The journey south was grueling.
Kael and Elira trudged through frozen ravines and wind-lashed cliffs for three days without seeing another soul. The Codex remained silent, its pages warm but dormant, as if conserving its energy.
On the fourth evening, they descended into a long-forgotten canyon—deep, narrow, and black as obsidian. Elira called it Rendscar.
"Old battlefield," she muttered. "From the first Flame Wars. No wind. No life. Just ghosts."
Kael glanced around. The stone walls towered above them, pockmarked by old scorch marks and strange carvings—eyes, symbols, flames inverted and broken.
"Feels like something's watching," he said.
Elira didn't respond.
By nightfall, they reached a series of hollowed caves carved into the canyon wall—ancient dwellings from a time before the Empire. Elira motioned for silence and signaled Kael to follow her inside.
The interior smelled of damp stone, dust, and something fouler—like rot clinging to old ash.
"Wait here," she said. "Let me speak first."
Kael opened his mouth to ask what they were dealing with, but Elira had already vanished into the dark.
He waited.
Minutes passed. Then, movement.
Figures emerged from the shadows—hooded, hunched, wrapped in ash-colored cloaks. Their eyes glowed faintly red in the dark.
One of them stepped forward—taller than the rest, his voice a raspy whisper:
"The Flame returns."
Elira reappeared beside Kael, her face unreadable.
"Kael. This is Varek. First Flamekeeper of the Ashen Fold."
Kael bowed slightly. "I… didn't expect a welcome."
Varek chuckled, revealing teeth blackened by smoke or worse.
"We don't welcome. We watch. We wait. For this moment."
He pointed to Kael's pendant.
"The last ember. The Codex still breathes?"
Kael nodded. "Barely. But yes."
Varek turned to the others and raised a crooked hand.
"Prepare the rites. The Flameborn seeks the truth."
The Fold began to move, silent and fluid, disappearing into the tunnels like smoke through cracks.
Kael turned to Elira.
"What is this place?"
She hesitated.
"Before the fall of Ardarion, the Fold were the keepers of forbidden flame—mages and scholars who preserved the secrets the Temple feared. After the collapse, they hid here, waiting for someone who carried the Flameblood."
Kael raised an eyebrow. "So they're… allies?"
She frowned.
"Allies to flame. Not always to reason."
Later that night, the "rites" began.
Kael was led into a large, circular chamber deep beneath the canyon floor. Dozens of torches flickered on the walls, casting shifting shadows across ancient runes etched into the stone.
In the center stood a basin of black glass filled with molten embers, pulsing like a heart. Varek stood beside it, chanting in a tongue Kael didn't recognize—harsh, broken, like fire cracking bone.
"What's going to happen?" Kael whispered to Elira.
"The Fold will test you. They want to know if you're truly Flameborn—or just another pretender."
"Test me how?"
She didn't answer.
Varek gestured Kael forward.
"Step into the circle. Give the Codex your blood."
Kael hesitated.
The basin trembled. The glyphs on its surface began to glow. Elira gave him a nod.
Kael stepped in, placed the Codex on the stone altar, and—before he could second-guess—pressed his thumb to the edge of the basin's blade.
His blood sizzled as it struck the molten embers.
Instantly, flame erupted—not from the basin, but from the Codex itself.
It opened, pages fluttering wildly, words igniting mid-air:
"Flamebound. Bound by blood. Bound by memory."
"To reclaim what was lost, one must pass through what was hidden."
A shockwave burst outward. Kael was thrown backward—then found himself standing in a place he did not know.
The canyon was gone.
He stood on a marble floor scorched black by fire. All around him rose ruined pillars and broken thrones—what might once have been a great hall. Flames floated in the air like spirits, drifting soundlessly.
At the far end stood a throne of obsidian, cracked in two.
And on it sat a man.
Clad in royal armor etched with flame, his face veiled in shadow, his eyes twin infernos. His voice thundered through the empty hall.
"You carry my blood. But do you carry my will?"
Kael stepped forward. "Who are you?"
"I was the last King of Ardarion. The Flamebearer. The Tyrant. The Rebel. The Godslayer.
And now, a memory."
The man rose from the throne. His body trailed smoke as he walked.
"If you would reclaim this flame, you must understand it. It is not glory. It is burden. It burns those unworthy."
Kael stood tall. "Then let it burn me. I'm not afraid."
The king raised a hand. Fire exploded across the chamber.
Pain.
Kael fell to his knees, body engulfed in heat, lungs searing.
The fire wasn't consuming flesh—it was burning memory. He saw flashes:
His birth mother, bleeding, handing him to a cloaked figure.
A silver tower collapsing.
A prophecy scrawled in flame: "He who binds fire shall choose its end."
Kael screamed.
And then—silence.
He opened his eyes.
He was back in the chamber, lying beside the Codex. Elira was at his side, and the Fold circled him, chanting low.
Varek's voice rose above them all.
"He bears the truth. Flameborn. Chosen. Marked."
Kael sat up, dazed. His veins glowed faintly, and his pendant had fused into his chest—now a living glyph of fire.
"What did I see?" he gasped.
Elira answered:
"The truth of your line. And the burden you now carry."
Kael looked down at his hands. They no longer trembled.
He wasn't just learning the flame anymore.
He was the flame.