The stench of death still clung to the stone. Solum crouched beside the corpse of the Fractured Ashborn, breath shallow, muscles trembling. The cave was quiet now—eerily so—but the silence did nothing to ease the knot in his gut. Somewhere deeper in the tunnels, the Consumed still stalked. He hadn't seen it leave. He only heard the soft grinding of its armored limbs dragging into the dark.
And now, there was only this body. Cold. Broken. Spilling black blood across the rock.
Solum stared at the hollow Lux Sphere lying beside the beast's ribs. Once radiant—now dim. Its surface had dulled to a cloudy crystal sheen, still warm with the memory of power.
He reached out and touched it.
Nothing.
Not even a flicker. Not a hum. Not a pulse of recognition. Just cold.
He lifted the sphere, cradling it in his palm, searching for something—some echo of the light that once marked him as Warrior. But the rejection still echoed deeper than skin. The Flame hadn't just denied him. It had erased him.
He was no longer of the light.
He set the Lux Sphere down and turned back to the corpse.
He knelt beside the beast's corpse, breath shallow, movements slow. The stench was heavy—feral and wet—but he forced himself to keep working.
Its bones were thick, almost metallic in sheen, fused with twisted plates of natural armor. Solum gritted his teeth, pressing his hand to a splintered rib. It had been cracked in the fight—easy enough to tear loose. He wedged his foot beneath the torso and pulled, wincing as the bone snapped free with a wet pop. It was jagged at one end and hooked at the other. Not perfect—but sharp.
The ribs were long and curved, thicker than human fingers, dulled at the edges . Not ideal. Not forged. But better than nothing. He snapped two free with a grunt, the motion tearing pain through his wounded side.
Daggers. Crude ones. Just bone. They gave him hope.
He peeled back strips of tough hide from the beast's flank, leathery and coarse. With shaking hands, he wrapped the rib-bones tightly, building crude grips. The hide clung stubbornly, but eventually held. They weren't sharp, not really—but they were pointed enough to stab if he got close.
If it came to that.
Solum slumped beside the corpse again, leaning against the cool stone. His robes were shredded from the ceremony—blackened by fire, slashed by stone. Blood still wept from his side, sticky and half-dried. He reached toward the creature's hide, tugging loose a patch of its armored fur from the belly. It peeled away like leather, still warm on the underside.
He wrapped the fur around his torso and tied it off with another strip of sinew. It wasn't comfort. It was cover. A barrier between him and the cold, and whatever came next.
A faint movement caught his eye.
Black blood was still dripping from the beast's ruined throat. It had pooled in a crack in the floor and now crept toward him in slow, sticky trails. Solum started to move—too late.
The blood touched his leg.
It didn't burn. Not at first.
It seeped.
Through cloth. Through skin. Into the wound.
The pain flared like an ember reigniting in dry leaves. Not warmth. Not fire. Something else. fragments of a new core pulsing faintly like a dormant heart.
Solum's back hit the wall. His body convulsed—once, then again. It wasn't just pain. It was pressure. A second pulse. A second heartbeat, deeper than his own. He clutched his ribs and doubled over, gasping for air that wouldn't come.
It faded, slowly. The ache remained. The cold sweat. But the fragments settled.
It had begun to course through him like his ember once had
"What are you?" he muttered.
But he had a suspicion.
Something else. Something cast out, like him.
He placed a hand against his chest, feeling the faint throb beneath the bruises. It was still there. Alien. Wrong. But alive.
"A corrupted Ember"
Not light.
Not flame.
Solum didn't know what that made him anymore—but it wasn't Warrior.
He rose, teeth clenched, and staggered deeper into the cave, away from the corpse. He found a narrow gap behind a broken wall of stone, just wide enough to slip through. Inside, it opened into a cramped hollow—a place to rest. To hide. To think.
He wedged himself into the space and pulled his makeshift daggers close.
He should've felt relief.
He didn't.
Because he could hear the Ashborns.
Farther in the dark. Heavy roars and clashes.
He curled tighter into the hollow, heart pounding, hands shaking.
This time, he didn't even dare whisper.
'I should have never had ambition'
'it is the sin of the oblivious'