Emperor Cailan Gravis stood before the towering gates of the colosseum, their bronze plating dulled by centuries yet still imposing, like the jaws of some ancient beast. The air was thick with dread. From beyond those sealed gates came the muffled sounds of terror—the soft, broken cries of commoners caged inside, their whimpers scraping against the silence like rusted blades.
He closed his eyes for a brief, fragile second. He inhaled, tasting the scent of dust, sweat, and fear that hung heavy in the wind. When he opened them again, the weight of vengeance burned in his gaze like molten iron.
Cailan was not an unfeeling tyrant. He was not the sort of man to revel in rivers of blood or dance upon the bones of the fallen. No. He cared little for conquest. Power was never his hunger. Dominion was never his dream. But this war—this brutal storm—was no longer about empires.
It was personal.
His eyes lifted toward the massive archway ahead, where banners of his empire snapped in the wind, their black and crimson threads writhing like serpents. He exhaled slowly, yet his breath trembled beneath the iron calm he wore like armor.
Groa Aratat. That damn tyrant!
The name alone was poison on his tongue, bitter and cold. The architect of his misery. The butcher of his joy.
Once, long ago, Groa had reached for his throne with claws of ambition, launching raid after raid to break the Scorpion Empire's spine and swallow it up in its entirety. But when steel met steel and the Scorpions held their ground, he faltered. He abandoned his siege. The history books would say he left defeated.
But that wasn't all that happened, and Emperor Cailan Gravis would never forget what Emperor Groa did as a last ditch resort to have his way.
Before Groa retreated, he struck where no blade could pierce, where no shield could guard. He captured them—her—the gentle queen who had been his light in the endless dark, and their daughter, their innocent child with eyes as bright as dawn.
The mother and daughter has left the empire on a relaxation cruise before the war started. The queen and her daughter had left the Scorpion Empire for a brief escape—a voyage across sapphire waters, a simple respite from the crown's endless burdens.
It was meant to be a sanctuary of laughter and calm before the storm of politics could claim their peace again. The world, for a fleeting moment, felt untouched by war. The queen had smiled beneath the sun, her hair dancing in the salt-kissed wind, while their daughter trailed seashells across the deck like scattered jewels.
But fate is cruel.
When their ship returned, gliding toward familiar shores, the empire was no longer the safe haven they had left behind. The sky over the coast was choked with smoke. The sound of steel clashing against steel rolled like distant thunder. And before the sailors could turn the vessel, they were already in the jaws of death.
Emperor Groa had struck.
His banners, crimson and gold, blazed like fire against the horizon. His army descended upon the coastline with the precision of wolves scenting blood. They tore through the docks like a tempest, blades singing songs of slaughter. And when Groa saw them—the queen and her child, isolated amid chaos—he did not hesitate.
To him, they were more than flesh and bone; they were leverage, a dagger pressed to the throat of an empire.
Soldiers surged forward, trampling bodies as they closed in. The queen fought—gods, she fought—but her guards fell like wheat before the scythe. Blood ran thick upon the planks of the dock, spilling into the hungry sea. And when at last resistance crumbled, Groa's men seized them.
Chains clinked like mocking laughter as they bound their delicate wrists. Silks stained red dragged against the ground as they were pulled through the carnage—royalty reduced to spoils of war. Their screams were lost to the roar of battle, their tears to the dust and blood that smeared their faces.
Behind them, the ocean that once promised serenity now glimmered like a grave, reflecting the flames of the burning harbor.
And thus began the darkest chapter in Cailan's life.
Cailan had stood firm for his people. He did not yield his empire. He did not bend his knee. He held his crown high, even as his heart bled rivers unseen. For every heartbeat of defiance, he paid in agony. And then—when hope was a withering ember—Groa crushed it with merciless hands.
The day the news reached him—that they were gone, slaughtered without honor, without mercy—Cailan's soul became a storm. A vow was carved into the marrow of his bones: Groa will pay.
Years had crawled by since that cursed day—years of silence sharpened into steel. Time did not heal Emperor Cailan Gravis; it honed him. Each sunrise was a whetstone, grinding his hatred into a blade so keen it could split the fabric of mercy itself. He endured. He plotted. He forged alliances in the shadows where whispers moved like venom. And when mortal hands proved insufficient, he raised his voice to the heavens.
To Kratos—the god of war.
His prayers were not words but vows, spoken over blood-soaked altars that time had forgotten. When prayer was not enough, he gave offerings—lives extinguished in sacred fire, crimson spilling into the cracks of cold stone. And Kratos… Kratos heard. For a season, the scales of fate tilted under the god's unseen hand, and war bent in Cailan's favor.
But expectation and reality are cruel lovers, forever dancing out of step. What is granted by the divine is never without chains. Gods have watchers—silent sentinels who keep the order of eternity, ensuring that immortals do not meddle beyond the games allotted to them. They may toy with mortals, yes, twist their destinies for amusement, but only within the delicate threads of the Loom. Never beyond.
When Kratos glimpsed V'Zaleth—the Trickster God—lingering in the folds of this mortal war, suspicion slithered into certainty: the others were watching. Some hidden, some waiting, all ready to strike with judgment swifter than a thunderbolt.
If Kratos acted now, he would not merely tip the scales—he would shatter them. And divine law, once broken, binds even gods in chains of regret. A single reckless move could coil back upon him like a serpent devouring its own tail.
So he did what revealed his cautious mindset: he stepped away.
Bound by the iron decree of eternity, Kratos withdrew his hand, leaving Cailan naked beneath the storm. The heavens would not intervene. Not now. Not ever.
So here he stood. No god. No savior. Only a man—armed with fury, tempered by grief, and driven by a vengeance so deep it could swallow worlds.
He stared at those gates, at the shadows beyond, where Groa's empire clung to its crumbling pride. A sigh slipped from his lips—not of weariness, but of finality.
"I will not forgive," he whispered to the wind, voice low and edged like steel. "And I will not forget."
The gates loomed before him, silent sentinels to the slaughter that was about to begin. And for the first time in years, Cailan felt something close to peace—not because the pain was gone, but because justice, or rather vengeance at last, was near.