The following text contains major spoilers for Spin of Fate.

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Prologue

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14 year old AINA lives with her mother in the destitute lower realm of Malin. They are constantly on the run from enemy soldiers and bloodthirsty monsters. Aina finds a fox caught in one of her traps. Instead of killing the animal for meat, Aina sets it free so it can be with its cub. This causes her soul-spin to flip from negative to positive, resulting in a flash of white light.

The white flash awakens a giant nagamor that is slumbering nearby. The peacock snake attacks Aina, and her mother comes to the rescue, fending off the beast using channeling. As mother and daughter flee the nagamor, Aina’s foot slips through a gateway—a torana—leading to the blissful upper realm of Mayana. Her mother cannot enter since unlike Aina’s, her soul-spin is negative. Aina is reluctant to leave Malin, but her mother forces her into Mayana and blocks the torana with a boulder so Aina cannot return.

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Part I

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Aina, now 15, lives in the Mayani kingdom of Kirnos. For the past year, she has tried returning to Malin so she can reunite with her mother. However, the torana have been sealed by the upper realm authorities—an organization known as the Preservation—making voluntary descension impossible. Aina commits petty crimes in the hope of flipping her soul-spin so that she is forced to descend. When none of her crimes work, she tries something more drastic and attacks HIMALIA, the princess of Kirnos.

Aina is caught by a 17 year old royal guard, ARANEL, who sends her to a temple so she can repent. Here Aina meets ZENYRA, the leader of a group called the Balancers. Zenyra invites Aina to join the Balancers, who reside in Malin and are committed to aiding the unfortunate Malini. Aina decides to join the Balancers because she is intrigued by the Balancer’s mission, and because Zenyra—who is powerful enough to undo the seals on the torana—gives Aina an easy way into Malin.

Meanwhile, Aranel watches his brother SAMAREL ascend to the uppermost realm of Paramos. Aranel wishes to follow, but his soul-spin is not high enough for the torana to permit him through. A Preserver named SEIREM asks Aranel to spy on the Balancers. Seirem believes their charity is a guise and Zenyra’s true mission is something more insidious that could endanger the realms. Desperate to do some good and hoping this deed might improve his soul-spin, Aranel enters Malin as a spy.

In Malin, a 17 year old warrior named MEIZAN takes shelter under a volcano along with the five surviving members of his clan, Kanjallen. They are on the run from enemy soldiers; henchmen of the evil warlord KALDRAV who is trying to gain control over all of Malin. Meizan does not know what has happened to the other 3,000 members of his clan, who disappeared several moons earlier. Meizan and his chief, KANNA, dig an underground tunnel so their injured clansmen can escape.

Due to a channeling mishap, the tunnel explodes, leaving Meizan and Kanna surrounded by enemies. They are separated in the ensuing fray and Meizan meets an unsuspecting Aranel, who is blundering through Malin in search of the Balancer hideout, Incaraz. Meizan takes Aranel hostage, thinking he can trade him with the Balancers for medicine to use on his clansmen. The two bump into Aina, who is also looking for Incaraz.

As Aina, Aranel, and Meizan journey past the volcano, they are attacked by poisonous monkeys. Meizan channels to fight them off, but accidentally triggers an explosion that buries his clanmates. The trio escape to safety and find Incaraz, where Zenyra is expecting Aina. Aranel joins the Balancers as a spy, and Meizan, now alone and clanless, does so because Incaraz offers him refuge from Kaldrav’s soldiers.

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Part II

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Aina, Aranel, and Meizan settle into Incaraz and train under the instruction of three more senior Balancers: HIRAVAL, TARALEI, and REIMI. Channeling in Malin carries the risk of tainting the channelers’ soul and twisting their actions into violence; thus their training focuses on specialized techniques that will minimize the amount they expose their souls to Malin.

However, Aina is impatient to leave Incaraz and find her mother. Zenyra convinces her to stay a while and become stronger first. Aina trains diligently, but finds herself lagging behind Aranel and Meizan. Zenyra discovers a deformity in Aina’s keiza—the swirl on her forehead that allows her to channel—and hypothesizes that it is the reason behind Aina’s poor mastery of channeling.

In the meantime, Aranel fails to uncover anything suspicious about the Balancers. He does find reason to suspect Seirem, when, during one of his weekly reports, he notices the Preserver drinking from a flask containing an unusual shimmery substance. Instead of confronting Seirem, Aranel befriends Aina on the Preserver’s request, hoping to use her to learn more about Zenyra.

Aranel’s attempts to befriend Meizan, however, end in disappointment, as the latter shows little interest in him outside of spars. Aranel and Meizan are on lookout duty when they spot Kaldrav’s soldiers passing Incaraz. Meizan finds it suspicious that the soldiers, despite knowing the hideout’s location, do not press an attack. They fantasize about waging a war against the upper realms, something Meizan dismisses as impossible, since the soldiers have no means to ascend.

Later, Samarel comes to warn Aranel off his mission, saying that Seirem is using Aranel to further his own position within the Preservation. Desperate to one-up the brother he has always felt inferior to, Aranel rebuffs his advice. Meizan witnesses the brothers’ exchange, thereby discovering that Aranel is a spy. Since Meizan bears no loyalty toward Zenyra, he does not reveal Aranel’s treachery, but privately warns him not to endanger them with his antics. 

As the trio advance in their training, Zenyra teaches them full body projection, which involves removing the entirety of the soul from the body. Despite projection being an extremely difficult technique, Aina masters it very quickly on account of her faulty keiza. Aranel takes longer, but when he finally succeeds, he explores Incaraz and discovers a part of the hideout has been sealed off. He also notices that the hot springs contain the same shimmery substance that Seirem has been drinking.

While Aranel wonders whether Seirem can be trusted, Aina and Meizan grow to appreciate the comfort and safety that Incaraz provides. The trio attend a feast for Hiraval, Taralei, and Reimi, who have finished their training and leave the hideout on a long-term mission.

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Part III

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Zenyra takes Aina, Aranel, and Meizan on an emergency mission to a Malini village. Here they meet Taralei, who is looking after children who were left orphaned and injured when Kaldrav’s soldiers attacked their home. Zenyra explains the core purpose of the Balancers: to aid innocent children and give them a better life, in hopes that with love and care, they will be able to ascend. This hits Aranel particularly hard, and he begins to question all the things he’d grown up believing about the Malini being born evil.

While healing the children, Aina hears information that leads her to believe her mother is one of the many Malini embroiled in a nearby battle against Kaldrav’s forces. Meizan, too, learns that the 3,000 members of clan Kanjallen—whose whereabouts were unknown to him—are resisting Kaldrav. Aina sets off for the battlefield. She is followed by Meizan, who wants to find his clan… and Aranel, who simply wants to ensure that Meizan and Aina are safe.

When Aina reaches the battlefield, she sees a helmed woman riding a nagamor. The nagamor rider easily smites large portions of Kaldrav’s army. Amidst the chaos of battle, Aina is noticed by Kaldrav’s soldiers. She fights them off, and Aranel and Meizan arrive to back her up. The trio are soon outnumbered, captured, and imprisoned in Kaldrav’s fortress of Kaufgar. Aina and Aranel learn that the helmed nagamor rider is Meizan’s clan chief. Aina projects out of her body to inform Zenyra of their situation.

Meizan’s chief attacks Kaufgar with her nagamor and Kanjallen’s forces. The mayhem allows Aina, Aranel, and Meizan to escape. When Zenyra arrives to rescue them, she strikes the troops surrounding Kaufgar—including Kanjallen and their chief. A fierce battle ensues between the two women, in which the chief’s helm is knocked off. Aina is shocked to recognize her mother, Kanna. She reveals herself, but is heartbroken when her mother spurns her attempt at a reunion and tells her to stay away.

Zenyra takes Aina back to Incaraz with Aranel. Meizan, also stunned by the revelation that Aina is Kanna’s daughter, speaks with his chief. Kanna confides that she returned to their clan only after Aina’s ascension. She believes that Meizan, like Aina, is better off away from her and Kanjallen’s life of violence. She gives Meizan her final command: to return to the safety of Incaraz and look after Aina. Unwilling but ever loyal, Meizan complies.

In Incaraz, Zenyra comforts a distraught Aina and lets her know there is something unique about her keiza: the deformity in it causes Aina’s soul to change spin more slowly than others. Zenyra further explains that when a soul’s spin flips from negative to positive, or vice-versa, it passes momentarily through a fifth realm called the Universal Void. According to Zenyra, the Void is an empty white space, and that brief journey registers in the brain as a flash of white. In Aina’s case, due to her deformity, the passage lasts a few seconds longer than most people’s. During these moments, a torana appears, granting access to the Void. While Zenyra seems excited by this discovery, Aina doesn’t see the appeal in a gateway that leads into emptiness.

Aranel finally confronts Seirem about his mission and the lies he was brainwashed with, stating that the Malini are victims and Zenyra’s mission is truly charitable. To sway him, Seirem discloses what the Preservation have observed: instances of erasure—the complete and explosive destruction of a soul, a fate more permanent than death—that are disrupting the system that governs the realms. Seirem claims the erasures coincide with Zenyra’s activities in Malin, but Aranel is unconvinced.

He returns to Incaraz where he is waylaid by Zenyra, who knew he was the Preserver’s spy all along. She insists she has nothing to hide, and when Aranel asks her about the shimmery substance in the hot springs, she reveals it to be megarya blood. The blood of the megarya—a mythical winged dolphin—is banned in the upper realms due to its secret property: it can inflate a soul’s positive spin. Zenyra admits to ingesting it because she fears her soul will turn evil after prolonged channeling in Malin. She wants to keep her soul pure so she can continue the Balancer’s mission. Aranel accepts her reasoning and is more disgusted by Seirem, who has been drinking the blood to remain in Paramos, his morality a farce.

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Conflicted over his loyalties, Aranel challenges Meizan to a spar to clear his head. They are interrupted when Kaldrav’s soldiers break into Incaraz. Aranel and Meizan fight them off on the ground, while Aina provides support from above. They are vastly outnumbered and close to being overwhelmed when Kanjallen comes to their rescue. Meizan’s clansman RENJAN orders the soldiers to take Aranel hostage, but Meizan stops them from hurting him. His intervention allows Aranel to flee into Mayana, while Aina is carried away by Zenyra. Meizan escapes with his clan as Kaldrav’s soldiers destroy Incaraz.

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Part IV

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Aina awakes after days of drug-induced sleep to find herself tied up on a boat in the middle of the Malini sea. She is accompanied by an uncharacteristically agitated Zenyra, who refuses to free her, stating that Aina is too important to lose. Zenyra steers the boat to an island with a torana that leads into the lowermost realm of Narakh. A stranger emerges from within and greets Zenyra like an old friend. Aina is shocked to learn the stranger is none other than Kaldrav, who was Zenyra’s ally the entire time. Kaldrav has amassed his army on Zenyra’s request, and they plan to wage war against the upper realms and the Preservation.

As the two discuss their plans, a disagreement breaks out, which escalates into Kaldrav assaulting Zenyra. She retaliates by stabbing him in the keiza with a syringe of shimmering megarya blood. Kaldrav’s soul is too rotten to withstand this sudden inrush of pure blood, and his soul ends up erasing. As Kaldrav’s entire being explodes into nothingness, a regretful Zenyra steers the boat away from the island.

Back in Mayana, Aranel confronts Seirem about the megarya blood. The Preserver defends his consumption of it by saying he is privy to secrets about the universe that must be protected, for which he must remain in Paramos. He explains that Zenyra’s activities in Malin—which he suspects are causing erasures—risk awakening the planetary nagamor, Azyaka, who lies deep within the realm. As one of the four colossal beasts who created the universe, Azyaka has the power to destroy it if roused, which is why the Preservation are desperate to stop Zenyra.

When Aranel demands to know how Seirem is aware of all this, the Preserver says he has seen it reflected across the system that governs the realms. The system, a physical entity, is located inside the Universal Void, and includes the barriers that separate the upper and lower realms. Aranel is shocked to learn this, since he believed the realms were separated by an impenetrable cosmic force, not something as physical and tangible as a barrier—which could be broken if subjected to enough force. But Seirem assures him that the barriers can only be broken from within the Void, which no one outside the Preservation has access to. The Preservers destroyed all torana leading to the Void long ago; the only one still intact is located inside their headquarters in Paramos and guarded at all times.

As Seirem reveals more secrets about the system and the universe, Aranel is left feeling confused, betrayed, and wholly unconvinced that the innocent children born to Malin are deserving of their fates. But he bites his tongue as Seirem thanks him for his services and terminates his mission, offering Aranel his reward: enough megarya blood to allow him into Paramos and a position in the Preservation.

Meanwhile, Meizan returns to the remains of Incaraz on Kanna’s orders to search for Aina. He bumps into Aranel, who is trying to find evidence that links Zenyra to the erasures. They explore the hideout and stumble upon Zenyra’s secret chamber that had been sealed off before Kaldrav’s army broke in. Here they find a pool of megarya blood, as well as a row of tombstones and decaying bodies. Further inside, they discover syringes of black blood from a vandraghor, the demon roach that resides in Narakh. Vandraghor blood has the opposite effect of megarya blood and inflates a soul’s negative spin. Aranel and Meizan read Zenyra’s notes and learn that she has been experimenting with Balancers and Malini children from the villages: by injecting their keiza with vandraghor or megarya blood, she has been trying to make their soul-spins flip. Unfortunately, her experiments have caused close to one hundred erasures, including those of Hiraval and Reimi.

Aranel, who has heard from Aina about her defective keiza, realizes that Zenyra intends to try and flip her soul as well. He deduces that Zenyra’s true intention is to manifest a torana to the Universal Void, so she can enter and change the system that governs the realms. By drinking the megarya blood given to him by Seirem, Aranel ascends to Paramos and rushes to the Preservation’s headquarters. He meets Seirem there and stabs him with a syringe of vandraghor blood taken from Zenyra’s chamber, which causes the Preserver to descend to Mayana.

Aranel finds the torana that leads to the Void, but it is being guarded by Samarel. He tries to convince Samarel to let him through, stating he wishes to change the system in a way that makes the realms less unbalanced. The two brothers clash, both physically and ideologically. Aranel ultimately prevails using a trick he picked up from Aina.

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Aina herself has learned the truth from Zenyra who hands her a syringe of vandraghor blood and tells her to stab her own keiza. Zenyra is convinced that Aina’s deformity will cause a descension, during which the torana to the Void will appear for long enough to let Zenyra through. While Aina is disgusted and hurt by Zenyra’s lies, manipulation, and treachery, she also longs for the reality Zenyra paints: a future where both Aina and her mother could live a peaceful life in Mayana, something impossible within the constraints of the current system. 

Meizan returns to Kanna and reveals what he and Aranel discovered in Incaraz. Fearing for Aina’s safety, they ride Kanna’s nagamor across Malin in search of her. As they ride, Kanna tells Meizan that she intends to thwart Zenyra’s plans and keep the system as it is; she is content to live in a hellish world, so long as Aina is safe in Mayana. She cares not for equality, only her daughter’s well-being. Meizan, too, thinks that he would rather be stuck in Malin with Kanna and Kanjallen than embroiled in a war between the uppers and lowers.

Meizan and Kanna find Aina just as she stabs herself with a syringe of vandraghor blood. As Aina descends, there is a flash of white, and the torana to the Void appears. Zenyra enters, followed by Kanna and Meizan, and they arrive at the system: a physical representation of the realms and their barriers. Meizan and Kanna team up to stop Zenyra from interfering with the system, when Aranel arrives. With an impassioned speech about equality and a better future, Zenyra convinces Aranel to go along with her vision of breaking the barriers and recombining the realms. Meizan and Aranel clash while Zenyra fights Kanna, until all four are drained of energy.

Zenyra needs energy to break the barriers; since she is exhausted, she decides to take it from Kanna. By stabbing Kanna’s keiza with megarya blood, Zenyra harnesses the energy from her erasure to break one of the barriers. Aina, who has projected her soul into the Void, watches helplessly as her mother’s soul is wiped from the universe. An explosion rocks the Void, casting everyone out. Aranel is returned to Mayana, and Meizan and Aina to Malin.

A rift opens in the barrier between Malin and Mayana, allowing Kaldrav’s army—now led by Zenyra—through. Aranel watches in horror as Zenyra commands them to first attack Kirnos, where the Preservation hold great influence. He is plagued by regret about his choice to side with Zenyra in the Void, but hopes that the war will end soon so they can rebuild a more equal universe. Aranel goes to Malin to convince Meizan and Aina to join him. Aina attacks him on sight, blaming him for her mother’s erasure. She vows to join the Preservation so she can get vengeance on Zenyra, and swears to erase Aranel if they ever cross paths again. Meizan also rejects Aranel’s offer and tells him he is naive to believe Zenyra’s promises. He leaves to find his clan and the trio thus part ways.

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Epilogue

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Malin is ravaged by earthquakes as Azyaka awakens. Deep below the surface, a giant eye blinks open.

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