Kael's scream ripped through the valley.
The shadow that rose behind him loomed like a storm born of flame and hate. A monstrous form wreathed in smoke and heat, its face a tangle of molten metal and horns, its eyes twin furnaces of ruin. It did not speak—but its presence screamed of endless war.
And Kael stood between it and the world.
His body shook under its pressure. The chains wrapped around his right arm began to shimmer—red-hot, alive with runes older than language. They tightened, pulled taut, as if responding to the Dark Lord's rising will.
Behind him, Nyssa and Marek still stood at the valley's rim, staring down in horror.
"Gods," Marek whispered. "He wasn't lying. That thing's real."
Nyssa reached for her sword, but her hand trembled. "We need to help him."
"How?" Marek snapped. "We've got blades, not gods. That thing could melt a fortress just by frowning."
But she was already moving, sliding down the blackened slope, heart pounding. She didn't know what she'd do when she reached Kael. She only knew she wouldn't let him fight it alone.
Kael turned slightly as she approached. His face was pale, soaked in sweat and ash. His eyes flickered between gold and shadow.
"I told you to run," he rasped.
"I don't do that anymore," she said, stepping beside him.
The Dark Lord's form shifted again—smoke curling into blades, a thousand burning eyes forming across its chest. No mouth, no words. Just a crushing, ancient hunger.
Kael exhaled shakily.
"Then help me hold the chains."
He raised his right arm. The chains pulsed, and suddenly Nyssa saw them for what they truly were—not just metal, but binding threads, tethering the Dark Lord's essence to Kael's body. Every link burned with a name: gods, kings, forgotten titans—beings who had once worn the mantle of power absolute. All had fallen to the Dark Lord.
And now Kael bore their weight.
"He's trying to possess me," Kael whispered. "Not like before. Not subtly. This is war."
The shadow lunged.
Kael threw out his arm, and the chains snapped forward, slashing across the air like whips of burning judgment. The creature recoiled with a soundless roar, smoke unraveling into spirals of lightless flame.
Marek stumbled down to join them, wheezing. "What's the plan then? Chain it? Bury it? Hug it into submission?"
Kael didn't smile. "You run. If I lose control—"
"We've covered that," Nyssa cut in. "We're not running."
"Then stand back."
Kael stepped forward, raising both hands. The chains lengthened, floating now like serpents through the ash.
The valley responded. Flame surged upward. Shadows coalesced into skeletal figures—mockeries of men in broken armor. Wraiths born of the Dark Lord's memory.
Kael moved like a dancer forged in pain—swinging the chains with impossible precision. Each arc tore through the wraiths, each strike sending echoes through the ground.
But for every wraith destroyed, two more rose.
Nyssa drew her blade and leapt into the fray, back to back with Kael.
"We kill the fragments," she said. "And pray the big one stays watching."
"Don't tempt it," Marek groaned, summoning a pulse of magic from a talisman. "I only brought five exploding runes and a moderately cursed hairpin."
The battle was chaos.
Nyssa cut down the first three shadows with a flurry of strikes, but they didn't bleed—they burst into sparks and ash, screaming wordlessly. Marek hurled a rune into a cluster of wraiths, the explosion rocking the blackened stone, briefly clearing a path.
Kael, meanwhile, was a storm. The chains moved faster now, glowing brighter, wrapping around fragments and pulling them apart. But the more he fought, the more the chains dug into his skin. Blood seeped from beneath them, and his face contorted in pain.
And the Dark Lord… watched.
Still towering. Still silent. But its gaze was fixed on Kael. Studying him. Waiting for something.
Nyssa noticed.
"It's not attacking," she said, breath ragged. "Why?"
Kael staggered, falling to one knee. The chains flickered. "Because it's learning. Testing how much it can break before I break."
Marek helped Kael to his feet. "Well, it's doing a solid job. You look half-dead."
Kael coughed. "I feel worse."
Then—
The chains snapped. Not broke—but unlatched.
All at once, the flames surged and the ground beneath Kael cracked open, swallowing him to the knees. Shadows raced up his legs like vines, wrapping around him, pulling him downward.
"No!" Nyssa lunged forward, grabbing his arm.
Kael looked at her, eyes wide with horror. "Don't—he's inside the chains. It was never about me. I was the gate."
The shadow behind them began to step forward.
And it was stepping into Kael.
Marek hurled two runes into the pit. One exploded, briefly driving the shadow back. The other fizzled out in the air, the spell devoured.
Kael grabbed Nyssa's wrist, voice rising over the roar.
"Tell Jack. He was wrong. It's not me or him. It's both of us. We were meant to burn together!"
Then the ground gave way completely.
Kael was gone—dragged into the pit.
The chains snapped taut and vanished.
And the flame went still.
Nyssa dropped to her knees at the edge, stunned. Nothing remained. No body. No smoke. Just a scorched hollow where her friend had stood.
Marek was beside her in an instant, panting.
"Please tell me that was part of the plan."
She didn't answer.
Because for a moment—just a moment—she felt something in the ground.
A pulse.
A heartbeat.
Still alive. Still below.
And somewhere beneath the ash…
Kael was still fighting.