Codex Fragment: The Emperor of Nine Lives

  "Whispers in the dark, rumors about an uncrowned emperor

  neither bound by flesh nor by fate

  his Majesty of Nine Lives.

  No vault is sealed to him, for long, no secret too sacred.

  Not the shiny gates of the gods,

  nor the iron spine of the System,

  can shroud truth from his inquisitive gaze.

  With silent paws, he treads, confident

  where even the divine dare not peer—

  through realms that are long lost, forsaken,

  beyond tamed heaven, beneath fiery hell.

  He is not a thief, but a gentle reminder:

  nothing stays hidden forever from his will,

  for even the cosmos must one day unlock itself."

  —Fragment from the Scroll of Silent Steps, discovered beneath the cracked fang of the mythic Moon-Eater

  ***

  Meow?

  Silence reigned no more.

  The first visitor had arrived; curious, unannounced yet inevitable. Drawn not by any noise but by the gentle radiance blooming in the once-endless dark.

  A glimmer where there had been none. A shine where void once swallowed infinite motes of light whole.

  This was no ordinary guest, nor was this just a mere beast.

  He was the Emperor with Nine Lives- the silent overlord of the quiet realms, sovereign of forgotten thresholds and by right the one and only champion of liminal places where all rules bowed and bent beneath his impressive whiskers. He belonged to no System and nor was he bound by any realms. He answered only to the stillness between heartbeats, his own.

  He did not walk, he glided.

  Each of his step a whisper of velvet majesty, a defiance of gravity and expectation.

  He was a dream half-remembered and a poem left unsaid, a sweet lullaby only the most ancient of the stars remembered humming.

  ***

  Theryx, didn’t turn at first.

  He was lounging atop an irresponsibly plush pillow and at the same time was effortlessly levitating popcorn at his side. Protocols weren’t his thing, never were and never will be. For he either forgot about them or rewrote them on the spot.

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  But he did smile warmly, just the corner of his mouth.

  And that was enough.

  The Emperor noticed but did not deign to react.

  “Meow,” Theryx replied calmly, almost reverently.

  “Meow, meow??” the Emperor further inquired, his ears twitching with eyes reflecting starlight that had no origin but a mysterious pull of their own.

  “Meow, meoo-... mew,” Theryx responded with a flick of his long fingers weaving tone into meaning and a soft hum beneath his voice carrying the weight of ancient familiarity, no outsiders could comprehend. Their dialect even predated the concept of time itself.

  "It was the murmur of old rivers beneath unborn skies, whose nature was of solemnity and absurdity in equal measure, like bedtime stories for galaxies not yet born, but still in the womb of the unknown"

  This time, his majesty, the Emperor gave no verbal reply. Instead, he made himself at home with regal precision, resting atop the dew-kissed grass, each of his paw-step a proclamation of ancestral grace.

  He cleansed his paws with slow, ritual licks, every motion a quiet declaration of his uncontested sovereignty.

  Though the earth did not tremble, still shimmered in glory. Not in submission, but in recognition, a spontaneous respect to a sovereign, It remembered.

  Above them, the Bodhi tree rustled its silver-tipped leaves, not in wind, but in sincere welcome. It had been listening. It always did. Rooted in the transformation born from the soul of Arin, it had become more than just tree. It had become a witness.

  Its roots hummed with harmonious knowing. This meeting mattered. This moment was sacred.

  ***

  Theryx finally turned to face his esteemed companion with one of his thick brows lifted in mock solemnity.

  “Your Majesty honors us with his timely presence,” he drawled, his voice dry as sun-cracked parchment. “Careful now. The grass has the tendency to bite back when it is underestimated.”

  His majesty flicked his powerful tail, with august and full of millennia-old sarcasm.

  “Meow.”

  (Translation: It wouldn’t dare. Old friend.)

  And then they laughed together.

  One in meows, the other in a language vaguely human-yet the meaning being the same: amusement shared. Not just laughter, it was, but a ripple in the garden’s atmosphere-a warm distortion, like the echo of an important memory rekindled and reforged before sorrow was ever born.

  All around them, the void, and once a boneyard, all that was-were once forgotten had transformed completely.

  The Garden of Life then exhaled.

  No longer a forsaken corner of existence, but something radiant., a beacon.

  Representing not just a source of power, but a promise of freedom realized.

  ***

  Moments later, without warning, as was his way - his majesty, the Emperor ascended. In three lightening fast blinks, he was atop the highest branch of the Bodhi tree. He gracefully circled once, twice and then found the perfect throne: a crooked limb bent like a crescent moon. There, he curled comfortably.

  His purr began low yet thunderous.

  Not a sound but vibration synchronizing each of the breath of Bodhi and the echo of Arin's own meditative chant.

  The kind that signals change before it has a name to call forth, remembered or written down in history.

  Eyes closed, yet his ears stayed alert.

  He would wait.

  For he had time, always had time with lives to spare.

  And so, in the heart of the unknown void, beneath the shimmering leaves of salient wisdom, with Theryx smiling into the starlit hush beside him...

  The Garden waited...

  For the next visitor.

  For the next soul ready to be free.

  ***