The ash-strewn winds howled over the blackened peaks of the Marches of Veyr, where the soil itself whispered ancient sorrow.
Kael stood atop a ridge, the parchment map from the Vault clutched in his gauntlet. Ink made of ember and runes glowed softly against the darkening sky, pointing southeast—toward a land long thought cursed. Behind him, the others gathered: Darric nursing his side but ever defiant, Isryn brooding in her cloak of shadows, and Lyra keeping pace, her eyes never resting too long on the horizon.
They had entered a land where even memory feared to walk.
"First time I've seen trees burnt black yet still alive," Darric muttered. "This place feels wrong."
"It is wrong," Isryn said. "The Marches weren't always this dead. They were burned during the Sovereign Purge. Entire bloodlines were erased here."
Kael studied the landscape, then turned to them. "Keep alert. The Oracle lies at the heart of the Ember Hollows, and we're not the only ones seeking her."
As they moved deeper, they encountered signs of Sovereign experimentation—pillars of black glass, twisted runes etched into the cliffs, and bones fused into stone.
Then, the silence broke.
A tremor beneath their feet. A hiss in the fog.
From the mists ahead emerged towering creatures of charred armor and molten joints—Wyrmborn Sentinels, cursed remnants of the Sovereign's oldest war-forged abominations.
"They're guarding the path forward," Kael muttered.
Lyra notched an arrow. "Then we open it."
The first Sentinel lunged, a magma-forged axe cleaving toward Kael. He parried with the flat of his blade, sparks flying as he skidded back, boots grinding against scorched earth.
Darric struck from the side, sword slamming into a Sentinel's knee joint. It roared in rage—but Isryn whispered a curse beneath her breath.
A hex rune detonated at its chest.
"Ashpiercer Arrow!" Lyra shouted, her arrow splitting into a trio mid-air, each finding a gap in the Sentinel's armor.
Kael advanced on the largest, his eyes burning crimson. As the Sentinel raised both hands for a killing blow—
"Bloodflare Severance!"
Kael's blade carved upward in a devastating arc of red lightning, slicing the creature clean in half. Its core exploded, flaring like a dying star.
Two more emerged—but the group moved as one now.
Isryn's voidflames engulfed a sentinel's faceplate. Darric drove his blade through the exposed heat coils. Lyra danced through the chaos, each arrow more precise than the last.
Kael, at the center, unleashed his wrath.
"Red Tempest Fang!" he roared, a whirlwind of sword strikes cutting through the final construct, each hit echoing with a storm's fury.
When it was done, only silence—and steaming remains—remained.
Later, the group stood at the mouth of a canyon, beyond which the map indicated the Oracle's dwelling: a cavern known as The Veiled Hollow.
"There," Kael said quietly.
Isryn looked unsettled. "They say the Oracle doesn't speak. She shows. And not everyone survives what they see."
Kael stepped forward. "Then we'll find the truth… or die knowing we dared."
He entered the cavern.
The others followed.
And the dark stirred.