. She spoke meditatively, her words flowing with surprising fluidity: —Under my own conception of the world, free will exists as a real and inescapable experience. She sighed, took a breath, and continued: —It is not something that places us outside the laws of nature.

Rather, it is the human capacity to reflect on our desires and act in accordance with our reasoning. She paused, her green eyes fixed on Corren's, measuring his reaction. —It is a process that, although it has physical roots, transforms mere chance into an action with meaning and personal responsibility. The silence in the chamber grew dense. Selena felt the words settle in the air, seeking their place in the master's mind.

Then, after a few seconds that stretched thin, she released the phrase she had been saving, accompanied by a smile: —You could see it as... a man can do what he wants, but he cannot want what he wants. Corren meditated on it, almost savoring the words while silence reigned, his dark eyes moving as if he could see the ideas taking shape in the air. Only then did he stand, but this time he carried a book in his hands, a volume with a dark brown spine that Selena recognized instantly.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. As he passed by her side, he handed it to her with a solemnity bordering on the ceremonial. —Saved and delivered as you required —he let out with his deep voice, and in his words was a promise kept, a pact sealed. Only then did he leave, disappearing down the passage with his usual parsimony, his figure swallowed by the shadows. Selena, without further delay, headed to the desk and took a seat.

She placed the book on the coralwood surface and opened it. Jariel, the Chief Royal Scribe, was different from other authors she had read. He did not despise the crown, nor did he make great flourishes about hidden conspiracies. He did not seek to unveil manipulations or denounce injustices. He limited himself to thanking, first and foremost, the royal family itself for giving him the opportunity to write about the oldest dynasty in the world.

Among the pages that Selena turned with eager fingers, she learned that the kingdom was founded after the unification of several tribes. Under the reign of the first king, those scattered tribes —who had previously killed each other over pastures and water— were led to form a kingdom that would go down in history as the strongest in the world, the first on the entire continent. It was none other than one of five millennia of continuity. Five thousand years. Selena felt the air freeze in her lungs.

It was an overwhelming sensation, that of standing before a history so vast, so deep, that it dwarfed everything else. The kingdom of Erabergh was the pioneer, the first in the world, and it remained standing without losing the bloodline. Only then, right there, did the thought surge within her, clear as a diamond: That is why inhuman control exists. It is fear. Fear of losing everything they have built over thousands of years. The idea struck her with the force of a revelation.

It wasn't just cruelty; it wasn't just a thirst for power. It was the ancestral terror that everything would crumble, that five millennia of history would vanish like a sandcastle. And that fear justified any atrocity. Nevertheless, she kept reading. The Chief Royal Scribe continued telling how each great king of Erabergh had achieved great feats, but he highlighted three. First, the founding monarch, pioneer and fighter. Even so, the man deeply lamented that his name had been lost to the ages.

The first king was known only as the Monarch of Humility, because he had not even asked for a tomb to remember him by. His name, contained in ancient scrolls, had been fodder for the flames in the great burning during the revolt of the year 456 in the royal capital, Erabergh. A man who unified a kingdom, and not even his name survived. The second man highlighted was Corven Volgthar, the direct son of the founder. Among his achievements was having expanded the borders through treaties, not through war.

With the Treaty of the Five Founding Kingdoms, Erabergh had included under its power what are known today as the Great Duchies of Solendra, Aelthria, Verrion, and Thyll. Aelthria, a collection of settlements with a common faith —the burgeoning worship of Aelthra— was quickly integrated under the royal dynasty, which had been recognized by the goddess herself. A master stroke: when faith and power align, resistance becomes a sin. Solendra, on the other hand, was the most difficult treaty to grant.

It could only be added to the agreement by Erabergh, ceding the power to mint currency, a privilege it retains to this day. The kingdom, however, gained the wealthiest duchy and the most powerful mercantile force on the continent. Solendra had achieved its wealth even before the founding of the kingdom, as power centered on the Solendra family, the administrators of the money from the central seat of the Temple of Solendri. A perfect symbiosis between faith and finance.

The third highlighted by Jariel was none other than Thaerón I Volgthar, known as "the Vast." Under his great reign —through blood, treaties, and integration— the exploration of the known world was completed, and he conquered the great continent of Karys, expanding the kingdom and its influence on unsuspected limits. It was a complete renaissance: immense and powerful trade, the arts flourishing like never before, the philosophy of man expanded beyond imagination.

And above all, he created the first map of the continent, cartographing the extent of the known world for the first time. All of this in the year 2788. The author could only lament that, with the passing of centuries, neighboring kingdoms had separated due to crises, abandonments, religious differences, or diseases that advanced without mercy. Thaerón's dream of a unified empire had slowly crumbled, leaving Erabergh as a lonely giant on a fragmented continent. Selena, however, could only sigh.

A deep sigh, laden with a disappointment that weighed like lead. There was nothing about the noble houses she sought. Nothing about Scargoth, that name that rang in her head like a warning bell. Even the little she found about Solendra only confirmed what she already knew: they were the great power that had preserved autonomy and wealth. There was nothing. After so much reading, after hours submerged in Jariel's pages, she only found a wall.

Time and again, history closed before her, denying her access to the names she truly needed. But not all was loss. She had found something as important, if not more so: knowledge about the kingdom, about the continent, about the neighboring kingdoms that were once part of Thaerón's dream and were now separate entities, sometimes hostile. She had learned about the near deification of some monarchs, about how power and faith intertwined to create an unquestionable authority.