Thunder boomed across the endless sands of the Zarkan Desert as the first spear slashed through the air, embedding itself a mere inch from her head. She didn’t flinch. Her crimson robes, intricately woven with gold-threaded patterns of falling leaves, whipped furiously in the wind. Behind her, the jagged face of the sacred cliffs rose toward an electric skyline, jaguar-like emerald clouds snarling across the heavens. Her voice cut through the chaos, sharp as obsidian.
“Strike again, if you dare,” she challenged, her amber eyes blazing with righteous anger. Another spear came hurtling toward her, its shaft shimmering with the phosphorescent blue light of tech-forged steel. She turned her body at the last second—fluid like water—and it shattered against the cliff face behind her. The fragments fell harmlessly around her, their dim glow fading against the stark desert rock.
“Is that the power of the immortal sand kings?” she goaded. Her expression, somewhere between defiance and serenity, drew murmurs from the crowd of desert warriors amassed below.
The leader of the group, a towering man draped in bone-white armor carved from the exoskeletons of desert wyrms, stepped forward. “You wander into our dominion, Oracle, draped in the bloodied color of war, and yet you preach peace?” His voice carried authority but wavered slightly. He noticed her garments more than she did. The crimson of her robes glowed with a spectral light, as though plucked from the prism of an ancient fire, their golden embellishments glinting like the dawn itself. Her feet, clad in chief’s sandals encrusted with rubies and pearls, were firmly planted in the sand, proclaiming both royalty and rebellion.
She raised her delicate hands slowly, adorned with bronze wrist cuffs etched with inscriptions of an era even the desert had forgotten, and let the storm do its work. The wind tore at everyone present, lifting the Oracle’s many-layered robes until they billowed like phoenix wings. “I am not draped in blood but renewal,” her voice rang, carrying in it the weight of seasons and storms. “The sands are shifting, mighty Thalor of Wrath. You fear the prophecies because you cannot fight the tide of them. Attack me or grant me passage—either way, the crimson-draped herald walks forward.”
The Oracle—before she became so—had been an entertainer at the massive floating court-palaces of the Emerald Archipelago, far from deserts and prophecies. Her name then was Esra, a woman born of the sea and its tempestuous waves. She had worn an entirely different shade of red then—simple fabrics that wrapped tight around her as she dove into impossible underwater caverns for sport. She performed miracles of motion and daring that no one could replicate, and she looked vibrant and alive in her sleek crimson garb, her toned body a marvel among the nobles she entertained.
But Esra had seen something in the depths of her final dive. In a cavern lined with shimmering crystalline spores, she had touched an artifact etched with pre-Skyborn hieroglyphs, relics of humanity’s lost pinnacle. The moment her fingers brushed its surface, she was no longer just Esra. The knowledge of the old world and the stories yet unwritten coursed through her, transforming the simple diver into the Oracle.
When she surfaced for the last time, she turned toward the Emerald Archipelago and whispered, “The end begins today.” And she left, donning robes of crimson—the color of the dawn’s promise, and the blood needed to fulfill it.
Underneath the jagged cliffs, the silence stretched long. Esra—no, the Oracle—stood unwavering. The desert warriors whispered furiously to one another, but none dared make a move.
“Thalor,” she addressed the warlord again, this time softer, though her words still carried across the storm. “You wear the bones of wyrms, one of the first creatures to walk this earth after the Shattering. But their bones, like yours, will crumble unless you listen.” Her amber gaze pierced his. “Your people and mine stand on the edge of something far greater than your rage or my boldness. It is time for unity.”
The moment hung precariously, like the shimmering edge of a blade about to fall. Thalor’s jaw tightened, his eyes narrowing beneath his rough-boned helm. Yet before he could respond, the sky split open. A column of violet lightning struck a nearby dune, exploding it in a plume of sand and glass. The desert roared with fury.
The Oracle turned, her robes igniting faint sparks as the storm’s energy flirted with her. “If you will not listen, the storm will judge us all.” She stepped forward, toward the jagged cliffs, and without a single glance back she began to climb. The storm intensified with every handhold she took, dragging her crimson and gold robes to life, as though she were a flame defying gravity.
When Esra reached the top of the cliffs, the storm fell still as though holding its breath. Below, Thalor and his warriors watched in awe and trepidation. The Oracle stood at the summit, the stark contrast of crimson against the tan and jagged rock making her appear otherworldly.
She raised her hands to the heavens, murmuring forgotten words carried by desert winds. The storm answered, its glow gathering in a vortex above her like a colossal eye. When she turned to look back at Thalor below, she smiled faintly, half in sorrow, half in triumph.
“The sands are patient,” she said. “But even they must shift.”
There was no sound except the thunder as the Oracle stepped forward into the vortex, her crimson robes swallowed by light, leaving Thalor to stare up at a future he could no longer control.
The Source…check out the great article that inspired this amazing short story: Bold Red One-Piece Swimsuit for Confidence and Empowerment in Minimalist Chic Style
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