Light—searing and colourless—flooded Kaelen's vision.
There was no sky here.
No ground.
No breath.
Only a burning silence, stretching infinitely in all directions, as if the universe itself had paused to watch.
He floated, weightless yet anchored by something deep inside him. A tether of pain. Memory. Choice.
Where am I?
The light shifted.
Shapes began to emerge—monolithic, ancient, alive. Not structures, not exactly, but titanic remnants of something divine and broken. They drifted around him like the shattered bones of a forgotten god.
And in the centre of it all—
—a single flame.
It burned with no fuel, no wind, and no sound.
A tiny flickering star amidst the vast, silent void.
Yet Kaelen could feel its heat pulsing across his skin. Not scalding, not harsh—familiar.
He drifted toward it without meaning to. As if pulled.
The closer he got, the more the world began to return:
His heartbeat.
His breath.
His fear.
Because now, he could see the figure beside the flame.
Clad in robes of shadow woven with threads of starlight, the being stood tall and still. A hood concealed its face, but its presence radiated gravity—not the weight of mass, but of meaning.
Kaelen landed—though no ground existed—and the being turned.
"You are late," it said. The voice was neither scolding nor cruel. It was tired. Like a mountain that had stood too long against the wind.
Kaelen's throat was dry. "What… are you?"
The figure didn't answer.
Instead, it extended its hand, palm up, revealing an ember—tiny, orange-gold, pulsing faintly like a new born heartbeat.
"This is what remains of the First Flame," the being said. "The breath of creation. The spark that lit all stars."
Kaelen stared. The ember felt like it was staring back.
"Why show this to me?"
The being's hood tilted slightly. "Because you are more than you remember."
Kaelen flinched as the words hit a nerve—something raw, half-buried beneath trauma and time.
"Then why don't I remember?"
The being said nothing at first. It stepped aside, revealing a shape that had not been there before: a pedestal, carved from Blackstone, and embedded with ancient runes Kaelen instinctively understood, though he had no reason to.
He stepped forward.
The pedestal shimmered, and an image rose from its surface—a boy. Younger than he was now. Twelve, maybe thirteen.
It was him.
But he wasn't in the slums.
He stood in golden armour, surrounded by warriors. Celestial banners waved overhead. And in his hand was a sword—Nightfang.
Only it wasn't twisted and blackened as it was now.
It was silver, radiant, majestic.
"Is this…?"
"A memory," the being answered. "From before the Sundering. Before you were broken."
Kaelen stared. "I was—? Wait. Broken?"
The being turned its hooded gaze back to the flame.
"You were forged to carry the Flame. A guardian of balance. Of light and shadow. You fell when the world fractured. When the Flame was scattered and sealed."
Kaelen's thoughts reeled.
Was this truth? A vision?
Had he once been… someone else?
Something more?
The being walked to the flame and held its hand above it.
"The world is not whole. The light burns too bright. The shadow too deep. And you stand at the fracture's edge."
Kaelen took a step back, overwhelmed.
"If this is all true… then what am I now?"
The being finally looked at him—truly looked—and for a heartbeat, Kaelen saw beneath the hood.
Not a face. Not even a spirit.
But a reflection of himself.
"You are the question that must be answered."
Suddenly, the pedestal's light dimmed.
The ember pulsed—once.
Kaelen reached out, and the moment his fingers brushed the flame, it leapt to his chest, searing through his shirt and into his skin.
Agony.
He dropped to his knees, clutching his chest as light burst from his back in twin spirals—not wings, not yet, but the idea of them. His mark—the one that had burned into his skin on the day of his spirit pact—flared to life, glowing with a molten radiance.
Then—
Darkness again.
He woke with a gasp.
Cold stone. Dust. Real ground.
Rina knelt beside him, panic in her eyes.
"Kaelen! Gods—you were gone. You just… vanished."
He sat up, the pain still echoing in his chest.
"I saw it," he whispered.
Rina frowned. "Saw what?"
"The Flame. The truth. Or part of it. I was more. Once."
He looked down at his hand—still trembling.
Then at the sword beside him.
Nightfang.
It pulsed once—quietly.
Almost like it remembered, too.