The ruins of Myrrhal lay in silence.
Once a proud mountain citadel, it now stood as a jagged skeleton of obsidian and bone—torn apart by time, war, and something far older: magic twisted into hatred.
Kael stood at the edge of the stone bridge leading into its hollow halls. The First Flame throbbed in his hand like a living heart. The Codex, clutched tight beneath his cloak, had not spoken since dawn.
Beside him, Elira surveyed the path ahead.
"He's here."
Kael nodded.
"I know. I feel him."
They entered the ruin.
Black banners hung from broken towers—bearing no sigil, only flame crossed by a sword. The mark of the Shadow King.
Kael whispered:
"He's already trying to rewrite the past."
They descended into the inner sanctum, once the Flameking's southern throne. But now, it was warped—walls pulsing like veins, shadows thicker than dark.
At the center stood Dain.
Cloaked in robes made from scorched memories. The stolen shard pulsed inside his chest like a dying star. And in his hand… a blackened blade forged from splintered flame.
"Welcome home," Dain said, voice layered with echoes—not just his own, but the voices of every shard he had ever touched.
Kael stepped forward.
"You've changed."
Dain smiled.
"I've evolved."
Elira stepped beside Kael, whispering:
"That's not just him anymore. He's fused the shard wrong. It's taking over."
Kael's grip tightened on his sword.
"Give it back, Dain. Before it destroys you."
Dain laughed—cold, hollow.
"You still don't see it, do you? The Flameking wasn't a savior. He was a weapon. And I'm what he should have been. No doubt. No restraint."
Kael shook his head.
"You're not power. You're poison."
Dain raised his blade.
"Then let's see which of us burns cleaner."
The clash shattered the air.
Flame met shadow.
Kael's blade roared with truth—each swing pulsing with memory, mercy, legacy.
Dain's struck like voidfire—eating light, devouring will.
Elira weaved in and out of the battle, casting runes of resistance, but Dain's magic twisted them. Her barriers cracked. Her breath shortened.
Kael lunged, blade sweeping in an arc—
But Dain caught it with his palm.
Fire screamed. Sparks exploded.
Kael staggered back, stunned.
Dain stepped forward, his voice rising with every word:
"You hesitate, Kael. You forgive. You feel. That's why you'll fail."
Kael clenched his jaw.
"No. That's why I'll survive."
Dain raised the black shard from his chest.
It pulsed wildly—cracks forming along its edges.
"This piece of the Flameking—this is his rage. His grief. His hate."
He turned it toward Kael.
"And I embrace it."
He thrust it forward—
And the world shattered.
Kael found himself falling—
Not through space, but through memory.
A battlefield.
A throne room.
A funeral pyre.
He saw Flameking Valior, kneeling before his own child.
"You must never take all of me."
Kael gasped.
Suddenly, a vision: Dain standing in the same place, trying to absorb the shard.
The Flameking's memory had rejected him—burned him from the inside out.
And yet… Dain persisted. Clung to what remained.
A fragment of truth twisted into vengeance.
Kael landed hard—back in the real world.
Elira lay unconscious beside him.
Dain loomed above.
"This ends here."
Kael raised his sword.
"Yes. But not the way you think."
He plunged the First Flame into the stone beneath them—into the root memory of Myrrhal itself.
Flame erupted—not to destroy, but to awaken.
The walls began to glow.
A glyph—hidden for centuries—lit up beneath their feet:
"In fire truth lives. In shadow truth screams."
Dain screamed as the shard inside him began to reject him once more.
Kael reached forward.
"Let me end this."
Dain's eyes—just for a second—human again.
"Too late."
The shard exploded in black fire.
When the smoke cleared—
Kael stood alone.
Elira gasped, rising slowly.
"Where's Dain?"
Kael didn't answer.
He knelt, and from the ash…
He picked up what remained.
A cracked, black shard.
Still burning.
Still screaming.
He did not absorb it.
He placed it in the Codex.
Locked it shut.
And whispered:
"Not every memory deserves to live again."