Prologue

It happened at the eve of the autumn solstice.

As a pack of wolves came out of a forest clearing, their amber eyes reflecting the night sky.

As a flock of birds flew across the pacific, racing to reach the edge of the shimmering ocean.

As a group of friends in vibrant kimonos danced, their smiles glistened by the festival’s fire.

The moon vanished.

In the wake of its disappearance, the world fell into chaos. Turbulent tides hit the coasts. The land shook. Skyscrapers dimmed. Power was gone and communications turned to a deafening static.

As those still in dusk feared the looming shadow, clouds of bronze emerged to illuminate the night, gushing forth like rivers in the sky.

Seven circles across the earth, the size of entire cities, lifted ever so slightly, a mere inch off the ground, glowing a faint ethereal light. The people inside those circles experienced a change.

It started with a heartbeat.

Power enveloped their bodies. First around the chest giving them health. Then through the arms and legs giving them strength. Finally into their heads giving them insight to magics once impossible.

They say that in one of those circles, situated in the middle of Tokyo, a man grew wings of light.

In that brief moment of fear and confusion, when the world lost its moon to a night of bronze, the world changed forevermore.

Power came back and communications were restored. The sun rose following the equinox on the twenty-third of September of the year two thousand. From there the world and its people saw itself… ascending.