The crown settled like fire upon Kael's head.
No metal. No weight. Only pain.
It didn't rest—it rooted, thorns piercing skin, digging into his soul. The air thickened, pressing in like a fist. Shadows rippled across the walls of the tomb, ancient runes flaring to life, casting Kael in a light not of this world.
His knees buckled.
Visions tore through him—memories not his own.
A battlefield drenched in crimson. A throne carved from broken swords. A man… no, a king, with Kael's face—but older, colder—his eyes dead and filled with fire.
"You are not the first"
"You will not be the last."
The whispers clawed at him, each one a thorn in his mind. He clutched his temples, trying to force them out, but they only dug deeper.
He saw her again—Isla.
Not as she was, but as she could have been. Wearing the same crown. Bleeding from the eyes. Screaming his name as flames consumed her.
Kael roared and tore the crown from his head.
The tomb went silent.
Blood streamed down his face where the thorns had pierced. The crown pulsed in his hands—angry, alive.
Footsteps echoed above. Arin appeared, blade drawn, eyes wide. "Kael—what have you done?"
Kael didn't answer. Couldn't.
Not yet.
Instead, he staggered forward, the crown cradled in his arms like a newborn beast. Together, they climbed back into the light—or what was left of it.
Outside, the forest was… wrong.
The trees had twisted, their bark split open as if screaming. The sky bled red across the horizon. Time itself felt stretched, distorted.
Arin's hand clenched. "We shouldn't have come here."
Kael looked at him, eyes still glowing faintly. "We were always meant to."
Then something moved behind them.
From the hollow they'd just escaped, tendrils of shadow slithered forth, whispering in a language too old for tongues. Figures began to take shape—half-formed wraiths in armor of mist and bone.
Arin raised his sword. "What are they?"
Kael's voice was distant. "Guardians. Woken by blood."
The first one lunged.
Steel met shadow, and the clearing erupted into chaos.
Kael fought beside Arin, every swing of his blade guided by the voices still echoing in his skull. The crown burned against his chest, wrapped in cloth and regret. Each wraith they felled melted into ash—but for every one that fell, two more rose.
"We can't win like this!" Arin shouted.
Kael didn't disagree.
Instead, he reached inside himself, to the pulsing pain still left by the crown.
And something… responded.
Darkness flared from his palm—not death, not decay… but dominion.
The wraiths halted.
For a breath.
For a heartbeat.
Then—they knelt.
Arin stared. "What did you do?"
Kael's voice was not entirely his own. "I didn't choose this. But I'll use it."
The forest fell still once more.
The crown no longer fought him. It waited.
And far beyond the trees, where the mountains cut the sky like blades, something else awoke—watching. Waiting.
Because a Thorn-Crowned King had risen.
And the world was beginning to remember.