The wind howled through the rusted spires of Elraen Academy as morning light cracked over the jagged rooftops. Below, among the servant quarters nestled behind the grand marble halls, Raen Liora moved in silence. His boots were soaked, soles half-torn, but he didn't slow his steps. Today was the testing.
His heart thudded with something that was not quite hope. He had felt it every year since he turned ten—and every year, the Marking Stone had remained cold beneath his hand.
"Seventeen and still nothing," he murmured to himself, gripping the edge of his tattered cloak tighter.
The other boys—sons of noble families and high-ranking officers—would laugh if he showed up again. No Mark. No power. No future.
Still, something in him refused to quit.
Inside the testing hall, the walls shimmered faintly with ancient sigils. The Marking Stone stood tall and silent at the center, pulsing faintly in the presence of raw power. Dozens of students formed a line, each waiting to place their palm upon its obsidian surface.
"Move, rat," someone spat behind him.
Raen turned slowly. Veylan, the heir to House Marren, towered over him in gleaming silver armor that he didn't even earn. Power flickered around Veylan's shoulders like a storm waiting to be unleashed. Elemental class. Fire-born.
Raen didn't respond. He merely stepped aside.
Let them laugh. I didn't come for them.
When it was finally his turn, the hall went quiet. Even the instructors watched in mild curiosity, their expressions more out of pity than expectation. No one without a Mark had ever awakened past the age of fifteen.
Raen placed his palm on the stone. It was cool—silent. Empty. Again.
Laughter erupted behind him. One of the instructors sighed and scribbled something down in a ledger.
"I suggest you find a trade, boy," the man said without looking up. "Power doesn't come to those it deems unworthy."
Raen didn't reply. He walked out without a word. But inside, something trembled. Not in despair—no, he had cried all his tears long ago.
This was something different.
That night, under the silence of a moonless sky, Raen found himself wandering the abandoned ruins near the academy's border. His feet had taken him there without thought, drawn by something unseen. The place was off-limits. Forbidden. But rules had never protected someone like him.
There, half-buried beneath rubble and root, he saw it: a ring of dark silver, pulsing faintly with a blood-red core.
He reached out.
The moment his fingers brushed it, a scream echoed in his mind—not of fear, but power awakening. Ancient. Violent. Alive.
The ring leapt to his finger.
And it burned.
Raen fell to his knees, clutching his hand as visions exploded behind his eyes—flashes of war, of shadows consuming cities, of a man who wore the ring before him falling into darkness.
And then… silence.
The ring pulsed once.
> [Relic Identified: Vael'Thar – Dormant Echo Stage]
[New Host Accepted]
[Warning: Power detected. Suppression protocols failing.]
Raen gasped for breath, eyes wide. The stone on the ring gleamed. A whisper coiled into his mind.
> "You are the last. The cycle begins again."
And from the shadows b
eyond the ruins, unseen eyes opened.
[End of Chapter 1]