The world was cold. It had been so long that even the mere concept of warmth felt like a foreign memory, a flicker of a candle in a vast sea of freezing chill. The world was dark. The world was nothing but the empty expanse of ground and scrap. The world was pointless. There was no purpose to be found in the pitch-black emptiness. There was no goal to strive for. No dawn to anticipate. There was only the endless stretch of days that had been and days that would be. It had been so long since anything had changed that the mere concept of change felt like a foreign concept. It was a gift reserved for something greater, and such a concept had no place in this empty, worthless place. And then the world had changed. A sliver of light carved through the black. A muted flame lit in the distance, and with it came a hope that even a fool would not have dared to hope for. It was an empty promise that served only to make the dark darker, the cold colder. And then it had returned, and it brought with it heat. It brought heat, and it brought light. And, with the world’s death, there was awareness. There was a flood of energy so immense that it was practically incomprehensible. The world was so much more than what the self could have ever comprehended. It was only the taste of true understanding, but it was enough. More would come with time, after the promise was fulfilled. The self finally knew what the world was. The world was Reya, and the self was her dagger.