The rain fell hard over Nyron City, slicking the pavement in a cold shimmer as neon signs flickered overhead. Beneath one of them, a broken red cross that once marked a local pharmacy. Kael Vale crouched beside a dumpster, clutching a cloth wrapped bundle of herbs to his chest.His shift at the clinic had ended hours ago. Not that anyone cared. The other apprentices treated him like a shadow good for scrubbing floors and fetching medicines, but nothing more.He was "the charity case," the "orphan with no aura," the boy who'd failed every basic Qi detection test since he was seven. But tonight...something felt off.The wind whistled down the alleyway, pushing Kael’s soaked hoodie tight against his skin. His breath misted. Lightning cracked once, then again. A deep thrum pulsed under the concrete like a heartbeat slow, rhythmic, unnatural. That was when he saw him.A man lay sprawled in the alley, half submerged in garbage bags, chest rising faintly. His robes were tattered but strange

The storm returned just after midnight. Wind howled through the broken archways of the abandoned temple, hissing like a warning. Kael stood by the altar, drenched in sweat, still shaken from the vision. His shirt clung to his chest right over the pulsing seal that glowed with faint blue fire.He turned to the Hollow Flame. “That man… the one I found in the alley. He’s still alive.” The old master didn’t flinch. “And dying. Rapidly.”Kael’s fists clenched. “He’s calling out to me.”“That’s because the seal you carry was meant to anchor him to this world. It’s unstable. With each pulse, you’re tied closer to his soul and his enemies.”A deep silence followed. Then: boom. A deafening crack split the sky. The temple doors exploded inward.Kael ducked instinctively as dust and rubble filled the air. When the smoke cleared, a figure stood in the entrance cloaked in black, masked, surrounded by a faint aura of static. Their presence distorted the air. The pressure was suffocating.“You’ve go

Kael woke before dawn. Sweat soaked his shirt. His breath came in short, panicked bursts. But the room was quiet. The temple’s air was still. Too still.He blinked. His vision flickered just for a moment. And in that moment, he saw something else. Not the temple. But a battlefield.Flames tearing through the sky like dragons. Rivers running red. A silver robed warrior his back to Kael standing at the edge of a cliff, holding a glowing blue sword that looked… familiar. And then, a voice. Not his. Not his master’s. “You are not the first… but you must be the last.”Kael jolted upright. His heart thundered. He pressed a hand to his chest. The seal was calm but something had changed. His left eye still tingled. His thoughts felt... split. A second voice lurked beneath his own. Whispers. Hints. Not dangerous yet.He glanced at his reflection in the temple's cracked mirror. His left eye still glowed faintly blue. Kael approached the Hollow Flame, who was grinding herbs beside a small fire.

The temple was unusually quiet. Kael stood at the edge of a cliff that overlooked the Valley of Echoes, a place said to carry the voices of the dead. The wind there whispered things that shouldn’t be known. Names. Fates. Warnings.Today, the wind was silent. Too silent. Then he heard it, footsteps. Not soft like The Hollow Flame’s. Not dragging like the monks who swept the stone floors.These were light, steady, and rhythmic like someone who had walked through a battlefield without flinching. He turned. She was already standing there...Barefoot. Black robes flowing. And around her wrist: a single red thread, swaying like it had a heartbeat.Kael’s voice faltered. “Who?” She didn’t answer. Just looked at him… like she knew him. He’s taller than I remember. Still awkward. Still reckless. But that seal… it’s grown. He doesn’t even know what he carries.She had killed people with the same eyes. But not this one. Not yet. “Don’t move,” she said aloud. Her voice was soft, deadly. “I only ne

The wind shifted. Atop the hill near the temple gates, a cloaked man stood watching. His eyes glowed faintly silver, like moonlight striking a blade. He carried no weapons. He was the weapon. His name? Rekhar. The First Hunter.A Sealed whose soul had never fractured because he’d sacrificed his own emotions to keep it intact. He didn’t feel pain. He didn’t feel guilt. He only followed the pulse of fate. And now, fate had brought him to Kael.Kael awoke from a nightmare of fire and falling stars. The Hollow Flame was gone. The room felt wrong like it was already mourning something. Then the doors exploded inward. Stone cracked. Dust spiraled. Kael was on his feet instantly, seal burning against his chest.Rekhar stepped through the rubble. “You’re… early,” Kael said, half-joking, trying to calm his racing pulse.The Hunter didn’t respond. His hand twitched, and ten silver needles hovered in the air around him motionless, weightless. “I will kill you in under five minutes,” Rekhar said