The sky over Valenreach was red.
Not the soft blush of sunset — but the deep, boiling crimson of warfire. From the horizon, Ravon Draak's army poured forth like a living storm, silhouettes of twisted drakes and war-beasts descending upon the last flame sanctuaries.
Kael and Serenya stood on a wind-blasted rise, the temple ruins silhouetted behind them. Smoke curled from the once-holy towers. The last bastion of old flame was burning.
Kael clenched his fists.The ember in his chest pulsed like a heartbeat, echoing with rising fury.
"We're too late," he said bitterly.
Serenya's expression darkened.
"We're never too late."
The village below had become a battlefield.
Flamebound defenders — few and scattered — clashed with Ravon's Ashborn, corrupted soldiers laced with voidsteel, their blood turned black, their eyes hollow with ruin.
Kael surged forward, leaping down the rocky slope. Serenya followed close behind, blade already glowing red with runes of wrath.
They landed in the fray.
Kael raised his hand — a column of fire erupted from his palm, splitting a line of Ashborn down the middle. Flame howled through the temple square. Screams echoed across the stone.
A beast the size of a carriage charged him — a flame-twisted lizard with twin maws and armored plates seared into its flesh.
Kael didn't flinch.
The fire rose around him, not just as a weapon — but as a second skin. His body ignited, cloaked in whips of ashlight and pulsing energy. His feet left the ground.
And then—
He changed.
Not fully. Not yet.
But enough.
Wings of smoke exploded from his back. His skin cracked with molten veins. Horns of flame curled at his temples, and his voice — when he roared — was no longer human.
"BACK."
The beast faltered.
Kael crashed into it with the force of a meteor. The ground cracked beneath them. One strike to its core shattered it in a burst of black fire and molten bone.
Serenya, battling beside him, paused for a split second.
Her eyes widened.
"Your form… it's beginning to awaken."
Kael stood amid scorched ash, flames dripping from his hands like blood.
"I didn't try. It just happened."
"Good," she said, spinning into a parry and severing the limbs of two Ashborn. "You'll need it."
A new presence entered the battlefield.
Ravon's general — a man wreathed in smoke and crowned with an iron halo — stepped through the fire, dragging a massive blade that wept void energy with every movement.
"So this is the boy they whisper about…"
"The last breath of Aurex."
Kael stepped forward.
The two clashed.
Blades met in a shriek of power — voidsteel against flame. The general struck with brutal, calculated swings, carving craters with each motion. Kael danced between them, his power flaring hotter with each pass.
The ember reacted — and Kael let it.
His form began to shift again.
The Ashen Incarnate stirred.
Flames coiled around him like a cloak. His roar shook the sky. His wings unfurled fully — skeletal, glowing, nearly divine.
The general lunged — and Kael caught the blade barehanded.
With a wordless cry, Kael's fire surged through the weapon, shattering it in a flash of molten heat.
He struck.
And when his fist met the general's chest, it wasn't Kael that the battlefield saw — but a glimpse of Aurex, reborn in fury and flame.
The general fell, consumed.
Silence followed.
The Ashborn retreated, scattered by the power they didn't understand.
Kael stood in the aftermath, breathing heavily, flame dying down.
Serenya approached him slowly.
"You're changing," she said softly.
He looked down at his hands. Still smoldering. Still too warm.
"I can feel it," he said. "Like something is waking up inside me."
"Not just power. Memory. Purpose."
She placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Then hold on to who you are. Because soon, you'll have to decide if the flame controls you…"
"Or if you command the flame."
Kael met her gaze.
"I won't be Ravon."
"I'll be the fire that builds — not just burns."
Above them, the smoke cleared for a moment.
And the stars — long hidden by ash — blinked through.
A sign.
The world wasn't lost yet.