Chapter 01
Fragment I

The origin of the fracture was not his own making. The house did not break. It just stopped being whole.

Fragment II

He did not leave. That would have been easier to understand. But the origin of the silence was him.

Fragment III

She was still there. But somewhere else entirely. The children learned not to ask where she went — or what had become of the origin of her warmth.

Fragment IV

The one the world shortchanged before he could speak. The one he still owes. Some debts have no number. Some have only an origin.

Fragment V

No one assigned him the role. He looked around one day and realized no one else was doing it. That was the origin of the Duke.

Fragment VI

He did everything right. The system was simply not designed for people who do everything right. He had to return to his origin and build something the system could not reach.

Fragment VII — The Key

Every fracture has a source. Every signal has a start. Every story of the Duke begins in the same place. Find the origin and you find where you began too.