The dream began with fire.
Not the chaotic kind, but something slow—calculated. A line of flames that traced an invisible boundary across a darkened battlefield, etching symbols into ash-soaked soil. Above it, the sky split not with lightning, but with whispers—thousands of them, speaking in languages no throat could pronounce. Symbols bled from the heavens like rain, burning into the earth.
And standing at the heart of it all was Kael.
Not as a man.
But as something the dream refused to define.
The leader of the Crimson Vultures jolted awake in their sanctum, drenched in sweat. The flickering candlelight around them couldn't dispel the weight of what had just occurred. Not a nightmare. Not a vision.
A message.
Kael hadn't sent words.
He had sent understanding. And in doing so, he had done what no enemy had managed before.
He had entered the leader's mind without breaking a single ward.
A whispering hush fell over the hidden war room as the cloaked leader rose. The crimson-plated captains present stepped back instinctively—not from fear of their commander, but from the unseen shadow now following them like a second skin.
"What did you see?" one asked cautiously.
The leader didn't answer. Instead, they turned to the map of the Empire pinned across the wall.
"No more testing. We begin the siege on Cael'Thorne."
Gasps.
"The city is heavily fortified," a strategist objected. "We'll lose thousands."
The leader's voice was quiet.
"And we'll gain millions. We have to force him out. Into the open."
Cael'Thorne, the eastern-most bastion of the Empire, was a jewel once forged in dragonfire and bound by oathblood. Its obsidian walls had never been breached. But as dawn broke over the sharp towers and rune-covered gates, a sense of unease crept through its stone veins.
General Veyra stood atop the central bastion tower, watching the plains.
From the horizon, clouds of smoke curled in unnatural spirals, forming sigils in the sky. A warning. A declaration.
The Crimson Vultures had arrived.
She didn't panic. Veyra was a soldier trained in Kael's personal doctrines—terror is for the unprepared.
She turned to the messenger behind her.
"Send word to the capital. And initiate Phase Two."
Back in the Imperial Palace, Kael stood before a great circular table in the High Strategium. Lit by hovering flame orbs and enchanted war runes, the room pulsed with anticipation. Around him were his most trusted: Seraphina, Selene, High Magister Valtor, and a ghostlight projection of Veyra herself.
"Cael'Thorne will fall," Kael said without emotion. "They're sacrificing strategy for spectacle. They want to make me move."
"They're baiting you," Selene observed.
"No," Kael replied. "They think they're baiting me. But I baited them the moment I let them think I'd hesitate."
Valtor shifted uncomfortably. "We can't afford a full-scale eastern collapse."
Kael's fingers tapped the stone table once. "We won't need to hold it. Just burn the land they take."
The room went still.
"You mean to...?"
"Scorch Cael'Thorne's outer rim. Turn their victory into a burial pyre. When they claim it, they'll be claiming ruin."
Seraphina nodded slowly. "And the civilians?"
Kael's eyes flicked toward her.
"I'm not in the habit of sacrificing innocents," he said. "The Shadow Lines will evacuate them by dusk. Let the rebels find only ash and echoes."
"And what of the Heart?" Selene asked.
The room paused.
Kael didn't look at her. "It is not yet time."
That night, Kael walked alone into the Vault of Singularity—the sealed sanctum hidden beneath the oldest structure in the Empire: the Pillar of Null. This place existed outside of time. Here, even gods whispered softly.
Before him hovered a sphere—roughly the size of a heart, but blacker than shadow and brighter than stars. The Heart of Singularity pulsed once as he approached, as though recognizing its chosen tether.
He did not reach for it. He didn't need to.
"We are not yet ready," he murmured. "Not until they believe they've wounded me."
The pulse responded—not in words, but in clarity.
Not yet.
But soon.
In the eastern warfront, the battle for Cael'Thorne began at midnight.
The Crimson Vultures advanced not like armies, but like storms—red banners whipping against wind-sculpted siege towers and warbeasts with obsidian masks strapped to their faces. Screaming lancers struck the walls with blades that shimmered with blood-inked enchantments.
The defense, however, was eerily hollow.
There were traps—yes. Arrow wards. Alchemical flames. Collapsing battlements. But no full army awaited them.
By dawn, they had breached the city.
By noon, it was theirs.
And by twilight, the screaming began.
For beneath the city were chambers.
And beneath the chambers were vaults.
And beneath the vaults was Veyra.
She had stayed behind.
A single soul in a web of death.
The Crimson Vulture commanders found her in the central keep, sitting calmly before a circle of glowing runes.
"You're outnumbered," one snarled.
She looked up.
"I'm not here to win. I'm here to make sure you don't."
The runes ignited.
Flame cascaded through the veins of the city—not consuming, but altering. Magic warped the structure of the buildings themselves, collapsing them inward like melting obsidian. Red mist rose from the cracks. An entire city turned into a monument of death.
As Veyra vanished in light, she whispered:
"Kael sees you now."
In the capital, Kael stood silently on the balcony of the Imperial Tower.
The wind carried the ash from Cael'Thorne.
Selene approached from behind. "We've confirmed Veyra's death."
Kael didn't flinch. "She fulfilled her purpose."
"She was loyal."
"She was immortalized."
He turned slowly to face her. "They think they've drawn blood. Let them."
"But they'll rally."
"Yes. And then I'll remind them that I've never played by their rules."
Midnight.
A scream echoed across the Dreamscape.
The leader of the Crimson Vultures awoke once more, but this time... the dream was different.
They weren't watching Kael.
They were Kael.
He had tethered part of himself to their soul.
Memories bled in reverse. Thoughts no longer felt isolated. And in the shadow of that horror, the leader understood—
He's not trying to stop us.
He's already inside.
To Be Continued...