Starmaker Arvus ❲ULTIMATE❳

And Arvus, who had made a trillion suns without once being thanked, felt something crack inside himself. Not the Forge this time. Himself.

He turned back to his work. But now, when he shaped a nebula into a sun, he would sometimes pause—just for a moment—and wonder: Who will love this one? starmaker arvus

Arvus extended his perception through the crack. There: a small, yellowish star, already guttering like a candle in a storm. And orbiting it, a single world of silver cities and silent oceans. The people were fragile things of calcium and water, but their minds burned with a fierce, beautiful terror. And Arvus, who had made a trillion suns

Arvus had never been asked. He had simply been —the unthinking hand of celestial mechanics. But now, something stirred in his dust-heart. A memory? No. A possibility. He turned back to his work

For ten billion years, he had drifted through the Veil of Unformed Light, pressing his awareness against raw nebulae until they kindled into fusion. He had shaped blue supergiants for empires that would rise and fall before their light reached the nearest world. He had coaxed gentle red dwarfs into being, tucking them into the arms of spiral galaxies like lanterns for lost travelers. The universe called him Starmaker, and he worked alone.

"Thank you," the voice whispered, stronger now. "What do we call you?"