The air inside Aether'Khal had changed.
No longer did it smell of ruin and silence—it now pulsed with purpose. Magic flowed again through its veins. But Syrith Kaen Drexil's mind was elsewhere. The fragments of memory from the crystal haunted him, whispering riddles he couldn't yet solve.
Someone he trusted had killed him. But who? And why?
Averith watched him pace the chamber below the Echo Throne, her flame-lit eyes narrowed. "We need more than broken visions," she said. "We need names. Clues. Blood."
"We need the Bloodmarked Map," Roukhal said suddenly.
Syrith stopped. "That artifact was destroyed in the Skyfall War."
Roukhal shook his head. "That's what we were told. But I've read old logs in the Shadow Wing Library. It wasn't destroyed. It was sealed. Beneath the city of Tharan-Khul—deep in the bone crypts."
Averith's expression darkened. "The city of the dead?"
Roukhal nodded. "Buried under molten stone and ash. Forgotten by time, except for those who don't want it remembered."
Syrith stepped closer. "Tell me what you know."
Roukhal unsheathed a scroll from his belt, covered in ancient sigils inked in dried red—a language only the high blood-priests of old could read. "The Bloodmarked Map doesn't show roads or kingdoms. It shows… betrayals. Any blood spilled unjustly is marked on its skin. If your murder was written into fate, the map will show it."
Averith whispered, "Then it's not just a map—it's a memory etched in flesh."
Syrith's eyes glowed faintly. "Prepare a descent team. We head to Tharan-Khul at first dark."
That night, they flew through storm-winds on the back of Kaelorath, descending past the clouds into a region cloaked in eternal smoke. Thunder cracked like a voice of warning. Below lay the dead city: Tharan-Khul, sunken in lava-rock, haunted by the past.
They landed on jagged stone, surrounded by broken towers and molten rifts. A stench of death lingered, unmoved by time.
They entered the crypts with blades drawn.
For hours, they navigated bone corridors and tomb spirals, until they reached a door made of petrified hearts—still faintly beating.
Syrith pressed his palm to the seal. It burned into his skin, drawing a drop of blood.
The door opened.
Inside was a single pedestal. On it lay the Bloodmarked Map, bound in sinew, pulsing faintly like living skin.
Roukhal stepped forward carefully. "If you open it, there's no turning back. It will show every betrayal tied to your name. Even those you didn't know about."
Syrith didn't hesitate. "Let it show me."
He opened the map.
It screamed.
The skin uncurled, blood rising like ink. Symbols bloomed in red fire. Betrayals spilled forth, one by one, stretching across a canvas of pain.
Syrith's eyes locked on one: a sigil surrounded by a crown of thorns, marked with a serpent's tail.
His hands trembled.
"That mark," Averith said, "belongs to the House of Vael'Thar."
Syrith's jaw clenched. "They were my allies. My inner court."
Roukhal muttered, "One of them... poisoned you. Not for power. For something deeper. This map doesn't lie."
The map's center burned brighter.
Then a new mark appeared.
Not in red—but in black.
A mark even the map seemed to fear.
A silent pulse echoed through the room.
Syrith stepped closer.
"What is that?" Averith whispered.
Roukhal stared, pale. "That… is not betrayal. That's prophecy."
On the black mark, a single name appeared—one none of them had ever heard before:
"Vaerion."
The ink bled downward, twisting into words:
"When the King returns, the Reaper shall awaken. One is crowned in storm. The other in silence. And only one shall reign."
Silence fell.
Syrith closed the map slowly.
Then said with quiet finality:
"Find me Vaerion. Alive or dead—he holds the next piece of the blade."
The hunt had begun.
And across distant lands, the name Vaerion stirred monsters from sleep.