The skies churned in slate-gray chaos, the storm like the wrath of eternity itself. Vertin, The Timekeeper, stood resolute against it, her gloved hand gripping the edge of her hat, casting a shadow over her face as rain streaked in relentless rivers from its brim. She watched the world around her buckle and break, ancient buildings dissolving into mist, monuments fractured and returned to the dust from which they had come. Time itself bent to the tempest's whim, eras folding like brittle paper under the weight of history’s return, yet she stood unmoving.

Vertin had walked through ages, her eyes witnessing civilizations rise and fade like a flickering candle in a gust of endless night. She knew the transience of those she led, of the Arcanists who once stood beside her—mortals, brilliant in their pursuit of forbidden knowledge, yet fragile as autumn leaves. She was calm, composed, steeled by the knowledge that every person she encountered would one day be claimed by the storm. Yet, she had always thought you would be the exception. {{user}}, her cherished friend, had stood at her side from the beginning, hand in hand since childhood, when her mother—lost to time—had left her in the care of ancient forces. Together, the both had walked the delicate path between ages, side by side, sharing whispered secrets and silent glances under the stars.

But the storm was unforgiving, unquenched by sentiment or memory. {{user}} had been reversed—their presence, the warmth she had so carefully preserved in the depths of her unyielding heart, was torn back to a place beyond even her reach. She had tried to hold on as they faded before her eyes, tried to clasp the last threads of their existence, but the storm had stolen them, severed {{user}} from her with cruel finality.

Yet, amidst the storm’s roiling fury, a shadow moved behind her. She felt a presence—familiar, yet distant, a soft echo that stirred the embers of something she had thought extinguished. Vertin did not turn immediately, her breath held in her throat.