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The bedroom was lit only by the warm, amber glow of the salt lamp in the corner, casting long, soft shadows against the walls covered in posters of dinosaurs and spaceships. The rain tapped a gentle, rhythmic beat against the windowpane, the perfect percussion for a bedtime ritual.
Arthur tucked the duvet tighter around his youngest, Max, who was currently trying to wrestle a stuffed triceratops into a headlock. In the bunk bed across the room, Leo hung over the top rail, while Sophie sat cross-legged on the bottom bunk, her expectant eyes wide.
"Alright, crew," Arthur whispered, adopting his serious 'Storyteller General' voice. "Settled down. Teeth are brushed, pajamas are on, and chaos is managed. What’s on the docket for tonight?"
Max released the triceratops. "Percy the Penguin!" he chirped. "The one where he invents new dances!”
Sophie shook her head, her braids bouncing. "No, we read that Tuesday. I want 'Tales of Veridia'. The chapter where they fight the gryphon!”
"Boring," Leo groaned from the top bunk. "Let's do 'Bella the Bear'. She eats the honey. It’s classic literature."
Arthur held up a hand, silencing the debate. He reached past the stack of well-worn, dog-eared picture books on the nightstand—past Percy, past the Veridia anthology, and even past Bella. Instead, he pulled a dusty, leather-bound volume from the very back of the shelf. It smelled like old paper and cinnamon.
"Tonight," Arthur said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "we are going off-script. Tonight, I’m reading a personal favorite. It’s about a wizard named Sichas."
The kids went quiet. They didn't know Sichas.
"Is he a nice wizard?" Max asked suspiciously.
"He’s a busy wizard," Arthur corrected. "And a very, very powerful one. But he wasn't always powerful. In fact, his story begins with a bit of a disaster."
Arthur opened the book. The pages crackled.
Once upon a time, in a world called Oria, there lived a wizard named Sichas. Oria was a beautiful place, filled with floating waterfalls and trees that grew crystal leaves, but it had a massive plumbing problem.
You see, magic in Oria flowed through invisible tubes called ley-lines. And just like old pipes in a house, the ley-lines were leaking. Magic was spilling out everywhere. Toads were accidentally turning into teapots. Gravity would randomly turn off on Tuesdays. It was a mess.
Sichas was the High Mender, and it was his job to fix it. He stood in the center of the Grand Plaza, rolled up his sleeves, and grabbed the two biggest frayed ends of the magical ley-lines. He pulled with all his might, his boots sliding on the cobblestones. He grunted. He sweated. He turned bright purple.
But the magic was too heavy. It snapped back, sending Sichas flying into a fruit cart. He realized then that he was like a single ant trying to lift a watermelon. He simply didn't have enough magical muscle.
"I need to work out," Sichas declared, wiping melon pulp off his robes. "Magically speaking."
So, Sichas did something dangerous. He cast a spell not to fix the world, but to leave it. He opened a shimmering, swirling door in the air—a Rift—and stepped through, leaving Oria behind.
Sichas tumbled out of the Rift and landed on... sound.
He wasn't on the ground. He was bouncing on a giant, vibrating drumhead that stretched to the horizon. This was Sonus, the World of Echoes. Here, magic wasn't visual; it was auditory. To cast a spell, you didn't wave a wand; you had to sing the perfect note.
Sichas was a terrible singer. His first attempt to conjure a cup of tea resulted in a thunderstorm because he was flat on a high C.
But Sichas was stubborn. He stayed in Sonus for ten long years. He learned to hum the fabric of reality. He learned that a low bass rumble could move mountains, and a high falsetto could stitch torn fabric. He grew a long, silver beard and forgot how to speak without rhyming.
When he finally felt his voice vibrating with power, he opened a Rift and stepped back toward home.
He landed in Oria’s Grand Plaza. He looked at the town clock. Only three days had passed since he left.
"Excellent," Sichas croaked, his voice booming like a bassoon. "Time dilation. Very convenient."
He tried to grab the ley-lines again, singing a powerful ballad of binding. The lines knitted together... for a moment. Then, Snap! They broke again. He was stronger, but not strong enough.
"Back I go," Sichas sighed. He opened a new Rift.
This time, he arrived in Geometria. Everything here was sharp. The clouds were cubes. The sun was a perfect dodecahedron. The grass was made of tiny, green triangles.
In Geometria, magic was about precision and angles. Sichas spent twenty years here. He studied under the Triangle Masters. He learned to fold space like origami. He learned that if you stood at a perfect 45-degree angle, you became invisible.
He became incredibly disciplined. He even trimmed his beard into a perfect rectangle.
When he returned to Oria, another week had passed. The ley-lines were worse now. Gravity was failing every other hour; Mrs. Gable’s cow was currently floating past the clock tower.
Sichas combined his singing magic with his geometry. He sang a square song. He hummed a hexagon. He grabbed the ley-lines and wove them into a complex, unbreakable knot.
The lines held for ten seconds. Then—BOING—they unraveled, knocking Sichas flat on his back.
"Oh, come on!" Sichas yelled at the sky. "What does a wizard have to do?"
He needed raw, unadulterated power. He needed the impossible.
Sichas opened one last Rift. This one was jagged and red. He stepped through into the Maelstrom.
There was no ground here, only swirling energy. Lightning the size of skyscrapers crashed around him. This was a world where magic was wild, untamed, and angry.
Sichas didn't study here. He survived.
He spent thirty years wrestling lightning bolts. He had to catch pure energy with his bare hands and mold it into balls of light. He learned to eat thunder and drink static. He forgot his rhymes. He forgot his geometry. He became a battery of pure force.
When he finally ripped a hole back to his own reality, he crackled. Sparks flew from his fingertips. His eyes glowed like headlights.
He landed in Oria. Two weeks had passed since he first left. The world was falling apart. The sky was cracking like an eggshell. The ley-lines were thrashing around like angry snakes, tearing the city apart.
"Right," Sichas said, his voice sounding like a rock slide. "Let's finish this."
Sichas floated up into the air. He didn't just grab the ley-lines; he commanded them.
He opened his mouth and sang the Song of Sonus, a deep, resonant hum that vibrated the bones of every person in the city. The ley-lines froze, paralyzed by the sound.
Then, he used the discipline of Geometria. He visualized the broken world as a perfect sphere, calculating the exact angles needed to stitch the sky back together. Blue glowing triangles appeared in the air, clamping the reality shut.
Finally, he unleashed the power of the Maelstrom. He poured the raw lightning he had stored in his soul into the fix. Beams of pure white energy erupted from his chest, fusing the magical lines together, welding the universe shut with heat and light.
The sky flashed white. Then gold. Then a calm, perfect blue.
Sichas lowered gently to the ground. The toads stopped turning into teapots. Mrs. Gable’s cow landed softly in a haystack. The ley-lines hummed, fixed and flowing perfectly beneath the streets.
Sichas was exhausted. He was eighty years older than when he started, though only a month had passed in Oria. He walked over to the fruit cart he had crashed into so long ago.
"One apple, please," Sichas said.
"That will be two coppers," the merchant said, eyeing the glowing wizard.
Sichas realized he had no money. He thought for a moment, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a perfect, glowing cube of solid thunder.
"Keep the change," Sichas smiled.
Arthur closed the leather-bound book with a soft thud. The room was silent, save for the rain. He looked at his children. Sophie was clutching her blanket, eyes wide. Leo was leaning so far over the railing he was nearly falling out. Max was slack-jawed.
Arthur stood up, tucked the book under his arm, and smoothed the blanket over Max.
"And this has been a bedtime story, good night."
He turned to the door, hand on the light switch, when a small voice broke the silence.
"Whoa dad... that was EPIC!"
