Far across the scarred horizon, beyond rivers that flowed backward and skies that shimmered with fractured constellations, the Riftspire rose like a spear through the skin of the world. It was not built—it had grown, fed on forgotten oaths and broken time.
And at its pinnacle, wrapped in robes woven from shadowlight and silence, stood Draeven.
He watched Kael through a tear in space, a mirror of living glass, its surface alive with flame.
The boy was no longer broken.
And that was troubling.
Behind Draeven, the Rift pulsed like a wound trying to breathe. Its edges writhed, not in chaos—but in order so absolute, it rejected life itself. Every whisper of time was drawn inward, digested, and rewritten.
A voice spoke from the Rift.
Not with sound, but with shape.
"He holds three Embers. He must fall."
Draeven did not turn.
"He will come. He always does. That is his curse."
He walked to the edge of the Rift and held out a hand.
"I carved his soul from ash and grief. He is my reflection. My heir. And he will either take my place… or destroy the world trying."
Draeven moved to a table of obsidian where pieces of the world were scattered like a game board. Cities, armies, beasts—each one held in stasis by his will.
He waved a hand.
One piece flickered: a burning city with a phoenix crest.
"Ignite Calvareth. Burn their skies. Let Kael feel the cost of survival."
Another move.
A piece shaped like a woman cloaked in ice and chains.
"And release Ismara. Let him face love… twisted."
He looked again into the Rift-mirror.
Kael's group approached the Fields of Reversal—lands caught in a perpetual yesterday. Each step would drag them deeper into their own regrets.
Draeven smiled faintly.
"Come then, brother. Carry your sword, your fire, your hope…"
"And let's see if you can survive truth."
The Fields of Reversal stretched like a mirage before Kael's group—an endless expanse where time did not flow, but spiraled inward.
Each blade of grass shimmered with yesterday's memory. Every gust of wind carried echoes of what might have been.
"This place feeds on regret," Ysera said, eyes narrowing. "Step carefully, or it'll show you things you once wished were true."
Kael looked out across the fields. Somewhere in that mirrored haze, a ruined tower twisted upward—half-born, half-dream. Their path led through it.
"Then we keep moving," Kael said. "Eyes forward. Past stays behind."
They entered the fields—and the air changed.
Cold. Familiar. Personal.
Kael's first step triggered a vision:
A boy—himself—standing in a sunlit orchard. A man knelt before him, laughing. The man's face was warm. Proud. And though Kael couldn't name him, his heart ached.
"You don't have to become him," the man said. "Be more. Be free."
Kael blinked.
The orchard vanished.
The fields continued.
One by one, the others faltered.
Serana saw her brother, arms unburned by war, beckoning her home.
Veylan knelt before an illusion of his fallen twin, whispering forgiveness.
Ysera's chains returned, each forged of a different broken promise.
Kael reached for each of them, anchoring them in the now. Not with words, but with presence—his fire burning clear through the fog of what-might-have-been.
But the Field saved its worst for him.
At the heart of the plain, time cracked.
Kael stumbled into a memory not his own—and yet… unmistakably his.
A throne of shattered stone.
A woman screaming.
Ashreign driven through her chest.
And standing above her… Kael. Older. Wilder. Crowned in ruin.
"You came too late," the future self sneered. "You always do."
Kael clenched his fists.
"That's not me."
"Not yet."
The future-Kael raised Ashreign—its blade blackened, its Embers extinguished.
"You either burn the world… or watch it freeze. Choose."
The vision lunged.
Kael didn't flinch.
Instead, he whispered, "I choose now."
Ashreign flared in his real hand—alive, defiant, unchained.
He slashed the illusion.
Light exploded across the Field.
The spell shattered.
The past fled.
Kael stood at the heart of the Fields of Reversal, unbent.
Behind him, his companions stirred—freed from their false yesterdays.
Ahead, the broken tower came into view. A path of ash led straight to it.
But above it… wings stirred.
A woman in chains, her smile cold as moonsong.
Ismara.
The tower loomed ahead—spires twisted like reaching fingers, windows pulsing with soft, blue flame. Kael stepped forward, but the air thickened. The ash path grew cold.
Then she descended.
Ismara.
She didn't fall—she glided on wings made of iron links and frostbitten light. Her robes clung to her like mist. Each step she took across the ruined stones chained the wind itself to silence.
"You've walked far, Kael," she said, voice echoing from every direction. "Yet here we are again."
Kael gripped Ashreign tightly.
"I don't remember you. But my heart does."
She smiled—sadly, knowingly.
"That's because your heart loved me once. Before the fire. Before Draeven."
Ismara circled him slowly.
The others stayed back—unable to move forward, as if time had paused for just the two of them.
"We met in the Age That Wasn't," she whispered. "When Draeven fell, and you... rose. I was your oathkeeper, Kael. Your blade-sister. Your wife in lives forgotten."
Kael staggered, memory clawing at the edges of his soul:
A wedding beneath stars that never existed.
Her laugh, wild and free.
A battlefield soaked in blood—her dying in his arms, whispering his name.
Ashreign pulsed with grief.
"You died," Kael breathed. "I saw it—felt it."
"I did," she said. "But Draeven found me in the dark between timelines. He offered me a choice: live again... in chains. Or vanish forever."
Her wings unfurled—rattling, beautiful, cursed.
"I chose the chains. For you."
Kael lowered his blade, torn between rage and sorrow.
"Then help me stop him. Fight beside me, Ismara."
Her face softened—for the briefest second.
Then hardened again.
"I can't. He owns my flame now. If I turn on him… my soul unravels."
A pause.
"But I can test yours."
She raised her hand.
Chains exploded from the sky, twisting toward Kael.
"Survive me, Kael.
Burn bright enough…
And I might remember how to be free."
Ashreign met the first strike with a scream of light.
Kael leapt—into memory, into love lost, into war once more.
The sky burned as Kael and Ismara clashed atop the ruined tower. Her chains—living, writhing, forged from oath and torment—lashed out like serpents of silver fire. Each strike wasn't meant to kill.
They were meant to remind.
Kael dodged the first arc, Ashreign blazing as it carved through three others mid-air.
"You remember me," Ismara whispered, her eyes glowing with past lives. "Even if you deny it."
"I remember enough," Kael shouted, "to know you never fought to hurt me."
She hesitated. The chains faltered—just long enough for Kael to close the gap.
Ashreign met her binding halo in a spray of golden sparks. The ground shook.
The old stones beneath them sang with ancient magic.
Ismara twisted backward, eyes wide with fury and sorrow.
"This flame… It's not just Emberfire," she hissed. "You've merged the fragments."
Kael nodded, breathing hard.
"Ashreign no longer remembers a single path. It chooses now."
Below, Serana and the others fought their own war—shadows from broken timelines bleeding through the walls, memories made flesh. Ysera called forth a wall of starlight to shield them. Veylan struck down a future version of himself twisted by madness.
But they could only watch as Kael and Ismara battled alone—locked in a storm of old love and fire-born pain.
Kael struck high.
Ismara countered low, chains wrapping his leg and hurling him into a shattered spire.
Blood fell.
Memories surged.
He saw her—Ismara—kneeling beside him after a lost war, binding his wounds.
He saw her laugh during the age of starlight, dancing barefoot under falling petals.
He saw her burn, screaming, as Draeven's first betrayal shattered the sky.
Kael rose.
Ashreign pulsed, brighter than before.
"You said if I burned bright enough…" he whispered, stepping through the chains now as they trembled. "Then see me. Now."
With a cry, he launched forward—not to strike—but to embrace her.
Ashreign dimmed.
Kael dropped the sword.
And for one heartbeat, he trusted her.
The chains froze mid-air.
Ismara stood trembling.
And then they shattered.
She collapsed into his arms.
The cursed wings faded.
Her voice was ragged, broken.
"Kael… you still carry my name… even after everything."
"I never stopped," he said, holding her tightly. "Now help me end him."
Above, the Riftflare pulsed violently.
Draeven had felt the break.
The game board had changed.
The queen had returned.
The shattered chains still clung to the wind like memories, drifting in slow arcs of silver dust. Kael helped Ismara to her feet, her breath shallow, but her eyes—no longer cold—burned with purpose.
Below, the others rushed up the crumbling stairs of the tower. Serana arrived first, blade drawn, face hard.
She stopped when she saw Ismara.
"Kael. Step back. That's a Riftbound."
Kael shook his head.
"She was. No longer."
Ysera, sensing the shift in Ismara's aura, lowered her hand of starlight. Veylan kept his halberd half-raised, distrust in his eyes.
Ismara didn't flinch beneath their suspicion. She stood tall, wings gone, chains fallen, her aura shifting—no longer bound by Draeven's curse, but still touched by it.
"I don't ask for your trust," she said. "Only your aim. Point it at Draeven."
Serana narrowed her gaze.
"He's already ahead of us. Whatever trap you think you escaped… he let you."
Ismara nodded grimly.
"I know. I felt his grip slip the moment I remembered who I was. He won't make that mistake again."
Kael stepped between them.
"Then we don't wait. We move. Together."
He turned to the broken altar at the tower's center. In it, a swirling mirror of obsidian light had formed—another gate. Another passage deeper into Draeven's nightmare.
A sigil shimmered above it—The Mark of the Hollow Throne.
Ismara's voice was quiet.
"That path leads to the Forsaken Crownlands. Draeven's true fortress is beyond them. But the lands are cursed—ruled by kings who never died."
Kael retrieved Ashreign and looked to his companions.
"Then let's go unmake some dead kings."
As they stepped toward the portal, Ismara placed a hand on Kael's shoulder.
"You were more than my fire, Kael. You were my hope."
Kael looked at her—not as she was in this broken world, but as she once had been.
"Then let's bring that hope back. Blade by blade. Realm by realm."
Behind them, the tower crumbled, its duty done.
Ahead, the portal pulsed.
And Draeven, watching through a rift of starlight, smiled.
"Let them come. The deeper they walk, the more mine they become."