The winds over the Valley of Echoes carried no birdsong—only silence.
A silence too deep. Too perfect.
As if the land itself held its breath.
At the center of the valley stood a man draped in shadow and bone, encircled by runes carved into the earth with chilling precision. He did not move like a man. He did not breathe like one. He simply was.
The Speaker of Names had arrived.
He traced a line across the ground with a finger blackened by soul rot, murmuring words in a tongue no living throat should speak. Each syllable vibrated through the valley floor. Names—hundreds—formed in the air like smoke, woven from the souls he had devoured.
Behind him, they emerged: twisted revenants, hollow-eyed ghosts, soul-broken warriors. His congregation of the damned. They knelt in perfect silence as he opened his arms wide.
"It is nearly time," he intoned.
"The soulflare kindles in Alsira.
And with it... the final door."
Far from the valley's edge, Emilia stood in the war chamber atop the Soulspire Tower. Maps and scrolls lay scattered across the table. Threads of soul energy glowed faintly, tracing the tremors rippling from the valley like a spiderweb of warning.
"It's him," she whispered. "The one Elira feared most."
Asher leaned over her shoulder, studying the map. "You're certain?"
She nodded. "He's not just summoning the lost—he's binding them. By name."
Asher's jaw tightened. "Then he's close to breaking the seals."
"The last one's beneath Alsira," Emilia said softly. "If it falls, every trapped soul in the realm becomes his."
A heavy silence settled over them.
Then Emilia straightened. "We move tonight."
Under moonlight, a force rode toward the Valley of Echoes. Soulwardens. Adventurers. Soul-weavers. Chosen not for rank, but for resolve. Emilia led them, clad in dusksteel traced with silver, her armor etched in prayers. Soulflowers braided through her hair shimmered with pulsing light.
Asher rode beside her, silent as stone. Over his heart, the faint mark of Elira's soul-bond still glowed.
"We won't get another chance," Emilia said.
"I know."
"She believed in us."
"She still does," Asher replied.
The valley greeted them with stillness.
No ambush. No sound. No birds. No wind.
Just the Speaker.
He stood alone in a soul-ring carved into the valley floor, his form motionless.
He was not monstrous.
He was composed. Measured. Beautiful, in a terrible way. His eyes gleamed with ancient knowing.
"Emilia Gray," he said, voice as smooth as silk, and older than ash. "Daughter of soul and sacrifice. I have waited a long time to meet you."
Emilia drew her staff. White fire bloomed at its tip. "You're not taking Alsira."
"No," the Speaker said gently. "I'm taking you."
And with that, the circle of the dead surged forward.
Revenants howled.
Soulbroken shrieked.
The battle began.
Asher moved like a storm—his blade slicing through twisted bone and spectral sinew. Emilia spun her staff, unleashing arcs of soulfire that tore through corrupted ranks. The Speaker did not lift a finger. He simply watched.
And whispered names.
Each name a curse.
Each name a shackle.
One Warden dropped her sword and collapsed, trembling. Another fell screaming, hands to her skull.
"He's calling their true names!" Emilia shouted. "He's unbinding them from the inside!"
She surged forward—but shadows rose like walls between her and the Speaker. And then she heard them.
Names.
Not shouted, but whispered.
Her mother. Her father. Elira.
But Elira's voice did not command.
It guided.
"Breathe," came the whisper.
"Remember who you are."
With a cry, Emilia drove her staff into the earth.
From it burst a wave—not of fire, not of magic—but of memory.
Her father's laugh.
Her mother's lullaby.
Elira's soft smile.
Asher's quiet strength.
Her own journey—pain and defiance, sacrifice and rise.
The valley shuddered.
The false names burned away.
The Speaker faltered. His calm cracked.
Asher saw the moment—and struck.
Steel met shadow.
Blade met bone.
The Speaker bled—for the first time in a century.
He snarled.
And vanished.
Sound shattered around them like glass.
The battlefield went still.
But the damage had already been done.
The valley floor had cracked.
And with it—the final seal had weakened.
Emilia dropped to one knee, trembling. Asher was there in an instant, catching her before she fell.
Her breath came in gasps, but her eyes still burned. "He's not finished."
"No," Asher said. "But neither are we."
A hush fell over the battlefield.
And from the bloodied earth, a single soulflower bloomed.
Defiant.
Radiant.
Eternal.