The arch loomed like the ribcage of a god long dead.
Bone fused with blackened stone. Runes crawled across its surface like veins—glowing faintly red as Kael approached. The talisman around his neck pulsed once, then cracked clean in two.
The gate whispered open.
Kael stepped into the Trial.
The air inside the gate was thick, wet with silence.
He walked a narrow causeway of skulls, descending into a chamber so vast it seemed to swallow sound. At its center waited a crimson pool, unmoving, like frozen blood under glass.
Kael felt it before he saw it: his Blood Core screaming.
And then… he looked down.
At first, he saw only himself—scarred, silent, breathing.
But the reflection blinked.
Then it smiled.
It rose up from the blood like an echo given flesh: taller, darker, draped in veils of bone-armor that bled smoke. Its eyes were pitch voids, burning faintly crimson.
The Hollowed Kael.
"You've come far," it said, voice like cracked ice. "But not far enough."
Kael stepped back. "You're not real."
"I'm more real than what you pretend to be. I am the Kael who didn't flinch. Who didn't hesitate. Who didn't spare."
The hollowed form raised a hand, and images bled from the air—Kael's mercy to the bandit, his trust in strangers, his doubts. Each one twisted and distorted, turning into futures soaked in betrayal and death.
"You'll lose them all," the hollowed Kael whispered. "But I can save them. All of them. Give me the soul… and I'll give you the throne."
Kael staggered.
The temptation clawed at his spine. He could feel the power radiating off the Hollowed version—the weight of gods, the certainty of victory, the blood-forged authority.
But behind it… he sensed hunger. A void that could never be filled.
Kael drew his dagger. "You're not me."
The Hollowed Kael only laughed. "No. I'm what you'll become. Sooner than you think."
Then it lunged.
But the bloodpool shattered like glass at Kael's feet—and he fell to his knees, panting, alone in the chamber once more.
When he emerged, the caravan waited in tense silence.
Sorella stepped forward. "Well?"
Kael looked at his shaking hands. "I passed."
Tarren raised an eyebrow. "You sure?"
Kael didn't answer.
He looked back once at the Gate… and saw the reflection still watching from inside the blood.
It smiled.
************
The wind moaned across the broken land like a dying breath.
Dust swept through the caravan's path—red dust, tinged with something metallic. Even the horses snorted uneasily, their eyes rolling. The land here was wrong. Tainted.
Kael walked ahead in silence, the bloodstone compass trembling at his side.
His Blood Core pulsed. Once. Then again.
And with every pulse… came memory.
Scene: The Vyr King's Last Stand (Vision)
It hit him like a blade to the spine.
Kael's vision blurred, and suddenly he wasn't in the wastes.
He was on a battlefield beneath twin blood moons. A colossal figure in obsidian armor stood before a shattered army—his face hidden behind a broken mask etched with ancient runes.
The Vyr King.
Around him, corpses twitched—not dead, not alive, puppets of blood threads curling into the sky. He held the Crimson Heart—a pulsing, living artifact. With every beat, the land bled.
"Break the cycle," the king whispered. "Or become the next tyrant."
Kael gasped as the vision snapped like a bone.
Scene: The Bleeding Ruins
The caravan halted at midday near what looked like old stone ruins, buried in the red sand.
But when Kael stepped closer, the ground wept.
Thick crimson liquid oozed from the stones—slow, unending. The air tasted like copper and old screams.
"It's not water," Sorella said, kneeling beside a cracked wall. "It's blood. Old blood. Still alive."
Tarren muttered, "Gods, what happened here?"
Kael closed his eyes. The whispers were louder here—choruses of agony, murmured spells, echoes of rites too ancient for words.
"This is where the Heart was born," Kael said. "Or something like it."
Scene: Blurred Lines
That night, Kael's dreams weren't dreams.
He stood atop a tower made of bones, watching himself burn villages. He saw Taren's body lying in crimson mud. He saw Sorella screaming—because he was the one holding the blade.
When he woke, his hands were slick with blood.
He looked down.
No wounds.
No injuries.
Just blood.
Sorella's voice cut through the darkness: "You screamed."
Kael didn't answer.
He couldn't.
Because the wind outside still whispered his name… and in the ruins, something ancient had opened its eyes.
•
The storm had passed, but unease lingered like smoke over the encampment.
They found the settlers at the base of a ravine—emaciated, pale, and hollow-eyed, clutching crude spears as if they remembered what courage felt like. Children hid behind rusted carts. The wind carried the faint scent of ash and bloodroot.
Kael approached slowly, hands raised. "We're not here to hurt you."
The eldest, a gaunt woman with gray braids and cracked lips, replied, "You already have."
Scene: Secrets in the Dust
Inside the settlers' cracked stone refuge, Kael noticed strange glyphs carved into the walls—symbols nearly identical to the ones he'd seen in his visions.
"What is this place?" he asked.
The woman, whose name was Yresa, whispered, "An archive. Before the fall, this was one of the blood schools—hidden when the Vyr began devouring their own."
She unwrapped a cloth bundle: brittle scrolls, bone-inlaid tomes, and a carved crystal orb faintly pulsing red.
"This knowledge is dangerous," she warned. "But so is ignorance."
Kael reached toward the orb. His Blood Core screamed.
Take it. Devour it. They are weak. You are not. You could burn kingdoms with what lies inside.
He yanked his hand back. Sweat beaded on his brow.
Scene: The Choice
Later, by the fire, the caravan argued.
Sorella: "If they're hiding Blood System knowledge, they're a threat."
Tarren: "They're survivors. Barely. Knowledge isn't a weapon until someone makes it one."
Kael sat silent, fingers pressed to his temple.
The Blood System whispered like a blade against bone.
Spare them and you weaken. Rule them and you ascend.
He looked at the starving children.
He thought of the Bloodspawn. Of the Hollowed Self.
Then he said, "We don't burn them. Not this time."
Sorella stiffened. "Then what?"
"We give them food. Leave them be."
"But they know about the Crimson Heart—"
Kael's voice dropped. "So do I. And maybe mercy is what keeps us from becoming the monsters we fight."
Scene: The Burden
That night, the whispers turned cruel.
Mercy breeds rebellion. You will see.
Kael stared into the dark, eyes wide, the memory of the orb's glow still flickering behind his lids.
Power shared is power lost.
Power withheld is blood postponed.
In the distance, something howled.
Kael didn't sleep.
He just waited for the next choice.