[ASHEN VALE]
The dust hung thick as fog. Ash fell from the sky like flakes of dirty snow, coating stones, branches, and footprints. The forest here was not alive like Eloren's—it was dry, twisted, scorched by a fire that seemed to have never ended. Charred trunks rose like the fingers of a corpse clawing its way out of the earth.
And through this desolation, an old man walked.
His cloak, once white, had blended into the grayscale world around him. The fabric, stained and frayed at the edges, dragged along the ground like an ancient veil. His bare feet stepped upon the hot, cracked soil, and yet did not falter. He did not limp. He did not tremble.
His white beard spilled down to his chest, tangled with dust and soot. But his eyes… his eyes burned like flames of ice. Pale. Unusual. Always fixed forward—as if they saw something no one else could.
With each step, the old man left behind not just footprints, but fragments of a fate written long before the prison that had kept him buried.
And now he walked through a forgotten land, toward a place only he could name.
The sky above was clouded. The sun, hidden behind ancient smoke, barely warmed the skin. The wind was dry and carried the scent of coal and stone. A dead place.The end of the world, hidden within the kingdom itself.
It was here that he had chosen to hide.
Or perhaps… to wait.
The old man stopped before a tall stone, covered in moss and cracks, like an altar ruined by time. He laid his hand upon the symbol carved into it—an inverted triangle, crossed by a central line. The Seal of the Veil.
He closed his eyes.
And the world of ash fell away, just for a moment.
The heat of the dead land gave way to the frozen breeze of the Aetherial Mountains. He saw the halls carved into white stone, the stained glass windows pulsing with light from within, the living water of the fountains cutting through the corridors—balance in stone, fire, wind, and silence.
Home.
That was what hurt the most: to remember.
To remember the snow-covered path between the five sacred caverns, where the masters of the Veil did not walk, but glided in endless meditation. To remember the morning bells. The hands that greeted him with reverence… and the ones that condemned him when he left.
He had abandoned his people. Broken the vow of neutrality to follow the call of fire.
"The Veil takes no side."
But fire does not lie.
It was in the final Cavern of Balance that he heard the prophecy. The flames do not speak to just anyone—only to those who have already accepted the loss of all things.
He had fasted for seven days. Endured the cold without covering. Breathed the smoke of ancient roots until his body trembled from within. And then… the fire whispered.
It was too clear to ignore.The prince would fall.And something terrible would awaken with him.
So he left. Even as a master of the Veil. Even as the eldest of the Line of the Seal of Light. He left. And behind, he left his disciple. The boy he had raised since infancy. The one he called son, though no blood bound them.
"Stay. Guard the temple. Watch the flame. When I return, all will be changed."
But now doubt crept in. A terrible doubt.What if the boy had not obeyed?What if, sensing the world's imbalance, the pupil had left as well?
He was young and impetuous. More heart than discipline.
"If he left…" thought the old man, eyes still closed, "…then the flame of the temple is at risk. And with it, all that still holds the world in balance."
And then he opened his eyes.
The ash returned. The Ashen Vale surrounded him once more. And the memory laid a new weight upon his shoulders. Destiny was unraveling faster than it should.
"It has begun," he whispered.
The old man remained silent before the split stone, his wrinkled fingers resting upon the ancient seal. The dry wind passed through the dead branches like a forgotten litany, and for a moment, everything seemed still. Motionless. Almost sacred.
Until the shadows moved.
They did not come like a breeze. They came like blades.
And from within them stepped Nil.
His dark cloak nearly merged with the dimness of the trail that cut through the scorched ruins. His black hair, tied with perfect precision, caught what little light there was like smooth glass. His eyes—golden, like his father's—glinted with malice. And the smile on his lips carried no humor.
It was a warning.
The old man turned slowly, unhurried, as if he had been expecting him.
But Nil noticed it. The faint twitch in the hand upon the symbol. The smallest pull in the shoulders. Fear. However brief, it was enough. Nil smiled with satisfaction.
"You're far from home, old man," the prince said, voice calm. "Or is this dead land your home now?"
The old man did not reply. He merely stared back at him with glacial eyes.
"I found your path... curious," Nil said, pacing in slow circles around him. "You avoided the obvious roads, crossed small villages, followed the wind. You know where my father's armies march. You can feel the movements, can't you?"
Then, the old man spoke, his tone unchanged:
"And you, Prince Nil… are a man who does not understand the forces he stirs. You've brought down the wrong wall. Touched the wrong key. And now something that was locked away, sealed by ancient hands, begins to rise. That is not power. It is ruin. A price you are not yet old enough to pay."
Nil stopped in front of him, his eyes narrowing.
"Hmm. Poetic."He stepped closer, so near that the old man could feel the chill in his breath.
"Remember who opened your cell. Remember… that I am one of the few in this continent who knows the weakness of your people. You're looking for something, aren't you? Or should I say… someone?"
Nil offered a brief, shadowed smile.
"You know, it's strange seeing you here… so far from your pristine White Mountains in the north. So distant, so… lofty. Where the clouds kiss the peaks and men live as if war were just a story for other lands."
The old man clenched his jaw. But he said nothing.
"I recall an odd custom of yours: running water beneath the hearth to balance fire and flow in the same space. Children learning to meditate with blindfolded eyes. And true names… reserved only for the dead. Very elegant. Very mystical. Very… useless."
Now, the old man watched him with closer attention. A line of concern crossed his weathered face—something had changed.
Nil noticed. And smiled again.
"Your people of the Veil love to pretend they are above conflict. 'We take no side,' you say. 'We are the border between the world of men and the world of fate.'"He spat on the ground."Hypocrites. You live within invisible walls, as if the filth of the world cannot reach you. But it does. It always does."
He stepped forward. His voice dropped, heavier:
"I know your masters. I know where they train. I know which of the caverns is used for trials of the spirit. I know a demon once foretold the fall of Cronos. And I know your greatest fear… is being forced to choose a side."
The old man stepped back half a pace, involuntarily.
His eyes narrowed. When he spoke, his voice was steady, though faintly hoarse:
"That's not knowledge found in archives. Not something learned in royal libraries…"
"Surprised that a 'son of the throne' knows so much?" Nil mocked, stepping even closer.
The tension now was thick enough to strangle the wind.
Nil smiled once more. A cold smile.A bloodless cut.
"Oh, old man… the world is far filthier than your white mountain."
Nil had already turned away, his steps light over the ash-covered ground, when he stopped once more. The wind lifted the hem of his black cloak ever so slightly, and he looked over his shoulder—the smile was gone.
What followed was cold.Implacable.
"You're going to hunt him for me."
The old man gave no reply, but his body hardened—like stone beneath a hammer.
Nil turned fully, his hands now tucked into his pockets, his voice low but clear—like a blade sliding across a throat.
"I know Rael is alive. I can feel him—just as you feel the approach of a storm. And you… you know it too. He's coming back. And you're not here to flee. You're here because you believe you can reach him. Because you think you can still stop what's coming."
Nil drew closer again, slow, like a shadow that casts no sound.
"I don't want you to teach him. I don't want you to guide him. I want you to kill him."
The old man met the prince's gaze—and for the first time, his stare faltered.Not from fear… but from weight.
Nil saw it. And pressed deeper.
"You'll bring me his head. Then you'll walk to the gates of Cronos yourself, kneel, and accept your chains. And if you don't…"
He stood directly in front of the elder. He didn't shout. He didn't need to.
"…I'll send fire to the roots of your homeland. I'll climb every peak of the White Mountains with soldiers, blacksmiths, and torches. I'll tear down your meditation halls. Desecrate your tombs. Rip the veil you revere to shreds. And every neutral coward will be forced to choose—iron… or ash."
Silence.
The threat hung in the air like an unspoken plague.
"Don't forget, old man. I know your people's weakness," Nil said, with a reverence so cold it froze the blood. "So either you betray the boy… or else—"
And then the young man vanished, like an omen that would only be understood too late.
The old man stood there, unmoving.
In the stillness of the dead land, between the embers of the past and the smoke of what had yet to burn, he whispered no prayers.
He simply closed his eyes.
"I hope my pupil is well," he said quietly to himself.