Chapter 17: Emberreach, Where Gods Rot
—Where cursed winds carry divine whispers, and the ash of broken heavens feeds the roots of corruption.
The scent of scorched petals rode the air like a dirge.
Emberreach was not a city—it was a scar. Once blessed by the Divine Pantheon as a place of renewal, it now lay entombed in embers, overgrown with bioluminescent thorns and twisted flora that pulsed with something ancient. Something wrong.
Shen Nightfall stood at the threshold, silent as always. Nyxria beside him, her pale silver eyes catching the glow of the moon—or what remained of it. The Lunar Shift had fractured the night sky, and now strange constellations pulsed above them, forming shapes even the System could not identify.
[System Alert: You have entered a Forbidden Zone – "Emberreach Bloom."]
[Status Effect: Lunar Blight - Passive debuff applied. Vision altered. Resistances suppressed.]
[Voidbrand synchronization: Stable at 81%.]
"Something's awake here," Nyxria said, fingers twitching at her side. "It's not just gods that rot in Emberreach. It's memory. Faith. Purpose."
Shen said nothing. But his Voidbrand pulsed once on the back of his hand, and the shadows around him deepened, subtly rippling with unseen force.
The Bloom That Should Not Be
As they descended the cracked obsidian steps into the city's hollow basin, the architecture grew stranger. Buildings were folded into themselves, statues wept petals instead of blood, and from the cracks in the stone rose roots—burning from the inside out. The entire region pulsed like a single living organism.
[New Sub-Quest Unlocked: "Trace the Bloomroot."]
Something beneath Emberreach is feeding on dead divinity. Find it before it finds you.
Reward: ???
Suddenly, a scream.
Not human. Not god. Something in-between.
Nyxria whirled, drawing her [Whispersteel Dagger], but Shen raised a single hand, halting her. A ripple of darkness exploded from his palm—silent, controlled, and invisible to all but the most sensitive.
Out from the ruined chapel ahead limped a figure—no, a survivor. Or what remained of one.
It was a priest once. His robes bore the fractured sigil of the Hollow Moon Order, but now his body was overtaken by roots and luminous spores, crawling into his eyes like vines reaching for the sun.
The man knelt, unseeing. His lips cracked open in worship… of Shen.
"You… the one who tore the veil. The Anathema Ascendant… you returned."
Seeds of Forgotten Divinity
"I know your face," the root-priest gasped, weeping nectar. "They called you a curse… but we called you a prophecy. The Bloom responded when you awoke."
"Who fed the roots?" Shen asked at last, his voice as calm and cold as an undisturbed grave.
The priest shivered. "A weapon of thorns. A girl… once divine. Now unmade."
[Main Quest Update: Identify the one called "Thorned Saint."]
A former demigod now grown twisted within the Emberreach Bloom. Dangerous. Unstable. Drawn to Voidbrand resonance.
Nyxria stiffened. "Another Voidbrand wielder?"
"No," Shen murmured. "Something worse. A failed god."
The wind shifted, and a wave of heat burst outward from the chapel's center. Vines snapped and withered. A new presence entered the city.
The Second Brand
She appeared barefoot, hovering above the ground. Her skin was etched with glowing veins of rose-gold, bleeding from her spine in slow, trailing streaks. Her eyes… were empty, save for the flower blooming inside her pupils.
She smiled at Shen. "You smell like him. The one who cracked the gates."
"Who are you?" Nyxria asked, blade raised.
The girl floated down, tilting her head like a curious child. "I'm the one left behind when faith broke. The seed of the gods that never bloomed. And I've come for the brand that should not exist."
Her aura ignited—brilliant, unnatural, and blasphemous.
[Hostile Entity Detected: Thorned Saint – Bloomwrought Demigod]
[Threat Level: Cataclysmic. Class: Forbidden]
She raised a single hand.
The ground split open.
And from beneath Emberreach, something screamed—a chorus of old gods buried beneath roots.
The Bloom Clash
What followed was not a battle.
It was a war of presence.
Shen moved first, stepping through the fabric of space like mist. His Voidbrand flared black and gold, summoning a weapon yet unnamed—a shard of nullsteel woven with divine memory.
He struck.
The Thorned Saint blocked it with a petal shield—each petal the remains of a god she had consumed.
Nyxria joined with a spiraling arc of silver flame, cutting low—but vines intercepted her blade, and the ground swallowed her into a maze of thorns.
[Nyxria – Status: Trapped in Bloomroot Labyrinth.]
Shen surged forward, casting [Black Eclipse]—a technique that erased not just light, but intent. For a moment, the Thorned Saint faltered. Her smile vanished.
"You're not supposed to exist," she hissed, bleeding radiance. "The Voidbrand was erased… sealed… forgotten."
"I'm not the one who broke that seal," Shen replied. "I'm the one who remembers why it was locked."
He channeled a second technique: Null Horizon.
And the sky—cracked again.
Chapter End Teaser
[System Alert: Shen Nightfall has engaged a Forbidden-Class Entity. Synchronization reaching 92%. Warning: Voidbrand awakening imminent.]
coming soon 👇
[Next Chapter: "Thorns of the Saint, Roots of the Void"]
Can the Void outlast the Bloom? Or will faith corrupted prove stronger than the silence of the forgotten?