The mountains didn’t forgive.Cold wind tore across the cliffside as Kairo trudged through the high pass, his cloak tattered, blood dried on his hands. Two days had passed since the archive incident. Two days since the man he once called master tried to kill him.He hadn’t slept. Couldn’t. Not with betrayal gnawing at his gut.Kairo collapsed beside a frozen stream, dragging in a breath as he stared at his reflection—sunken eyes, sharp jaw, a scar splitting his right brow like a crack in porcelain.This was no longer the boy trained in shadows.This was a man alone.And hunted.He’d left the Shadow Sect. Which meant one thing: a death sentence. No one left the sect. You either died with them, or by them. That was the rule.Kairo, however, had no intention of dying. Not yet.He dipped his hands into the freezing water, letting it numb the sting of old wounds. As he washed the dirt from his face, he heard it—twigs snapping, too deliberate to be wildlife.He grabbed his blade.Four figur

The fire in Kairo’s mind didn’t burn out after he left Ravenspire.If anything, it burned hotter.Lord Nazar. The name echoed in his thoughts like a curse — heavy, ancient, and cloaked in shadow. No face. No history. Just a whispered title among assassins who feared even speaking it aloud. Now, it was a target. One Kairo intended to mark with blood.They camped beneath the skeleton of a dead tree, miles from Ravenspire. The stars flickered above like distant sparks from a forge, cold and unreachable.Ayame sat nearby, sharpening her curved blade with slow, methodical strokes. She hadn't said much since the fight with Jin. But her silence wasn’t awkward — it was calculated. Like she was waiting for the storm inside Kairo to settle before stepping into it.“You didn’t kill him,” she said finally, not looking up.“I got what I needed.”“Is that why your hands are shaking?”Kairo stilled. He hadn’t noticed.He looked down at his fingers, still twitching from the adrenaline. Or maybe it wa

The Whispering Monastery wasn’t built. It was carved. Etched into the side of the Blackwind Cliffs, its spires and towers clung to the rock like stubborn roots. Ancient stone pathways wound between the buildings, wrapped in mist and moss, worn smooth by centuries of forgotten footsteps. Wind howled through narrow tunnels and broken arches, carrying with it voices—faint, unintelligible, and haunting. They weren’t alone. Not in the physical sense—Brother Kael walked ahead of them with practiced ease—but in spirit. The walls breathed. The air buzzed. Kairo felt it in his bones, in the weight behind his eyes, in the pulse that thudded in his throat. “The monastery is alive,” Ayame whispered as they stepped through an arched stone gate. “I can feel it watching.” Kael didn’t turn. “That’s because it remembers.” The courtyard opened up like a secret kept too long. Statues lined the edges—warriors, monks, women with swords and men with scrolls—frozen in poses of defiance, serenity,

The library beneath the Whispering Monastery was nothing like the others. The air was stale, thick with dust, and the scent of parchment aged by centuries. Candles flickered in alcoves along the walls, casting eerie shadows over shelves stacked with scrolls and tomes wrapped in silk and leather.Ayame trailed behind Kairo, her steps quiet, almost reverent.“You’re sure the answers are here?” she whispered.Kairo nodded. “Kael said the Crimson Syndicate used to be part of the Silent Blade. That means there must be records—logs, names, or something.”They stopped at a table in the centre, where an old book lay open. The ink was faded, but the symbol on the page was unmistakable—a black serpent coiled around a blade.Ayame traced it with a finger. “This…" this was carved into one of the raiders’ daggers, remember? The one we found outside the village.”Kairo clenched his jaw. “So it wasn’t just a coincidence. They really were Crimson.”As they pored over more pages, a narrative began to

The Veiled Marsh was every bit as menacing as the legends claimed.Twisted trees loomed overhead like ancient sentinels, their gnarled branches clawing at the gray sky. A dense fog snaked through the underbrush, muffling sound and warping sight. The air hung thick with dampness, each breath heavy as if it had been filtered through centuries of sorrow.Kairo stepped carefully over a moss-covered root, his blade pulsing faintly at his back.“Stay close,” Ayame murmured behind him. “We stray even a little. We lose each other.”Kairo nodded. His heart beat louder than his footsteps.For hours, they moved like shadows—silent, watchful. They spoke little, trusting hand signals and eye contact to communicate. The marsh demanded it. One wrong sound, one broken branch, could give them away.Suddenly, Ayame raised a fist.Kairo froze.A low growl slithered through the fog.Ayame’s hand drifted to the hilt of her left blade. Kairo drew his sword slowly, the metal humming softly, as if it, too, s