♤ Greetings to all who decided to pick this chat story ♤ 😊

we will be starting off strong with a... 👇

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‼️ DISCLAIMER ‼️

This is a bit of promotional material for my upcoming full-length novel Burn for Rose by Paigely Blisson (FYI, not my real name), which will be released at the end of October. I have been struggling to market it on social media, and honestly, it has not been going well. So I thought, why not share it here where my writing journey began? I have been writing here for years, and it feels right to return to my roots. Just to clarify, this is not my main account because I do not want to mix the two. I am not here to mislead or bait anyone. What I will be posting is an early release in chat story format, not the completed version of the book. If you enjoy what you read, I would be truly grateful if you considered pre ordering Burn for Rose. Thank you for your time and support. It means more than you know.

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Alright, now that the important stuff is out of the way, it is time to begin the story, pookies.

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○ PROLOGUE ○

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It started with a match. Not one that lit a fire, but one that struck against history, sharp and furious. People had always believed in the illusion of order. Governments. Flags. Borders. Presidents who spoke of unity while building walls. For years, it had worked. The illusion held. But people starved beneath gold-painted towers, and the rich carved their names into laws. Somewhere along the line, humanity began to realize that illusion had teeth, and those teeth were buried deep in their necks. They struck.

It wasn’t a revolution led by leaders or figureheads. There were no icons on posters, no charismatic saviors. Just fury. Raw, boiling and collective. Protests turned into riots. Riots turned into flames. Every country bled. Every system fractured. What began as a call for change became a war against structure itself. And then, nature answered.

Volcanoes erupted in the north. Fault lines cracked the western coasts. Cities drowned, while others burned. What the people didn’t destroy, the earth did. The last president resigned on a livestream that ended in silence. No one replaced him.

The world entered darkness. Not apocalyptic. Just… leaderless. For fifty years, it drifted. No borders. No currencies. No flags. Some tried to recreate the old systems. Most didn’t bother. Communities formed around survival. Trade and barter returned. Old skyscrapers became growing grounds for potatoes. Marble courthouses turned into shelters. Slowly, humanity began to breathe again.

And then they came.

They called themselves the Syndicate of Order. Their words were smoother than any politician’s had ever been. They promised no flags, no elections, just structure, unity and peace.

They didn’t beg. They didn’t plead. They simply arrived in tailored suits and glass airships, promising homes for the homeless, jobs for the aimless and wealth for the desperate.

And they did deliver everything they promised once the people trusted them. First the Syndicate divided the recovering world into twelve dominions. Each was granted a new name, new purpose, new identity.

The dominions were not ruled by presidents or kings, but overseen by eight ruling Houses within the Syndicate. Each House managed sectors of life: trade, technology, agriculture, enforcement, intelligence, energy, infrastructure, and culture.

It was sleek, efficient, and cold.

People called it the Rebalancing. And for a time, it worked. But power always eats. The dominions became reflections of the Houses that governed them. Six grew beautiful and brutal with wealth. Four kept industry and silence. Two withered beneath it all. And while the world looked up at the sky and saw gleaming towers and Syndicate-crafted cities, something darker crawled beneath their feet.

The Triumvirate of Legacy.

A criminal empire, quiet, old and lethal. No press releases. No speeches. Just shadows and blood. It had been alive even before the Syndicate, operating under the cracks of broken governments. Three Houses held the reins: the cunning, the cruel, and the one older than both. A House that had stood untouched while empires rose and crumbled. The Vescari.

While empires rose and crumbled. The Vescari. Vescari was not built on greed. It was built on inheritance. On legacy. On the knowledge that real power does not announce itself. It whispers. It waits. It owns everything in silence.

While the Syndicate claimed the skies, the Triumvirate ruled the veins of the earth. Ports. Black markets. Vaults. Data streams. What could not be seen was theirs. And they liked it that way. Now, the world lives in balance. Not peace. Not war. Just a quiet standoff.

Twelve dominions. Eight Houses of Order. Three Houses of Legacy. One fragile structure pretending it can last forever. But nothing lasts forever. Each dominion carries its own soul.

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Dominion Argenta is all gleam and glamour. Wealth drips from its gold-lined streets. Glass towers shimmer under permanent artificial sun. Fashion is currency. Scandal is power. Its citizens live for the show and die by reputation.

Dominion Felsin is its colder sibling. Wealthy, but without performance. Power is silent here. The air is crisp, the people sharper. Intelligence firms hide behind bookstores. Every room is bugged, every smile means something.

Dominion Calvare thrives on culture. Music and art bleed from its walls. Its citizens are chaotic, passionate, riotous in their love of expression. But beneath the surface, it is policed heavily and creativity is a monitored freedom.

Dominion Vairel runs on steel and oil. Trains run twenty-four hours. Machines don’t stop. The sky is always gray with smoke. It feeds the Syndicate’s infrastructure. The people are strong, practical, and quiet. They worship industry, not faith.

Dominion Tharael is the heart of enforcement. Military academies replace schools. Drones patrol every corner. Obedience is holy. Children are raised to serve the Syndicate. Law is not questioned. Justice is not gentle.

Dominion Enros is the cradle of medicine and innovation. Hospitals are sprawling cities. Life expectancy is higher than anywhere else. But experimentation is unrestricted. The poor become test subjects and ethics are optional.

These six are the pride of the Syndicate. Controlled. Rich. Relentless. Then come the four middling dominions.

Dominion Hanver deals in trade. Its ports are busy, its people quick with numbers and sharper with blades. It is crowded, colorful, buzzing with backroom deals and whispered alliances.

Dominion Stretok survives on agriculture. Greenfields stretch endlessly. It is quiet, peaceful on the surface. But hunger haunts its borders because the Syndicate takes more than it gives.

Dominion Windstone was once a mining hub. Now it is hollowed out. Its people live in the bones of old operations. Forgotten, but fiercely independent. They trade minerals for medicine and loyalty for survival.

Dominion Bravach handles energy. Reactors hum in the distance. Lights never go out. But radiation has its price. The Syndicate calls it a marvel. Locals call it a slow death.

And then there are the last two.

Dominion Nirell and Dominion Morvak. Both ignored. Both are dangerous in different ways. Morvak lives in a permanent winter. Its cities are abandoned except for black market runners and broken things. Nirell, Nirell is a contradiction.

Beauty rots beside garbage.

The central city gleams with commercial glory. Syndicate towers pierce the sky. The outer rings, however, are drowning in the trash the other dominions don’t want. Waste is shipped here in silent convoys. The poor live in stacked shelters made of plastic, glass and forgotten luxury. They pick through garbage to find food, value, and warmth. No one looks at Nirell too closely. It is a dominion both essential and discardable...

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That's it for now pookies see you in the next chapter...

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_CHAPTER ONE_

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{ORANGE HILL}

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Their shouts cracked through the thick stink of the air like it owed them something.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Two women, both old enough to have outlived common sense, were wrestling over a blanket that had clearly been through several lives before it landed in Orange Hill.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ The thing was crusted with brown stains, torn at the corners, one of its seams unraveling like loose intestines.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ It wasn’t even warm looking. But here, anything soft was gold. The left one yanked, spit flying from her wrinkled lips. The right one dug her bare feet into a pile of crushed bottles to anchor herself. Glass cracked under her heel. Neither of them flinched.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ The wind shifted and the smell hit me harder than it had that morning. Rancid plastic. Rotting fruit cores. Burnt rubber. Grease. Wet mold. Things I couldn’t even name. Things that never should have existed together. It was the scent of everything no one wanted anymore and that was the point. Orange Hill was the end of the line. The last stop for the forgotten and the filth.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Every dominion had a contract with Nirell. More specifically, with the bottom side of Nirell. Waste Management Unit 47B. Orange Hill. That meant anything unsalvageable from all twelve dominions was packed into silver cubes, tagged, and dumped here. Broken tech. Stale food. Soiled luxury. Torn fabrics. Expired medicine. Even the occasional body part that fell through the system.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ I was born in Orange Hill. Raised in it. Fed by it. Or, at least, I fed myself with whatever it coughed up. When I was six, I slipped into a pit of wet garbage trying to reach a plastic bag with what looked like cereal crumbs. I nearly drowned. My brother dragged me out by the ankle. I was coughing up a blue sludge for three days.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ That was the first time I almost died.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ It wasn’t the last.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Now I’m sixteen. Technically. No birth records around here. No candles or cakes either. Just my siblings giving me their extra bread crust and pretending we had something to celebrate.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Shoes? What are those? I lost my last pair when a pipe burst in the southeast trench. My feet are calloused hard and dirty like the rest of me. I’m wearing an oversized purple t-shirt that used to belong to my oldest sister. There’s a rip under the arm.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Underneath it, a thin grey long sleeve, the cuffs stretched out. My shorts were pants once. Then rats got to them, now they cling to my knees and flap when I walk.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ My hair’s wrapped up in a piece of faded cloth I found last week, acting as a headband. What’s underneath is two stiff, sun-bleached braids. I haven’t washed it in months. I can’t afford to. Water is a luxury here.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ The last time I bathed properly was two days ago at school. The scholarship kids like me get six-minute shower passes twice a week, because the rich kids said we smell, like duh of course we smell, WE ARE BEANTH POOR, in fact I know exactly how many pumps of soap the machine gives before it stops. Three. No more. You learn to make them count.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ A hand landed on my shoulder. I didn’t flinch. I didn’t need to turn around either.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Khis. My best friend since forever. Seventeen. Shaved head. Built from scraps and labor. He works, he steals, he survives. Still poor. Still here.

He holds out a half-bitten sandwich, mold growing on it.

He shrugs, takes a bite anyway

Just then, something glints in the trash. A real bag. Branded. Valuable.

Kaelina catches a glimpse of it by the corner of her eye, and before anyone could react, she bolted towards the item, diving into the sea of trash to get it.

Unfortunately, a girl also grabs the bag at the same time as her.

Since none of them back off, they are forced to fight, pulling each others hair hair. Scratching and rolling through trash.

All for a bag...

Khis finally catches up to Kaelina.

A shout brings the fight to a halt

And a strong hand yanks Kaelina back and off Lacy.

☆Kaelina's thoughts☆ Nema Vale. My sister. Second born. Twenty years old and full of disappointment. She had our father’s height and our mother’s stare. Cold and calculating. Like she always knew something we didn’t and hated that she couldn’t tell us.

Khis appeared beside Kaelina, picking bits of garbage out of my hair.

Another set of footsteps came

Riven

Eighteen. Middle child of five, I saw the youngest. Riven was probably born with a scowl on his face. He looked more like Nema than he looked like me. Same straight nose. Same gray-brown eyes. Same full lips and sharp chin. They could’ve been twins if not for the two-year gap.

He looked at me and didn’t say anything.

Riven didn’t respond. He just stepped past us, grabbed the bag from the ground, and handed it to me without a word.

We Ran. Fast.Trash flew under our feet as we tore through the dump field. The wind picked up behind us. We could hear shouting. Footsteps. Someone threw a bottle. But we didn’t stop.

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Goodness pookies that was long, anyways that's all for today.

_CHAPTER TWO_

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☆ Kaelina's thoughts ○ We ran as if our lives depended on it. It probably did, Lacy brothers were extremely violent and had the muscle to back it up.

☆ Kaelina's thoughts ☆ Lacy and her brothers continued to chase us, and we didn’t even know where we were going. We just needed to get as far as possible.

[ Northern Orange Hill ]

Nema ran ahead of Kaelina, Khis, and Riven, barely out of breath.

A shout disturbes their upcoming argument.

☆ Kaelina Thoughts ☆ Without an objection from the law abiding Nema, we ran up the hill, and Lacy and her brothers stopped at the warning signs.

☆ Kaelina's thoughts ☆ We quickly ran past all the warning and trespassing signs. Honestly, they should have put up a gate or something. We finally came to halt when we were sure we were in the clear and the bag still hung to my chest

Suddenly, Khis's ears perck up.

Khis finished his sentence and bolted towards the others, though exhausted followed him.

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Alrighty that's it for today, pookies.