---
Kael came to with blood in his mouth and a sky split by fire.
The crater had changed.
Where once there was glass, now there was only molten sand, shaped into spiraling runes—unreadable, but familiar. As if they weren't meant to be read, but remembered.
His bones screamed as he pushed himself up. His fingers stung. His back burned.
And standing at the center of it all, untouched by the chaos—
Was it.
The creature that wore a Kael-shaped shadow.
Six wings folded in flame. Eyes like scorched glass.
It smiled with Kael's mouth.
> "You woke early," it said. "Not many survive that."
---
Eira scrambled to her feet beside him, her eyes flickering with silver energy, breath shallow and fast.
> "What… is that?"
Kael didn't answer.
Because a part of him already knew.
The thing stepped forward. Its feet didn't touch the ground. Heat bent around it like worship. Every word it spoke felt like it came from behind Kael's ears—too close, too deep.
> "I am what comes after."
"After gods burned out. After cities fell. After mankind forgot how to listen to the fire inside them."
Its voice echoed across their bones.
Kael stared. "You're part of the Devourer."
The thing tilted its head.
> "I am one of its tongues."
---
Arion and Vireya stirred, just behind Kael. Arion raised his weapon, but it melted in his grip before he could aim.
Vireya dragged herself up, blood in her teeth. "This... isn't tech. This is something old."
> "This is what the Emberborn worship," Kael said. "Not the Devourer. Not death. This."
The being nodded.
> "They name us Flame. But we are simply truth."
It turned to Kael.
> "You were supposed to awaken in a hundred years. You were not meant to break free this soon."
Kael took a slow step forward, despite the burn in his lungs.
> "I don't care what I was 'meant' for."
> "That," the being smiled, "is why I'm allowed to test you."
---
The air cracked.
Without warning, Kael fell to his knees, screaming.
Not from injury.
From memory.
Visions tore into his mind:
Himself, screaming in chains as fire crawled up his arms.
Eira, crucified in light, crying his name before she shattered into cinders.
Sel, begging for forgiveness as Kael buried a blade in his chest.
A Citadel… burning, and Kael at the center of the storm, laughing with hollow eyes.
None of it real.
Not yet.
But it could be.
The being's voice slithered into him:
> "You think you choose. But choice is illusion. Your blood already remembers what your mind resists."
Kael gritted his teeth.
> "No fate controls me."
The creature leaned closer. "Then prove it."
---
Kael rose—slow, unsteady, but upright.
"I'm not your weapon," he said. "I'm not your prophecy. I'm not your pawn."
The creature blinked once—genuinely curious.
> "Then what are you?"
Kael didn't know yet.
But he felt it building—beneath the skin, in the marrow, in the part of him that survived the mirror.
The same fire the creature spoke with—
Was in him.
He raised his hand, and for the first time—
The flame answered.
His palm erupted in red-orange light, licking up his arm, but not burning.
Controlled. Alive.
The creature paused.
> "Well. This changes things."
---
The being took one step back and vanished like smoke.
But not before speaking one final phrase that chilled the crater to silence:
> "The other one awakens soon."
"And she will not ask questions first."
Kael fell to one knee again, sweating, trembling.
Eira caught him.
> "What the hell was that?"
Kael whispered, "A messenger."
> "From what?"
> "From whatever I'm becoming."
---
Later that night, as they camped in the hollow remnants of the crater, Kael sat alone.
His hand—still smoldering faintly—wouldn't stop trembling.
Not with fear.
With hunger.
Something inside him was waking up.
Something old.
Something that wanted more.
And in the distance, beyond the dunes, far from firelight…
A woman stood atop a ruined Citadel wall.
Hair white as bone.
Eyes like dying suns.
And in her arms—she cradled a blade forged in Kael's name.
> "Let him rise," she whispered. "So I can burn him down."