2026-01-04 21:05:26It was a nightmare stitched together from the chamber’s dead bones of ancient warriors fused with ash-wolf skeletons, armored plates grown over like tumors, mana twisting the whole mass into something that had forgotten what it once was. Ten feet tall at the shoulder, four mismatched arms ending in claws and broken blades, a skull split open to reveal a pulsing crimson core where a heart should be.
It roared, and the sound was every death in the room crying out at once.
Elias tightened his grip on Crimson Reaper. The greatsword hummed in his hand, eager, almost pulling him forward. His new aura flared instinctively a veil of red mist coiling around his body, sharpening the world to a razor’s edge. Sounds became clearer, movements slower. War God’s Instinct sang in his blood.
Thorne floated to his flank, expression grim but alive with something dangerous. “Guardian’s bound to the trial. Kill the core, it dies. Everything else just slows it down.”
“Noted,” Elias muttered.
The guardian charged.
Elias met it head-on.
The first clash shook the chamber. Crimson Reaper met a bone-clad arm—sparks flew, bone shattered, but the limb regrew almost instantly, mana knitting it back together. A second arm swept low; Elias leaped, aura propelling him higher than should have been possible. He came down blade first, carving a deep gouge across the creature’s shoulder. Black ichor sprayed, hissing where it touched the floor.
It backhanded him.
He flew ten feet, slammed into a wall hard enough to crack stone. Pain exploded across his ribs two cracked, maybe broken. But the aura flared hotter, crimson light sealing fractures as fast as they formed.
“Get up!” Thorne barked. “It’s testing you. Pain is part of the lesson.”
Elias spat blood and rose. The rage stirred again, deeper this time, tasting the pain and wanting more. He shoved it down.
The guardian barreled forward, claws raking furrows in the stone. Elias rolled under the swipe, came up inside its guard, and drove Crimson Reaper upward in a vicious uppercut. The blade bit deep into the chest cavity, stopping inches from the core.
The guardian howled. All four arms slammed down.
Elias twisted the sword and ripped sideways. Flesh and bone parted. He dove between the creature’s legs as the arms cratered the spot he’d stood.
He came up behind it, breathing hard. The core pulsed brighter, mana surging to heal the wound.
Thorne’s voice cut through the chaos. “It’s drawing from the chamber’s essence. Longer this drags, stronger it gets. End it fast.”
Elias nodded. He let the aura build, felt the bloodline respond heat coiling in his legs, his arms, his spine. Not blind rage. Controlled burn.
He charged.
The guardian spun, jaws unhinging impossibly wide. Elias slid beneath the bite, blade dragging a burning line across its underbelly. He rolled to his feet and leaped onto its back, boots finding purchase on jagged bone. It bucked wildly, trying to throw him.
He climbed higher, Reaper buried to the hilt for leverage.
One clawed arm reached back, groping for him. Elias ducked, felt talons shred the air where his head had been. He grabbed a protruding spine, swung around, and drove the sword straight down into the exposed core.
The impact jarred his arms to the shoulder.
Crimson light exploded outward.
The guardian froze. A sound like cracking ice filled the chamber as fissures raced across its body. The core pulsed once twice then shattered in a burst of red mist that rushed into Elias like a tidal wave.
He dropped to the floor as the guardian collapsed into a pile of inert bones.
Silence.
Elias stayed on his knees, chest heaving. Crimson Reaper lay beside him, blade drinking in the last wisps of essence. His aura slowly dimmed, but the power settling in his veins felt permanent. Deeper.
A new panel shimmered:
(Primordial War God Bloodline – Purity: 40%)
[Stage Advanced: Battle Lord (Initial)]
(New Ability Unlocked: Blood Rage (Basic) – Temporary explosive power boost. Warning: High risk of loss of control.)
(Weapon Evolution: Crimson Reaper – First Awakening. Edge permanently enhanced.)
(Crimson Vitality upgraded – Regeneration significantly improved in combat.)
Thorne floated closer, staring at him with something perilously close to respect.
“You just forced a stage breakthrough in one fight,” he said quietly. “Most take months. Years. The old bastard would’ve liked you.”
Elias pushed to his feet, wiping ichor from his face. His ribs were whole again. “Felt like it was trying to kill me.”
“It was. And you killed it first.” Thorne’s mouth twitched. “Welcome to the path, Battle Lord.”
Elias sheathed the ache in his muscles and picked up Crimson Reaper. The sword felt lighter now, extension of his arm rather than burden. He slung it across his back where it shrank further, fitting perfectly.
He returned to the pedestal. The crimson crystal pulsed invitingly. When he touched it, warmth flooded him, but no immediate surge.
“Stabilizer,” Thorne explained. “It’ll help anchor the new stage. Absorb it slowly over kills, or you risk the rage taking root.”
Elias pocketed it and opened the journal again, flipping past his ancestor’s note. The next pages were battle records tactics, weaknesses of divine bloodlines, warnings about specific gods still active in the empire.
One entry caught his eye:
The Voss Clan was once our shield-bearers. Loyal until the coalition offered them elevation. Betrayal runs deep in their current line. Trust none who bear the name lightly.
He closed the book. Harlan’s face flashed in his mind.
Thorne watched him carefully. “You’re thinking of going back already.”
“I’m thinking of Mira,” Elias said. “She’s alone up there. If Harlan framed me once…”
He didn’t finish. Didn’t need to.
Thorne nodded. “Fair. But you’re not ready for a full clan yet. You need allies, resources, a place to grow without every hunter in the empire descending on you.”
“Where?”
“Borderlands. There’s a war academy in Greyhaven neutral ground, takes anyone with potential. Strong survive, weak die or leave. You’ll find fights, training, and people who don’t give a damn about your name.”
Elias considered. It made sense. Power without control was just another way to die.
He headed for the exit stairs. The chamber’s runes dimmed behind him, the trial complete.
Halfway up, Thorne spoke again, quieter.
“One more thing, boy. The rage will get louder with every stage. You held it today. Doesn’t mean you always will.”
Elias paused. “Then I’ll keep finding reasons not to let it win.”
Thorne was silent for a long moment.
“Good answer.”
They emerged into the Ashen Wastes under a sky bruised purple with dawn. The fog had thinned, revealing a distant horizon where the barren lands gave way to sparse forests the edge of civilization.
Elias took a breath of cold, free air.
For the first time since the fall, he knew exactly where he was going.
Greyhaven. Then home.
And when he came for House Voss, Harlan would learn what bloodless really meant.
In the distance, a lone ash wolf howled mourning its pack, or sounding the alarm.
Elias smiled, small and cold, and started walking.
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The Price of Victory
The throne hall air hung heavy with the smell of copper and charred flesh, Seraphine’s body still warm on the marble, blood pooling beneath her in a slow, dark mirror that reflected the guttering torches and Harlan’s roaring flame aura in fractured, mocking shards. Her eyes were closed now my doing and the wound in her chest still leaked in weak, rhythmic pulses, the gurgle of her last breath echoing faintly in the high ceiling like a whisper that refused to die. My hands were slick with her blood, Reaper dripping red onto the stone in fat, wet drops that splattered and spread, the metallic tang thick on my tongue, mixing with the bile rising in my throat. Liora stood frozen beside me, lightning still crackling faintly along her blade, blue white arcs dying in the air like dying stars. Her face was pale, eyes wide, locked on Seraphine’s body, the scar on her cheek stark against skin gone gray. Kora’s wind had stilled, dust settling around her feet in a soft, choking cloud, her hands
The Hall of Broken Promises
The throne hall doors had barely groaned shut behind us when the air turned thick with the smell of old fire and fresh blood, the gold plated walls reflecting the last guttering flames in warped, distorted patterns that made every shadow look like it was bleeding. The floor was cold marble streaked with old scorch marks and newer, darker stains dried blood from older fights, fresh from the loyalists we’d just cut down in the antechamber. The echo of their dying screams still lingered in the high ceiling, bouncing back faint and hollow, like ghosts too tired to scream anymore. Harlan stood at the far end, flame aura roaring around him in a crown of white-hot fire, eyes locked on me with that same smirk he’d worn when he pushed me out of the airship years ago, the one that said he’d already won. Lord Voss sat the throne behind him old, broken, flame dim and flickering like a candle in a draft, but his eyes were still sharp, watching, calculating, the way a dying man watches the vultur
The Slaughter at the Threshold
The throne hall doors loomed ahead like the jaws of a dying beast, gold plating cracked and blackened from failing wards, the faint hum of dying mana vibrating through the stone floor and into my boots, each step sending small tremors up my legs that made the stitches in my side tug with fresh, dull pain. The air in the antechamber was thick, hot, heavy with the stink of scorched metal, old blood, and the sour rot of mana cores that had finally given up the ghost, the smell clinging to my tongue and making every breath feel like swallowing ash and regret. The last loyalists had pulled back deeper inside only a handful remained here, crimson plate gleaming dully under flickering torchlight, flame auras low but steady, eyes hard with the kind of fanaticism that doesn’t flinch at death because it’s already decided the cause is worth it. We burst through the side corridor in a tight wedge me at point, Reaper drawn and low, crimson mist already coiling around the blade like living smoke;
The Whisper’s Origin
The whisper had been growing louder for days, no longer just a faint vibration in the stone but a voice that seemed to speak directly into the marrow, soft and persistent, repeating my name in tones that felt both ancient and intimately familiar, like someone who had known me long before I knew myself was trying to remember how to speak. It came most clearly in the hours when the cavern was still, when the fire had burned down to embers and the only sounds were Rag’s deep, rhythmic breathing and Mira’s small, occasional murmurs in her sleep; it rose then, threading through the quiet like smoke, curling around my thoughts until I could no longer tell where my own mind ended and the voice began. I lay awake that night, Liora curled against my side, her head on my chest, silver hair spilling across my shoulder in loose strands that caught the last red glow from the dying fire. Her breathing was slow and even, one arm draped across my waist, fingers loosely curled against the bandage on
The Last Threshold
The manor had finally stopped pretending it could hold on. It drifted downward in exhausted, uneven lurches now, each drop accompanied by a deep, metallic groan that rolled through the mountain like thunder trapped in stone, the lowest spires no longer scraping but gouging long, jagged scars across the upper platforms, sparks flying in brief, angry bursts that lit the gray dawn like dying fireflies. The air carried the heavy, acrid scent of molten gold cooling too fast, mixed with the faint, wet rot of mana conduits that had given up entirely, leaving only the throne hall’s solitary glow high above a pale, flickering gold that looked less like defiance and more like a lantern someone had forgotten to extinguish before abandoning the house.I stood at the forward ledge in the thin, cold light of pre dawn, cloak pulled tight against the wind that bit harder now, carrying flecks of ash and the sharp tang of exposed wiring that stung my nose and made my eyes water. The ache in my side ha
Still Here, Somehow
The cavern smelled like old smoke and damp stone and the faint copper tang of blood that never quite washed out of the air no matter how many times we tried to scrub the floors. The embers in the fire pit were down to almost nothing, just a dull red line that barely reached the walls, throwing shadows that moved slow and tired, like they were as exhausted as the rest of us. I sat against the crate, back to the rough wood, legs stretched out in front of me, the ache in my side a steady pulse now, not screaming anymore, just reminding me with every breath that I was still leaking a little inside, still not quite whole. Liora was curled beside me, head on my shoulder, silver hair loose and tangled from the wind and the sweat of the last push. One arm draped across my chest, fingers loosely curled in my tunic right over my heart, like she was checking it was still beating even while she slept. Her breathing was slow, even, but every now and then she’d hitch, a small catch in her throat,
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