Before empires fall, the earth remembers.
Before a war begins, the silence grows too loud to bear.
The tunnels beneath Ravenmark were not drawn on any map.
Walled off, sunken into time, they pulsed with old veins of spiritsteel and bones too ancient to name. Here, under layers of city and sin, Ash stood alone — facing a door that hadn't been opened in centuries.
It was not made of wood or iron.
It was carved from obsidian, etched with shifting glyphs that only glowed when he approached. Each symbol twisted like it recognized him — or feared him — as if the stone itself had been waiting.
Ash raised a hand.
The door opened without a sound.
He stepped into darkness.
Torchlight sputtered to life on the walls, one by one, revealing a long circular chamber buried far beneath Ravenmark's noble towers.
In the center stood a pedestal.
Upon it: a mask of jagged onyx and white gold. Its eyes were slits of red crystal, its edges cracked with age… yet untouched by dust. It radiated presence — not just magic, but will.
Ash stared at it, unmoving.
He knew what it was.
He had worn it before.
"You're not supposed to be real," came a voice from the dark.
Ash didn't turn.
A figure stepped into view — Lady Seris Malgrave, cloaked in raven-feather black. She held no torch, yet the fire followed her like a loyal hound.
She stared at the mask. Then at him.
"They called it myth. A weapon wielded by the First Warborn. The one who conquered the Tribes of Flame and broke the Old Crown. You shouldn't exist."
Ash's reply was quiet.
"And yet here I am."
Seris approached slowly, her eyes gleaming like knives catching moonlight.
"Are you… him? The same soul? Reborn?"
"No," Ash said. "I buried him."
A pause. A breath.
"But the world kept digging."
Above them, the city's surface bristled with tension.
Whispers spread like wildfire: that Ash had vanished into the stone, that the nobles had summoned shadow-binders, that the old shrines had begun to weep blood.
In Lowend, people lit candles in their windows.
Not to mourn.
But to mark loyalty.
To prepare.
To believe.
Deep below, Seris touched the edge of the mask, her fingertips barely grazing its cracked surface.
"You don't have to put it on."
"I know."
"You could walk away from this. Be a symbol. Inspire the broken. But once you put this on, you're no longer just Ash. You're something older. Something the world has forgotten how to fight."
Ash nodded.
"That's why they'll lose."
He picked up the mask.
The obsidian flared with red.
For a moment, the torches flickered out — replaced by images burned into the walls: legions marching beneath the black sun, mountains shattered by a single strike, banners drenched in gold fire and ash.
Ash did not flinch.
"This world," he whispered, "was built on the bones of a lie. A peace written in fear. That ends now."
He turned to Seris.
"Stand with me, or leave. But do not get in the way."
She did not speak.
She simply bowed her head… just slightly.
Then turned, her cloak of feathers vanishing into the dark.
Ash stood alone in the chamber once more.
He held the mask, feeling the weight of centuries.
Of victory.
Of destruction.
Of the man he used to be — and the war that was never finished.
Then, without ceremony…
He placed the mask upon his face.
The torches died.
The earth shuddered.
And far above, in the highest tower of House Velron, Lord Valric awoke choking in his bed — a mark scorched into his chest, shaped like a downward sword in flame.
He screamed
But no one heard him over the howl of the wind.