The wind howled over the Bleeding Spires.
Lightning cracked across a sky choked with ash and smoke. Beneath the looming spires, in the heart of the Black Citadel, the Demon Lord opened his eyes.
They were twin voids—deeper than night, older than fear.
A ripple passed through the throne of obsidian upon which he sat, as if the earth itself recoiled from the power that stirred.
He had felt it.
A spark that should have never ignited.
A name long erased from history now whispered through the undercurrents of the world's magic.
Kael.
The Sovereign blood had awakened.
A Revelation Ignored No Longer
The Demon Lord rose from his throne, his cloak of shadows unraveling into tendrils of living night. Around him, the High Circle of Wraiths—his loyal, half-dead generals—kneeled in silence, each one shivering under the weight of his presence.
"He survived," the Demon Lord growled. "Even after the seal. Even after the false order swore he would die forgotten."
A wraith dared to raise its voice, wheezing, "The Sentinels were certain he would never awaken."
The Demon Lord turned slowly toward it. The wraith turned to ash.
Another spoke quickly. "Shall we silence him, my Lord? Before the fire becomes an inferno?"
The Demon Lord extended one clawed finger and conjured a shard of flame—not red, but sickly green, laced with void.
"No. The boy must suffer first. He must be broken, not merely killed." His voice was death wearing a crown.
He turned toward the east, where the Sovereign Sanctuary pulsed like a flicker of light on the edge of the world.
"Send Maldrakar. Let the Ash General deliver my greetings."
Maldrakar, the Ash General
Deep beneath the Citadel, within a chamber of molten stone and chained souls, a figure awoke.
Maldrakar—the Ash General.
Once a hero. Now a weapon of annihilation. His flesh fused with cursed iron, his eyes white-hot embers that never dimmed.
He knelt before the Demon Lord, chains dragging behind him.
"Your will," he said, voice like two swords grinding together.
The Demon Lord spoke no more. He merely pointed toward the east. Toward Kael.
Maldrakar rose.
"Then the boy shall burn."
Meanwhile, in the Sanctuary
Kael woke from his trance, sweat dripping from his brow. Training under Sylara's guidance had pushed him further than he thought possible. His control was sharpening—but still fragile. Still dangerous.
He had learned to draw on fragments of his Sovereign energy: to forge flame, disrupt magic, and sense the ancient ley-lines beneath the world's surface.
But something now pressed on him. A shadow brushing the edge of his senses. A chill not born of cold, but of being seen.
Eva entered the chamber, her flame-lit staff flickering low.
"You felt it too," she said, not as a question.
Kael nodded. "Something's coming."
Sylara emerged from the far corridor. "Not something. Someone. A creature who burns cities and salts the ruins."
"Maldrakar," Eva whispered. Her voice trembled. "He's real?"
Sylara's eyes narrowed. "He was once a knight who fought to protect this realm. The Demon Lord turned him into something else—beyond pain, beyond mercy."
Kael's fists clenched. "Then he'll have to break someone else. I won't fall."
Sylara studied him, then said calmly, "If you face Maldrakar now, you will die."
"I'm not afraid."
"I did not say fear. I said die."
Kael turned toward the mouth of the cavern, the wind howling louder than before. He could feel the storm gathering. Maldrakar was already coming. The ground itself seemed to shudder beneath distant steps.
Kael closed his eyes.
"I made my choice. I'll fight."
Sylara nodded grimly. "Then we prepare the Sanctuary for war."
The Spark Becomes a Flame
Far above the caverns, deep in the forest of the Ashen Peaks, trees withered in Maldrakar's wake. The very grass turned to dust beneath his tread.
He paused only once, eyes blazing, and whispered:
"I have come for the Sovereign."