The halls of Sanctum Virelith groaned with quiet tension, ancient stone echoing every footstep like a whispered warning. Malchior stood before the frozen window of the observatory tower, watching the storm outside churn against the sky. Snow lashed the black spires like claws trying to tear them down.
"Kel is gone," he said flatly, eyes fixed on the jagged horizon. "And we both know who's responsible."
Behind him, Veyla's presence was as cold as the air itself. "If it's really him… if Leon Ashbourne has returned… then this Empire is already bleeding."
Malchior turned. His amber eyes shimmered, not with fear, but curiosity. "You sound frightened."
"I'm calculating." She brushed a streak of pale hair behind her ear. "Kel was the weakest of us, but he wasn't a fool. He was a Commander. And he fell without sending a distress signal. That alone tells us everything."
"He's hunting us," Malchior said, a slow smile forming. "And he's starting from the bottom."
"Then we're not the only ones in danger." Veyla flicked her fingers, and a floating sigil, black and shifting like smoke, appeared in the air. "The Black Sigil reported movement near the southern frost veins. A ruin we left untouched since the war… until now."
Malchior's eyes narrowed. "They spotted him?"
"Yes. And the land's been torn apart by shadowfire. Creatures of unnatural origin. A wyrm seen flying through the clouds, blackened, frost-bound, and bound to something else. Something worse."
They both knew what it meant.
"Leon's building a warpath," Veyla whispered. "And if we wait for him to come to us, Sanctum Virelith will become his graveyard or ours."
Malchior stepped away from the window, shadows coiling at his boots. "Then we'll strike first. Wake the Fifth Sigil. Send word to the capital. And alert the 7th Commander. Let him know the caged wolf is loose again."
"Do you really think the Emperor will believe us?" Veyla asked.
"I don't care if he believes. We act, or we die."
Outside, the wind screamed louder, as if the world itself had heard Malchior's words.
South of Sanctum Virelith, the ruined veins of frost twisted through the land like frozen scars. Once a battleground of ancient magic, now it was a dead zone, no warmth, no life, only ice and ash.
And in the center of it all stood Leon Ashbourne.
His cloak fluttered in the wind, eyes half-closed as he scanned the battlefield ahead. The remnants of a shattered outpost littered the area, one of the Empire's hidden northern stations. Recently manned. Now deserted.
"They ran," he muttered. "Or they were warned."
From his shadow, Kel emerged without a word, standing silently behind him. His eyes glowed faintly blue, his armor rimmed with frost. A moment later, the great bulk of the frost wyrm rose from the dark, slithering through the ice like a serpent beneath water.
Leon said nothing to them. No orders. No greetings.
He didn't need to.
With a slight motion of his hand, both returned to his shadow, vanishing as if they'd never existed.
He stepped forward, running his fingers along a frozen Imperial banner that hung from a broken pike. Ice cracked beneath his grip. "You're watching, aren't you?" he murmured, eyes lifting toward the distant spires.
There was a rustle behind him.
He didn't turn.
From the blizzard stepped five figures, cloaked in black, bearing no insignia save for a mark that shimmered on their gauntlets: fifth of a black sigil, spiraling like a warped star.
"I was wondering when you'd show," Leon said, his voice low.
One of them spoke. "Leon Ashbourne. By order of the Eternal Empire, you are to be destroyed."
Leon cracked his neck. "You brought five."
"We are enough."
He smirked. "You're not even close."
In a blink, the shadows around Leon surged, tendrils writhing in anticipation. The ground beneath his feet shattered from the pressure of power releasing.
He reached behind his back and drew his sword, long, sleek, blackened with a glint of frost running down the center of the blade.
The Black Sigil agents formed a circle, blades and relics drawn.
Leon's eyes glowed faintly violet. "Then let's begin."