"So… you're all really going to leave?" Max stood still, arms folded, voice low.
The hall around him held quiet like a breath. Walls patched with scrap metal. Air dry with dust and rust. The settlers stood in scattered lines, skin pale, clothes thin, their eyes distant—like they had already stepped away from this place long before their feet would.
Old Man Mark nodded once. "Yes. We can't stay here anymore. Every stone, every path reminds us of the past. Of the sands. Of the screams." His words cracked, voice dry like old bark. "It's better we go. Far away from the Dancing Fire Region… far from what we let happen."
Max didn't move. "I understand." His tone stayed flat. "Headquarters already got my message. The evac ships are being prepped. You'll have your way out."
Mark looked down. When his eyes lifted again, they shone with something faint. "Thank you, Max. I mean that. Truly. Even after everything—after what we did to you and your brothers—you still risked your lives to help us."
Max's face barely shifted. "We didn't save everyone." His gaze swept the room, landing on the ones too scared to meet it. "So I don't really need your thanks."
Mark's face pulled into a quiet, worn smile. "You've got a good heart… better than most I've met." His voice dipped lower. "But don't let that be your end. You're smart. Smarter than anyone I know. But a good leader—" he paused, searching the words, "—a good leader must know when to be ruthless. When to let some burn, so others may live."
Max's brows drew close. His voice dropped, sharper. "Like how you sacrificed those children?"
The air snapped. Every pair of eyes in the room froze. No one moved.
Mark's jaw tightened. The wrinkles in his face seemed deeper now. "You think I wanted that?" His voice rasped. "You think I slept since? I did what I was taught. What I had to. I'm not a genius like you, Max. I wasn't born with choices. I used the knowledge I had, and I made the decision no one else would."
Max looked away, his jaw rigid, fingers curled just a little tighter. "They didn't deserve to die."
The silence that followed weighed heavier than anything spoken.
Mark's voice dropped, barely more than a breath. "They didn't. You're right."
Max took a step forward. His eyes didn't leave Mark. Something colder crept into his tone now. "Tell me something."
Mark blinked. "What?"
Max's voice stayed calm, but something sharp cut through. "How did you end up in Sandworm Valley?" His eyes narrowed. "It makes no sense. My father's sacrificial blast scorched this region clean—no life, no ground, just fire and silence. So how?" His voice edged with tension. "How did you all crawl out of that and build something?"
Mark didn't speak. His mouth opened, then closed. His eyes dropped.
Max's voice dropped lower. "Dunehaven…" He stared through the man now, like peeling back the skin of a lie. "Shouldn't even exist."
Old Man Mark let out a breath, slow and brittle. It rasped through the air like dry leaves crushed under a boot. His eyes dropped to the floor—not just from shame, but like something deeper kept pulling him down. Something buried.
"It wasn't right after the fire," he said. Each word seemed to drag its own weight. "For a long time, no one dared step foot in the Dancing Fire region. They called it cursed… hollowed. Your father's flames didn't just burn the land, Max. They scorched memories, melted legacies. Even the name of this place vanished in smoke. But time… time makes fools of all of us."
Max didn't blink. His eyes stayed sharp. "What do you mean?"
Mark lifted his head slowly. There was nothing behind his gaze. Just a void. The kind that didn't form overnight.
"One day, a team of desperate scavengers came back from an expedition. Said they saw life returning to the valley. Fragile… but real. No one believed them. Not at first. But they were broken people, Max. Exiles, widows, fractured families crawling out of the wreckage of the old city. They needed land. A place to breathe."
Max's jaw tensed, lips a thin line. "And so you chose a graveyard?"
Mark gave a slow nod. "It wasn't my decision alone. A coalition of fringe leaders met—old men playing gods. They organized expeditions, sent builders, terra-formers, and a few tech heads to survey possible safe zones. Their task was simple: find soil. Find hope."
Max's voice dropped colder. "Yeah… I remember that. I remember my father warning them to stay away. Said it wasn't safe. But the military had their own saying."
Mark's face tightened, shadows forming in the creases of his skin. "The military... They're the reason we ended up in Sandworm Valley. Told us it was 'secure territory.' Assigned sectors, gave us false confidence. And when the creatures came… when the sky turned to ash and the ground trembled…"
His words caught. His throat moved, but no sound came out.
"They didn't come for us. Not a single damn airship."
Max's eyes narrowed. "You were part of the military?"
Mark gave a dry chuckle. No humor in it. "Once. I was a capable earth user—good enough to lead squads. My unit was tasked with escorting settlers into the valley. They picked us because we were locals… familiar with the terrain. But that didn't save us."
Max didn't respond. His silence said enough.
Mark went on. His voice cracked, like it was trying to hold something back and failing. "We were halfway through the trek when the vibrations started. Faint at first. Then came the roar beneath the surface—then the sky split open. The sandworms erupted like a tidal wave. Screams everywhere. My comrades died in seconds… my wife… my daughter…"
He didn't finish. The words dried up in his throat.
Max turned his face, gaze falling to the corner of the room. The shadows there didn't move.
After a long pause, he said, "Why did no one report this? The military only said the region became a danger zone. They never mentioned lives lost."
Mark's stare went flat. "Of course they didn't. Why admit failure? Why stain their perfect records? We were ghosts before we even died."
Max's voice came out low. "So how did you survive?"
Mark filled his lungs again, as if the memory took effort to carry.
"We shouldn't have. After the first attack, the worms pulled back. We thought it was over. It wasn't. Something bigger stirred. A Tier 6." His hand trembled at his side. "I'll never forget the sound it made—like the earth was screaming."
A chill slipped down Max's spine. His fingers curled.
"It swallowed a couple of people. But after that, something strange happened," Mark said. "It didn't attack again. It just… stayed there. Still. Turns out one of the settlers had Nightveil Drought on them. Don't ask me how he got it. Because I don't know, it supposed to be gone. But it worked. Put the beast to sleep. It dug into the sand and never came back up."
Max kept his eyes locked on Mark. "And the others… they were afraid of it?"
"Yes. The smaller ones wouldn't come near. So we did what we had to. We built above it. I buried the Tier 6 deeper with my Vein, found soil. We grew more Nightveil around it to keep it worm from going waking up. That thing became our shield… and our prison."
His voice drifted off.
Then another voice snapped through the air. "So you used children to make sure the worm would stay fed?"
Mark froze. Max turned his head.
Kael stood in the doorway, arms crossed, shoulders stiff. His eyes locked on Mark like flame to dry grass. The heat there wasn't from his Vein.
"Don't think this story earns you sympathy," Kael said. His voice didn't rise. It didn't need to. "Don't think it justifies anything."
Max moved, one step closer. "Kael—"
But Kael didn't look away. "What? Don't tell me you're siding with them now. Don't tell me you think feeding kids to that thing was a choice worth making."
Behind him, another shadow slipped through the doorway. Ash.
He didn't say a word. He didn't have to.
His eyes moved across the room—past Mark, past Max, past Kael. They landed on the settlers. On their sunken faces. Their empty stares. Not one of them looked surprised. Not one of them denied it.
They didn't even flinch.
Ash stood still.
And the silence around him said more than any of them ever could.
Old Man Mark opened his mouth, but no sound came. His hands shook, fingers curling like they were pulling something out of the dirt—something that didn't want to come.
"I… I never wanted it to happen that way," he said. His voice cracked. Not from age—something deeper. Something broken.
Kael stepped forward, shadows under his eyes like bruises that never healed. "But it did. And you let it. So tell me—how many kids did you feed to that thing before we showed up?"
The air didn't move. The room didn't breathe. The silence had teeth.
Max didn't speak. His jaw locked like a steel trap.
Ash pushed off the doorway and stepped inside. The room felt thick—like the walls remembered the screams. The settlers didn't even lift their heads. Their eyes were drained, lost somewhere far from here.
Kael's voice fell quiet, but it cut deeper. "You know what I hate most? That look in your eyes. Like you've already accepted you're the villain… and you're just waiting for someone else to end the damn story for you."
Mark stayed still.
Ash's voice came in, low. "Was there ever a moment you regretted it? When you made that first choice… when you looked a child in the eyes and decided they were the price—did you hesitate?"
Mark lifted his face. Eyes raw, rimmed red. "Every night. I hear their screams when I try to sleep. Still."
Kael's face twisted. "Still... Its wasn't loud enough."
Max reached out, hand resting on Kael's shoulder. "Kael… that's enough."
Kael pulled away, eyes still locked on Mark. "Don't forget what they did, Max. I haven't. We bled for people who would've watched us die. Don't confuse desperation with innocence."
Ash's gaze moved over the settlers again. They weren't standing. They weren't hiding. They were just… waiting. Waiting for the end of something they'd already outlived.
His thoughts stirred like sand under the wind. 'This place isn't a settlement. It's a tomb with beating hearts.'
Mark sank into a chair. His arms dangled over his knees. "We did what we had to," he said. "I don't expect forgiveness."
Kael turned. No heat in his voice now, only cold steel. "Good. Because you won't get it."
Ash stepped beside Max, resting a hand on his shoulder. "Let's go. There's nothing left here but ghosts."
Max gave a slow nod.
As they turned toward the door, Mark's voice scratched through the quiet. "Wait."
The brothers paused.
"I know you hate us. Maybe you should. But still…"
Behind him, the settlers moved. Slowly. Heads bowed. As one, they spoke.
"Thank you."
Max looked at them. His face didn't shift, but something flickered in his eyes. "I hope you guys safely leave Dancing Fire Region. You deserve that at least."
They stepped outside.
Sunlight slammed into them. Too bright. Too clean. It didn't match the dirt they'd just walked through.
Wind swept in, carrying more than dust.
Kael broke the silence. "I don't care what anyone says… we're not like them. Sacrifice doesn't make you noble. It just means you had something to lose."
Ash glanced over at him. 'He's not talking about them' , he thought. 'He's talking about himself. The new Vein System… it was starting to crack open his thoughts now that the sandworm chaos had faded.'
Ash spoke, quiet. "No. But maybe we get to be better."
Kael exhaled, sharp and dry. "I hope so."
They kept walking. No more words.
Then___
Suddenly. The ground let out a low rumble.
Then a second one—louder. Deeper. Like something buried was waking up. Something old.
The sound cracked through Ironhold like a whip. Guards snapped to attention, boots pounding the ground. Shouts flew across the streets.
"Gate two—shut it down!"
"Get the children inside!"
"Armor up—now!"
Blades clanged. Shields rose. The fortress turned frantic.
Shutters slammed. Heavy locks clicked. Market stalls were left behind, fresh food rolling across the dirt. A woman yanked her child by the arm, vanishing into a shelter. A man dropped a crate and ran, not looking back.
No one moved toward the sound. They just ran from it—like instinct had taken over.
Screams tore through the air. Not from pain. From recognition.
Max stood still for a beat. Just one. Then his voice snapped through the chaos. "Oh no… guys, we need to move. Now."
Ash spun toward the tremor, feeling something pull at his blood. A thrum inside his veins. Low. Rising. "Is it…?"
Max didn't wait. "Yes." His face was set, eyes locked. "The creature waves have begun."