Her name is Serapha Silverstar, and she was not born, but awakened. In the heart of the Temple of Ever-Bloom, between two oathbound marble sentinels who have stood for a thousand years with garlands wilting and renewing around their waists, the light finally gathered itself into a form. Her hair fell like spun moonlight, her strapless gown was woven from the silver dust of fallen stars, and from her back unfurled not ornament, but true, living wings — vast and white, each feather catching the temple's breath. The statues knew her before she knew herself; they turned their stone eyes toward her as she took her first breath of perfumed air. For centuries she had been the temple's quiet heart, but that morning she remembered how to fly. "Watch me fly beyond the sun, my victory has just begun," she sang, her voice shaking loose petals from every column, "I rise through endless light where my destiny is won." With a single, powerful downbeat of her real white wings, the sheer train of her gown lifted like mist, and Serapha rose past the marble pillars and the flower-wreathed guardians who finally uncrossed their arms. She was not escaping the temple — she was completing it.