When Ash Turns to Fire
Monshin stared into the obsidian mirror at the heart of the Spire of Chains.
Smoke coiled inside it, whispering secrets only ancient traitors could hear. Chains hung from the ceiling like dead serpents, swaying slightly as if disturbed by unseen hands. The air stank of burnt oaths and blood memory. Monshin's breath came out in fogged plumes, despite no cold being present.
"He made the pact," Nimistran said behind him. "The Ash-Wyrm lives again."
Monshin's gauntleted fist cracked the edge of the mirror.
"So be it."
He turned.
Behind him stood the four remaining Imperial Paladins—Arshimest the Oathforged, Selkan the Mirror-Eater, Voshtan the Pale, and Iravel the Silent Prayer. Once twelve. Now four.
Thermuz was gone.
But his war… had just begun.
"Send the Eclipse Host. And ready the Vault of Stars," Monshin said. "We burn everything he's touched."
Arshimest growled.
"Even Kelari?"
Monshin nodded. "Especially Kelari."
---
Meanwhile, in Kelari…
Matt stood atop the reforged Warborn wall, the ash-dragons circling above—ghostly serpents of fire and smoke, visible only to those who bore the Flamebound mark.
His body felt changed.
Stronger. Hotter. Sharper.
The Voidflame was now laced with Ashlight—a second spectral energy that bound memory, rage, and prophecy into every strike. His veins burned with dual power: one that devoured, and one that remembered.
"The Voidflame devoured. The Ashlight remembered. Together… they prophesied ruin."
Mailane approached.
"They're massing," she said. "We have less than a week before the next assault."
Matt nodded.
"Then we make it the last thing they ever do."
Grey teleported beside them in a flash of scorched air. "Bad news. The Eclipse Host just wiped out the north watch. Black fire. Soul nets. And… something else."
He held up a medallion.
It bore Thermuz's sigil—but warped, corrupted, oozing black residue.
Sam stepped in, inspecting it with a grim frown.
"That's soulforged. This wasn't made by Thermuz."
Matt's voice darkened.
"Then he's not just dead… he's rebuilding."
---
Elsewhere… in the Vault of Stars
Monshin walked across a bridge of silence, his reflection trailing behind him in reverse.
He approached a chained coffin hovering in a void of starlight. Celestial sigils floated around it, slowly eroding into glyphs of unmaking.
Inside it, something stirred.
"Time to wake, brother," Monshin whispered.
"The world needs your silence again."
---
The Flamebound War
Eclipse Host Rising
The first Eclipse Host arrived at dawn.
Not with warhorns.
Not with banners.
With silence.
Shadowed figures emerged from the mist, faces masked by silvered veils, bodies cloaked in robes of stitched soulcloth. Their blades whispered when drawn. Their feet never touched the ground.
Mailane spotted them first from the tower watch.
"They're here."
Matt joined her.
He saw them too.
Fifty figures at first.
Then a hundred.
Then more—spilling like ink across the horizon.
"Those aren't soldiers," Grey muttered. "They're ghosts with rules."
Sam's sigils flared. "That's soulforged binding. They're feeding off the mist. The longer we wait, the stronger they get."
Matt clenched his fist.
Voidflame ignited, swirling with Ashlight.
"Warborn—prepare to strike."
The War Council met inside Kelari's last standing keep.
Sam pounded the table. "This isn't a siege—it's a culling. We can't hold if we don't disrupt the soul siphons."
Mailane crossed her arms. "We move first. Hit them before they stabilize their field."
Grey nodded. "And we need names. People need to see heroes stand. I'll take Vanguard."
Matt turned to the lieutenants—Nira the Emberwalker, Boran the Hammerchain, Lysra the Flameweaver.
"Today, we burn brighter than ever."
---
The Battle of the Silver Ash
When the Warborn clashed with the Eclipse Host, the sky turned grey. Ash fell sideways.
The Host fought without emotion. No screams. No hesitation. Every strike bled heat and soul from the living.
But the Flamebound had changed Matt.
His strikes burned backwards through time. Where Eclipse blades drained, his Ashlight scorched memory. Soulcloth turned to crystal. Veils burst into screams.
Matt moved like the Wyrm incarnate—spinning, coiling, devouring the unnatural.
Mailane's Shadowsidian blade carved ghostlight, turning host captains into dust.
Grey danced through flame sigils—appearing behind foes, slashing, vanishing.
Sam inverted a soul-siphon. It exploded—pulling five Host members into a singularity of screaming bone.
The Warborn held.
Then the sky broke.
A figure descended—tall as a building, clad in silver flame.
Monshin's Messenger.
Eyes glowed like moons. Its sword spoke in reversed thunder.
"Matt Salurga," it intoned.
"The Vault of Stars has opened. The Warden awakens."
Matt narrowed his eyes.
"Let him wake. I'm done waiting for gods to fall."
"Now I pull them down."
He leapt.
Void and Ash ignited.
The Messenger met him.
Their blades struck.
The clouds shattered.
---
The Warden of Silence
There was no sound.
The moment Matt clashed with the Messenger, the battlefield went mute.
No war cries. No steel. No flame.
Just pressure.
The kind that crushed lungs and stole time.
The Warden had arrived.
A being from the Vault of Stars.
Neither dead nor alive.
Clad in mirrored bone.
Eyes like eclipses.
Armor made of peeled seconds.
Matt gasped—his breath crumbled.
Sam's voice shook. "It's not just muting… it's nulling. Dismantling concepts. I can't even cast a sigil."
Mailane gripped her sword. "Even my blade feels… forgotten."
The Warden raised a finger.
Ten Warborn fell.
No wounds. No screams. Just—absence.
Matt staggered.
He reached inward.
To the Flame.
To the Void.
To the Ash-Wyrm.
"What is this thing?"
The Wyrm replied—its voice like shifting coals in an endless throat.
"He is Silence. The first silence that followed the first scream. A god born when sound itself was betrayed."
"Can I kill it?"
"No."
"Then I'll break it."
Matt opened his eyes.
Gold and black.
He sheathed his sword.
And walked forward.
One step.
The Warden moved. Time unraveled.
Second.
Matt summoned no fire.
Third.
He stopped.
Then he spoke.
"I am Matt Salurga. I remember every scream."
A crack split the air.
Sound returned.
The Warden flinched.
Matt roared.
From his throat came every scream the Paladins ever silenced.
They hit the Warden like a tsunami.
Silence shattered.
The sky screamed again.
The Warden fell.
Matt collapsed.
Blood ran from his ears.
His voice raw.
But he smiled.
"Let them hear me now."
Mailane knelt beside him.
"You did more than fight," she whispered. "You made the world listen again."
---
Interlude: Thermuz's Remnants
In a hidden sanctum of blackened bone, far below the Empire's oldest cathedral…
A masked cultist stitched flesh.
The corpse twitched.
A heartbeat.
"Soon," the cultist whispered, sewing a soul into sinew. "He walks without a soul… and carries a god instead."