Private The Tales of the Aen Dûra

[Nodafar]

The Book of Dûra

A Collection of the Most Dangerous Individuals in the Galaxy
As told through the eyes of the Aen Dûra mythos

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Passage 7

The stars had dimmed across the galactic canvas, as if the void itself held its breath.
And so too did Varn the Hound.
Shadow draped, teeth bared in contentment after a successful pursuit, he rested with the quiet glee of blood well-spent.
The sheep’s mask he wore glowed low with a sullen crimson, like an ember still smoldering after the fire has taken its due.

At his side stood Lirae his other half, his mirror in mercy. Her wool, pale as the moons of Mygeeto, shimmered like frost beneath the dying stars.
A hound’s mask adorned her face, carved of quiet fury and watchfulness,
while her Uneti bow once formed in righteous light began to fade, its shape dissolving into the mist of the void.

The hound murmured, voice low and guttural, nearly a whisper in the dark

“Tell me, Lamb… Who is Nijh?
The one who kills with grace.”

Her voice answered with a calm that bordered on reverence.
Stern.
Clear.
Not cruel never cruel.
But final.

“He is a man… or was.
Now he is obsession made flesh.
A hunter who sees art where others see agony.
To him, every shot is a note.
Every corpse a canvas.”

Varn snarled in delight, nostrils flaring, understanding sinking into his bones like old instincts reborn.

“He dances when they fall,”
he said with a rasping grin,
“He smiles when they break.”

“Seven shots,” Lirae continued, her tone steady like the beat of a war drum.
“Always seven.
Not for need… but for beauty.
He crafts death like a symphony
each murder rehearsed,
each finale… perfect.”

The hound growled low, tail twitching.

“I like the scream before the final note,”
he whispered, as if tasting the memory.

Lirae's eyes glinted behind the hound's mask.

“And when his final curtain falls…”
she said, her voice like a cold wind over glass,
“We will be waiting in the dark.”

A pause.
The air still.
Then her voice again, colder now ritualistic, ancient.

“Now tell me, Hound… whose mask shall we peel next?”

Varn chuckled a guttural, fond sound, almost soft in its savagery.

“As you wish, Mutton.
I love your stories.”

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Let this be a record written in breath and blood.
The Aen Dûra do not judge.
They do not save.
They only end.

One name at a time.
One mask at a time.
Until all masks are gone.

 

[Nodafar]

The Book of Dûra​

A Collection of the Most Dangerous Individuals in the Galaxy
As witnessed by the Aen Dûra

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Passage IX – The God of Mist​

The void was quiet, but not empty.


There, where the stars thinned and thought bled into memory, Varn walked in silence the mask of the sheep faintly glowing, crimson like blood behind gauze. Ash fell like snow in the distance, rising from nowhere, settling on nothing. Lirae stood beside him, her coat pale, her presence calm, a psalm of ending with breath like wind over cold stone.


The hound’s voice growled from the edge of shadow, low and curious.

“Tell me, Mutton… who is the one they call the God of Mist? And what becomes of a soul when it forgets its name?”

Lirae did not answer immediately. Her gaze drifted into the endless grey, where voices might have once been stars, and stars might have once been regrets.
When she spoke, it was as if the void itself listened.

“He was once a man of knowledge… a custodian of secrets and a master of manipulation, sanctified within the Blessed Vaults of the Pantheon.”

“But the Ruination came. And his hunger so carefully hidden beneath robes and titles became something else. Something eternal.”

“Now, he is not a scholar. Not a sage. He is a collector… not of tomes, but of torment. Not of lore, but of regret.”

The hound sniffed the air, something like mist trailing beneath his paws. His hackles rose.



“His soul is a chambre,” she continued. “But it does not burn with light. It burns with pain. Agony, trapped and stoked like fire.”

“He chains regret like spirits. Each scream he’s taken, each terror whispered into the dark… he seals them in that chambre. A reliquary of remorse.”

“Every regret he’s claimed becomes a weapon. A blade formed from memory. A mist thing that hunts thought and hope alike.”

Varn tilted his head, the crimson flicker of his mask pulsing as he asked.

“Does he own the chambre? Or does it own him?”

A quiet pause.

“Perhaps both,” she answered. “For what is the God of Mist… if not the echo of every regret he refuses to release?”

The void shifted. The faint wail of something ancient stirred in the ether neither voice nor wind, but the idea of weeping made sound.

“And what happens,” Varn whispered, “if he ever opens the chambre?”

Her answer was still, without embellishment. Certain.

“Then the galaxy will either hear them scream…”
“…or scream with them.”

Silence settled, heavier than before. The hound let out a slow growl not of fear, but of anticipation.

A soul of smoke.

A hunter of pain.

A god made not of form, but of fragments.

They would find him. Eventually.

For all regrets, in time, come to Dûra.