The war tables of the Crimson Dominion groaned beneath the weight of maps. Lines of ink stretched across the parchment like veins, each marking borders, strongholds, and supply roads. The room was filled with the hum of authority: dukes in layered robes, barons with their heavy rings, ministers clutching scrolls of supply and strategy.
King Veythar sat enthroned at the head of the chamber, his eyes fixed on the map but his presence fixed on every man and woman in the hall. He did not need to speak often; his silence was command enough.
"The armies of Elyndral are already stirring," Duke Marveil reported, his thin finger pressing against the Aelthwyn Borderlands on the parchment. "Their spies have moved faster than anticipated. They will not wait for us to strike; they prepare to strike first."
"Let them," Baron Hilreth countered. His voice was coarse, the voice of a man who had commanded battalions in blood. "The Dominion's walls are iron. Their swords may outnumber ours, but our craft is sharper. Their numbers will only make the slaughter more efficient."
"The slaughter is not our goal," murmured Minister Alvaren, keeper of the treasury. He adjusted his spectacles, eyes narrowing on the map. "A war of attrition would drain us as surely as them. The king desires swift victories—no waste of coin, no needless loss of life. The quicker their crowns fall, the faster the Dominion unites."
A hush followed his words. All eyes flickered to Veythar, who still had not spoken.
At last, Seliora, the princess draped in crimson silks, stepped forward. Her voice was velvet over steel. "My father's will is simple. Elyndral will be the first, but not the last. Each kingdom will bow not through exhaustion, but through fear. They will lose not their soldiers, but their kings."
The council stirred uneasily at her phrasing, but none dared interrupt. Seliora's eyes glittered with the same cunning as her father's. "When the head is cut, the body kneels. And we," she said, her lips curving faintly, "are the hand that holds the blade."
Kaelith, the prince, leaned forward in his chair, his grin sharper than his sister's calm words. "Let them gather their legions. Let them think they have strength. By the time their banners unfurl, their leaders will already bleed into the dirt. The people bow to whoever wears the crown. We will wear every crown."
A murmur of agreement passed across the nobles. Some voices swelled in cautious support, others in quiet doubt, but all bent beneath the weight of inevitability.
And then, the sound of chains.
The hall stilled.
From the shadows of the doorway, she entered.
The Nameless One. The weapon. The Hollow.
Her chains dragged faintly across the stone floor, ringing like broken bells. A cloak of deep black swallowed her frame, her face hidden behind the silver mask with hollow eyes. The nobles turned to look, some in awe, others in fear. Whispers rose and fell like frightened birds.
"Is that…?"
"The weapon…"
"The king's hollow knight…"
She moved with neither hesitation nor pride. Each step was deliberate, stripped of will, shaped by command. Her long hair, once pale like moonlight, was unwashed, tangled, and darkened with soot and blood. Her figure was thin, weathered by endless battles with beasts in silence, her wrists still marked raw from chains.
She was not Illyria anymore. She was not anyone.
Veythar's lips curved faintly as he gestured toward her. "Behold," he said, his voice calm, resonant, filling the chamber, "the loyalty of silence. My son and daughter's blade. The dagger of the Crown."
The courtiers bowed their heads, though some could not bring themselves to look at her hollow eyes. For though she was broken, there was something terrifying in her stillness—something that mirrored not life, but death perfectly trained.
The meeting drew to a close, plans sealed like ink pressed into parchment. The banners of war would march, the insects of shadow would spread, and the first crown—Elyndral's—would soon fall.
The nobles began to disperse, their whispers trailing like smoke.
And then, as the Hollow weapon turned to leave, her voice, flat and toneless, slipped through the mask.
"The Crown's… Hollow Dagger."
The words were neither loud nor strained, yet they sliced through the chamber sharper than any blade. For the first time, the weapon had spoken—not with memory, not with soul, but with the identity forced upon her.
The whispers stopped. The courtiers froze.
Even Seliora's calm gaze flickered, as if a chill had touched her spine. Kaelith's grin faltered, then deepened in fascination.
But Veythar only smiled, faintly, with the pride of a man who had finished forging his blade.
The Hollow left the chamber, chains trailing behind her like the toll of a funeral bell.
---
The drums of the Crimson Dominion rolled across the courtyards of the capital. The sound was deep, deliberate, not hurried, but steady—each beat like the march of inevitability. The kingdom's war machine had awakened.
In the palace's inner hall, the final orders were given. Nobles, ministers, and captains bowed as King Veythar descended the dais, his cloak trailing like the shadow of a lion. His gaze swept over them, cold yet certain, like one who already knew the outcome of battles that had not yet begun.
"Form the columns," he commanded, his voice neither raised nor sharp, but filled with weight. "No soldier of the Dominion marches without purpose. No mage without silence. The first prey lies at the borders of Elyndral. Show them the hunger of the jungle."
A murmur spread, as if his words were both a promise and a warning.
In the courtyard below, preparations had already finished. Soldiers stood in rows of iron and crimson, their armor polished to a dull shine that reflected no light. Standard-bearers lifted the banners of the Dominion—deep scarlet crossed with black, the emblem of a chained sun in the center. Warhorses stamped their hooves against the stone, sensing the tension of their riders.
Beside the military, the Entomancers stood cloaked in the guise of ordinary war mages. Their eyes glimmered with the faint blue runes etched into their pupils, a mark of their forbidden craft. At their belts hung glass vials, each filled with a faint green shimmer that seemed to shift and twitch, as if alive.
They called the swarm Vel'zarith—the Bonegnawer Mist. Tiny, near-invisible winged vectors bred to infiltrate camps, to nest beneath skin, to whisper commands into the nerves of men until they rose not as soldiers, but as puppets.
"Do not unseal them until the order is given," the chief entomancer said, his voice cold, steady as he lifted his staff of black resin. "A single drop of blood may wake them. And then, there will be no border to defend."
Nearby, a figure stood apart.
Clad in a cloak as dark as midnight, the Nameless Assassin bowed her head as the armorers fastened the last of her gear. The cloak was light yet heavy with enchantment, swallowing her figure into shadow. Beneath it, her wrists were bound with bracers forged from obsidian and runes that pulsed faintly in red, binding her body to the king's command. A mask lay in the hands of a servant—silver and black, blank-eyed, with no mouth carved into it. A face without voice, without self.
"Her fingers dug into her chest, as if holding her heart together."
She did not resist as it was lowered over her features. She did not blink. She had no name.
The gates opened, and the first march began.
Thousands of boots struck stone in unison. The roar of war horns echoed as the Dominion's army surged forward like a tide of iron and shadow, toward the Aelthwyn Borderlands—the strip of forests and ridges where Dominion and Elyndral met.
---
On the other side of the ridge, Elyndral had already stirred.
Reports from spies had arrived weeks before, whispering of Dominion's intent. Elyndral was no stranger to war; their kingdom had been forged in blood and muscle, its pride rooted in soldiers born to wield steel as easily as breath. Unlike the Dominion's cold precision, Elyndral's strength was raw, brimming with the confidence of an army trained for generations.
In the fortress-town of Gravenreach, their banners snapped against the wind—blue and silver, crossed spears over a mountain crest. Soldiers thronged the barracks, armor strapped in haste, but with the certainty of habit. The clang of hammers against shields rang through the courtyards. Mages traced glyphs of warding across the walls, their chants carried by the chill breeze.
The generals of Elyndral stood upon their war table, maps unfurled.
"They march swiftly, but they underestimate our readiness," one growled. His scarred hand pointed to the ridges of Aelthwyn. "We will strike before they cross. We are not prey. Elyndral has never bowed, and it never will."
A roar of approval rose among his captains.
Yet none of them saw the truth. None of them knew that the Dominion's war was a deception—that their soldiers were not the only weapon being sent to the borders. The swarms of Vel'zarith slumbered within glass, waiting for a single word to be unleashed.
And above all of them, the Nameless Assassin moved silently among the marching Dominion army, her shadow stretching forward, long and thin across the road.
---
The two kingdoms now moved toward each other like storms colliding on the horizon.
The Borderlands of Aelthwyn waited in silence. Trees whispered. Wind carried the faint stench of iron. No blood had yet been spilled, but the ground itself seemed to shiver, knowing that soon, armies would clash upon it.
And in the hidden chambers of the Dominion's palace, King Veythar stood once more before the war council. His lips curved faintly—not in joy, not in cruelty, but in satisfaction.
"The strongest survive," he murmured, more to himself than to his ministers. "And only the lion rules the jungle."
No one in Elyndral yet understood that the first battle would not be fought with swords or steel.
It would be fought with silence. With shadows. With hunger that crawled on wings unseen.
And somewhere, bound beneath the earth, a emotionless dragon's tears fell once more, unseen, unheard.