I stood at the cliff's edge, my eyes locked on the ever-twisting maze below. From up here, the labyrinth looked endless, like some massive, breathing thing sprawled beneath the sky.
A place stitched together by chaos and madness. Somewhere in that void, Dune and Syras were running.
Beside me, the black-masked wolf, Rehan stood tall, arms crossed.
"They jumped in there?" he asked, voice low behind the obsidian wolf mask.
I nodded silently, clutching my yellow fox mask a little tighter around my face. I didn't know what to say. What could I say? I saw them leap into that cursed place like it was nothing.
Rehan exhaled through his nose. "Tch. Can't do anything about it. I'm not risking Faceless' lives for two damn Whispers. They are probably dead already."
He turned away, already moving. "We hunt again tomorrow."
But before he could take another step, something rustled in the brush, sharp, urgent movement. A masked figure burst from the trees, breathing hard. Blue wolf mask.
"Nevron?" Rehan narrowed his eyes. "Why aren't you with the team?"
Nevron knelt quickly. "Sir Rehan, we have a problem… A huge problem."
I tensed.
Rehan didn't speak. He just waited.
"One of our four villages, Village of Alisya has been destroyed. Erased. Buildings crushed. Fields burned. Over half the people killed. The rest…" Nevron hesitated. "The rest were enslaved. To be used as fragments."
I heard how Rehan's heartbeat fastened. But Nevron wasn't done.
"And… worse…" His voice broke slightly. "Ruler Alisya… is dead."
Everything went still.
Then Rehan's green Neba ignited like wildfire. The earth trembled beneath his feet, stone splitting from the sheer pressure as green flames twisted in the air.
He didn't shout. His voice was sharp. Low. Deadly.
"Who did it? Tell me everything, Nevron."
I was trembling now. Not just from the rage in Rehan's voice, but from what it all meant. A Ruler… one of the four, the eternal wardens of the Trial… is dead?
That wasn't just shocking, it was impossible. Rulers had stood for thousands of years. Not even calamities dared to touch them. They shaped and controlled this world. They were the Trial.
And now… one was gone.
Nevron lifted his head. "He left one survivor… to send a message. He calls himself…"
A pause.
"Dragonslayer."
Rehan's fists clenched.
"Dragonslayer?" he repeated.
"Yes. That's what he named himself. He leads an army of Whispers. Hundreds of them. They are all well trained, blood-hardened, like monsters hiding in human skin.
"The survivor described Dragonslayer as tall, broad-shouldered, with long, fiery crimson hair and burning red eyes. He wielded a massive sword, big enough to split houses clean in half."
"He didn't just kill. He enjoyed it. He bathed in the blood of villagers and laughed like he was born for war."
I couldn't stop shaking.
This wasn't just another rogue Whisper. This was… something else.
"A devil," Nevron whispered. "A Crimson Devil of Rendely."
Rehan said nothing. He waited.
Nevron swallowed. "His last words… the message he left behind for us all…"
"There is nothing I hate more than the desperate, the ones who'll lick mud, eat shame, and crawl on broken knees just to cling to a breath of life. That's what you are. Trial humans. Faceless, nameless and hopeless. You claw for survival like rats in a burning cage.
"So I've come to end your suffering."
"I've come to crush the weak who forgot how to die with dignity."
"Tell your villages. Tell your leaders and rulers."
"Dragonslayer is coming."
"With a sword sharp enough to split your gods."
"And a flame strong enough to burn your history."
"I am the Crimson Devil of Rendely."
"And I'm here to make the Trial… bleed."
The wind howled across the cliff's edge, stirring the grass and leaves, but no one moved. Nevron kept his head bowed. I could feel sweat pooling under my mask.
Rehan's Neba still crackled around him, green fire curling like vines up his arms, splitting the ground beneath his boots. His aura was too dense, too violent, like a second heartbeat that shook the earth.
Finally, Nevron lifted his face, voice quiet but urgent.
"…Sir Rehan. What are your orders?"
Rehan didn't answer right away. He was still staring out over the horizon. The labyrinth below was long forgotten now. Even Dune and Syras, trapped somewhere in its heart, were ghosts compared to this.
Then, slowly, Rehan's flames began to die down. The shaking stopped. The fire hissed out like steam, leaving only smoke curling around his hands.
He straightened.
"Let me get this straight," he said, voice razor-sharp. "A Whisper… thinks he can declare war on the Trial?"
His words were soft.
But they burned more than fire.
"He kills a Ruler… leads an army of stray rats… and gives himself a title like Dragonslayer?" He laughed under his mask.
I glanced at Nevron. He didn't dare speak again. Rehan rolled his neck, the crack of bone loud in the quiet.
"If a Whisper wants a war…" He turned, his black wolf mask catching the last light of dusk.
"Then we'll give him one."
"I don't care how big his army is. Or how loud he roars. When the dust settles, I'll be the one standing over his broken body."
His green Neba flickered again, coiling around his fists like venomous snakes.
"And when I find him…" Rehan's voice dipped into something cold.
"I won't just kill him. I'll erase his name. I'll drag his soul through the Trial itself, and when I'm done, even the whispers will forget who he was."
He stepped past us, cloak catching the wind.
"Let him come."
I could barely move.
Rehan, the coldest of the Wolves, was no longer just hunting.
He was declaring judgment.
And the Crimson Devil of Rendely?
He'd just made himself the target of a storm.