Chapter 59
Wind screamed across the shattered plains of Varinholme as the second sun hovered just above the earth, casting everything in hues of smoke and rust. Trees wilted. Rivers turned to steam. Magic trembled in the air like a dying songbird.
And Nezutsu—stood still in the center of it all, chest rising and falling, the echo of Elaruh ringing in his veins.
"It's like something ancient just… woke up inside me," he murmured.
Serapheia, now visibly weakened, leaned against her staff of moon-glass. "It didn't just wake. It remembered."
Behind them, Kaelith guarded the citizens evacuating through a crumbling arcanite gate. Eshryn maintained a barrier with runes that frayed with every impact from the falling thrones above.
But none of them noticed what was rising from the deepest crater nearby—
A creature not born, but forgotten.
Subplot Twist: The Pale Veil Reborn
The crater glowed faintly violet, then cracked like an egg.
A whisper, like static from a dying god, filled the air.
And from the depths crawled something clad in tattered priest robes. Its head was wreathed in broken halos, and its arms were chains. Where eyes should be, it had an endless veil of white—shimmering with the tears of a thousand silenced voices.
"The Pale Veil…" Serapheia's voice cracked. "That… thing was once the High Oracle of Valestria."
"Was?" Nezutsu asked.
"Until he tried to speak the true name of the world. And was turned inside out by the Thronebreaker."
Now the Pale Veil turned toward Nezutsu, head twitching unnaturally.
It knelt.
"Ashless Flame," it spoke in five overlapping voices, "you are early."
The Memory of Names
The Pale Veil extended a hand, revealing a jagged sliver of obsidian wrapped in burning feathers.
"The world is cracking, and names are bleeding from its wounds. You must remember yours. Not the one given… but the one carved into your flame."
The moment Nezutsu touched it—
He was elsewhere.
A forgotten battlefield.
His feet stood on the bones of stars.
A city made of constellations burning in the distance.
In front of him—the Thronebreaker, tall, radiant, cruel. And beside him, a boy with the same face as Nezutsu. Smaller. Fragile.
Crying.
"You were mine once," the Thronebreaker whispered to the child, who wore a chain around his soul. "But you burned too bright. You disobeyed."
Nezutsu watched the memory unfold.
He saw the boy scream—and ignite.
Not with fire, but will. With refusal.
"That was the first death of the world," a voice said beside Nezutsu.
Serapheia's spirit, perhaps—woven through memory—gazed solemnly.
"You refused to be remade. And so the gods buried you. Hid you. Rewrote the stars. But a flame never forgets the shape of its burn."
Return & Awakening
Nezutsu snapped back into the present.
And now—he knew.
"My name was Sol'Tarein," he whispered. "That was who I was, before Nezutsu. The last spark of rebellion. The child who made even the gods afraid."
Serapheia's knees buckled. "Then it is true. You are the Fulcrum."
Kaelith shouted from afar, "We've got a bigger problem! The Ash Sun… it's falling!"
Twist: Countdown to Annihilation
The Ashen Sun had begun to split—like a cocoon. Inside it, writhing shadows formed rings of glyphs.
"It's forming a Seal of Dominion," Serapheia realized. "Once complete, it will erase all magic on this continent."
"Even yours?" Eshryn asked.
"Even mine."
"Even mine?" Nezutsu asked quietly.
"Especially yours."
"Then I'll stop it."
"You can't! Not unless—"
"—I let the Flame out."
The Other Flame
Before he could move, a second eruption of flame occurred beside the Ashen Sun.
But it wasn't Nezutsu's.
A mirror figure descended from the ash clouds—dressed in identical clothing, same face, same scars—except his flame was black and blue, not violet.
"What the—?"
The twin landed with a smirk.
"You're early, brother."
"Brother?" Nezutsu breathed.
"Did you think you were the only piece left behind?"
And the sky shattered.
[TO BE CONTINUED...]