It was the dusk of one age, the dawn of another—a time when the quiet hum of ancient dreams faded beneath the tread of a new and terrible ambition. The Radiance, an effulgent god of primordial being, held sway over the soft and slumbering minds of the insect kingdom. It was a time when her light united all creatures into a single consciousness, their individuality subsumed, their thoughts but whispers in her luminous hive. Her reign was timeless and unchallenged, a gleaming crown above the dim world below.
But light, no matter how enduring, casts a shadow. And so it was that the Wyrm, a being as old and vast as the stones of the earth, slithered forth from the depths of memory. From the dying body of this ancient serpent arose the Pale King, a creature not of light but of sovereign will. He bore a vision of a kingdom, Hallownest, where the minds of his subjects would be their own, where insects might rise above their instincts to grasp for greatness. To these ends, the Pale King extended his pale glow, a new beacon that supplanted the Radiance and offered freedom from her thrall. The moths, her chosen children, turned their wings toward this new light, and thus, her radiance dimmed.
Yet the Radiance was no mere flame to be extinguished by time or choice. She lingered, a scar upon the dreams of Hallownest, her presence festering in the forgotten corners of slumber. The Pale King, in his towering hubris, would not suffer this rival. He sought a means to silence her forever—a prison to bind her light. In the Abyss, a pit of blackened depths teeming with the Void, he found his answer. There, among shadows thicker than despair, he shaped vessels: fragile beings of hollowness, empty of self, meant to seal the Radiance within their formless purity.
One vessel rose above the rest, unbroken in its emptiness. The Pale King named it the Hollow Knight, his perfect creation, the savior of his kingdom. With solemn ceremony, the Radiance was trapped within the Hollow Knight, entombed in the Black Egg, and sealed by three loyal Dreamers—guardians whose eternal sleep would bar the way to the prison.
But dreams are stubborn things, and light, though confined, will find the smallest crack. Over the long years, the Radiance began to seep back into the world, her infection an orange blight that turned the proud citizens of Hallownest into mindless husks. The Hollow Knight, too, faltered, cracks spreading through its perfect form, the seal weakening.
In this broken world, among ruins overgrown with despair and echoes of what once was, a new vessel stirs. It is one deemed unworthy, a failure discarded into the Abyss. Yet it rises, a fragment of the Void made flesh, carrying the faintest glimmer of purpose. It bears no crown, no destiny ordained by the Pale King, but it climbs nonetheless—toward Hallownest, toward the Black Egg, toward the flickering remnants of a kingdom betrayed by its dreams.
As the pale moths circle once more, and the infection spreads like an ominous tide, the vessel steps forth. A silent shadow in a land of faded glory, it carries the weight of a question yet unanswered: can the darkness of the Void swallow the Radiance whole, and in so doing, bring peace to a kingdom undone by its own ambitions?
And so, the tale begins.