Heir of Lightening

Chapter 100. Blood and Thunder.

The sunless sky remained a swirling mess of gray and crimson as Kirin stepped out from the cracked stone ruins he’d used as shelter. The wind was dry, coarse with ash, and the ground beneath his boots still crunched with old bones and scorched sand. The silence was never complete in this land. There were always whispers. Murmurs beneath the wind, like ghosts still trying to speak.

Kirin glanced back at the ruins, at the mural that had meant nothing to him but somehow still felt important. It had whispers of chaos energy, of ancient sects lost to time, of something called the Black Flame. He had memorized every symbol, even if he didn’t understand them yet. Someday he might. But not today.

Today, he had to move.

The ground stretched endlessly ahead of him, broken only by the rise and fall of jagged hills and spires that pierced the horizon like blackened teeth. He moved cautiously, every step measured. The underworld didn’t look like the kind of place where one made mistakes.

His body