Gareth stirred as the gentle sway of the New Ones rocked him in his sleep.
The creak of timber and the rhythmic slap of waves against the hull formed a lullaby he had long since learned to trust.
Beside him, Kael Draven slept soundly, his chest rising and falling with measured precision.
Even in rest, there was a tension about him — the kind of taut energy Gareth had learned to respect, and occasionally envy.
A faint smile brushed Gareth's lips. For once, the sea wasn't a battlefield.
The island, the pirates, even the invisible weight of his destiny felt distant here, cushioned by the warm hum of the ship's engines and the occasional call of gulls above.
A sharp rap on the door broke the serenity. Gareth's eyes snapped open.
"Oi! Wake up, boys!" a voice barked.
Marcellus shoved the door open without waiting for an answer, his soot-streaked face grinning in that familiar chaotic way.
"You two asleep or plotting the destruction of the ocean in your dreams?"
Gareth groaned, sitting up, hair sticking to his damp forehead.
Kael's eyes flickered open, a frown forming as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes.
Marcellus strode in, slamming a fist against the small table by the wall.
"Get dressed! Captain says we've got business before breakfast. And trust me, you don't want to be the last ones on deck today."
Gareth swung his legs over the side of the bunk, still half-asleep, but already smiling at Marcellus's energy.
Kael muttered something under his breath, reaching for his boots, clearly just as annoyed as he was intrigued by the interruption.
The ship's gentle sway, the muffled sound of the waves, and the early morning light spilling through the small porthole made the room feel impossibly alive.
For a brief moment, Gareth let himself linger in it — the quiet calm before the chaos of the day.
The ship's narrow corridors smelled of salt, wood, and last night's meals as Gareth, Kael, and Marcellus made their way toward the kitchen. The crew's laughter and the distant slap of waves against the hull carried through the ship, a comforting hum.
Marcellus, ever boisterous, had spotted a small flicker of fire from the cooking stove. His eyes widened, pupils darkening — a spark of memory igniting something buried deep.
In an instant, the man froze, muscles coiling like a spring. The hum of the ship vanished, replaced by the drum of his rapid heartbeat. Without warning, he launched himself forward with terrifying speed.
Gareth barely had time to react. Marcellus swung a fist that could have shattered the bulkhead; Kael rolled sideways, narrowly avoiding the strike, boots skidding against the wooden floor.
Gareth's mind raced. With a flick of his wrist, telekinesis flared, slamming Marcellus against the wall. But the moment he loosened, Marcellus surged again — faster, more frenzied, moving like a ghost.
The hallway became a blur of motion:
Kael ducked under a flying chair, kicking it back toward Marcellus.
Gareth leapt into the air, spinning mid-flight, using bursts of telekinesis to throw objects in Marcellus's path.
Pots and pans clanged, smoke curled from the stove, and the narrow corridor felt impossibly small.
Marcellus's attacks were precise, deadly, yet chaotic, driven by PTSD-fueled reflexes. Every step and swing seemed choreographed in its own terrifying rhythm — a storm contained in the ship's hull.
Gareth spotted Kael charging head-on toward the next strike. Without hesitation, he grabbed Kael by the shirt from behind, yanking him back in half a second, just as Marcellus's fist smashed into the air where Kael had been.
"Hang on!" Gareth shouted, and in the next instant, he pinned Marcellus down with a pulse of telekinesis. The man thudded against the wall, struggling, fists pounding, eyes wild.
Kael caught his breath, his chest heaving. "Damn… that was fast!"
Gareth didn't answer, eyes locked on Marcellus, holding him firm. "You're not hurting anyone. Not today."
Marcellus thrashed, rage and fear colliding, but Gareth's telekinetic grip was absolute. Even Kael took a step back, nodding — the power Gareth now wielded was no longer subtle, no longer just defensive.
Slowly, Gareth eased the pressure, letting the man slump against the wall, exhausted and trembling. The corridor was a mess: overturned crates, singed floorboards, and scattered cooking supplies.
Kael rubbed the back of his neck, voice low. "You… saved my ass. Half a second later, I'd be a smear."
Gareth exhaled, shoulders tense. "We all have our limits… even Marcellus. He's fighting ghosts of fire no one else sees."
Kael nodded, his usual smirk replaced with something softer, more measured. "And you… you're holding him down with just a thought. Lenziuela, you really are something else."
The kitchen door loomed ahead, scorched slightly from Marcellus's frenzy. Gareth let go of the telekinetic grip, the man collapsing into a heap, breathing ragged but alive.
The ship rocked gently beneath them, and for the first time that morning, a tense calm settled over the corridor — a quiet before breakfast, a brief pause before chaos inevitably returned.
The ship's corridor was a wreck — pots overturned, planks scorched, the air thick with smoke and sweat.
Gareth kept his telekinetic hold steady, not crushing, not releasing — just enough to keep Marcellus from tearing himself apart.
Slowly, the man's thrashing weakened. His breath came ragged, sweat dripping down his soot-streaked face.
"Let me go…" Marcellus rasped, voice breaking between rage and exhaustion.
Gareth knelt beside him, loosening his grip so Marcellus slumped against the wall.
"I'll let you go," Gareth said quietly, "but not until you stop fighting ghosts."
For a long moment, the only sound was the groan of the ship's timbers. Then, with a shudder, Marcellus let out a laugh that wasn't a laugh at all.
"You think I fight you, boy?" His eyes were wild, red-rimmed, staring somewhere far beyond the corridor. "I've been fighting fire for years."
Kael lingered nearby, arms folded, unease plain on his face. But Gareth didn't move. He waited.
Marcellus's hands trembled as he spoke, his voice dropping to a hoarse whisper.
"I was a family man once. Wife. Daughter. A small home near the shipyards. Thought I'd die old and happy, building hulls and chasing my little girl through the sawdust."
His jaw clenched. The next words scraped raw.
"Then they came. Not thieves. Not soldiers. A cult." His gaze unfocused, drifting to the flicker of the kitchen fire. "They wore masks of ash and spoke like priests, but there was no god in them. Only hunger. They said the sea demanded a tithe of flame."
Gareth's throat tightened, but he said nothing.
Marcellus's voice cracked, the words spilling faster, jagged.
"They tied me down. Made me watch. My wife's screams… my daughter's small hands pounding the door as the fire took her. The smoke, the stench — it's in my skin, boy. Every breath I take is ash."
His hand gripped his chest as if trying to claw the memory free.
"They burned everything, and when the flames died, I wasn't a man anymore. Just cinders walking."
The corridor seemed colder. Even Kael, hardened as he was, had no smirk left — only silence.
Marcellus laughed again, bitter, hollow. "You wonder why I smile so much? Why I shout, joke, drink? Because if I stop… if I stop for even a second… all I hear are their screams. All I see is fire."
Marcellus's eyes went distant, as if he was no longer in the ship's kitchen but standing again in the inferno of his past.
"And then… in that fire, I saw it. A veil—thin, silver, shimmering like smoke in the night. Behind it, I glimpsed the Soul itself—raw, endless, burning brighter than the flames that took everything from me. It stared back at me."
His breathing slowed, but his voice deepened.
"That night, I awakened. The fire did not just take—it opened. It split me, broke me, and showed me the truth. The Veil. The Soul. And it left me alive when I wanted to die. They died and i always know that deep inside me it was my fault. I always put the blame on myself"
Tears welled in his eyes but did not fall. He swallowed them, just as he had swallowed the screams of his family. "And so I walk… marked. Haunted. With nothing but ashes where love used to be."
He lowered his head, voice breaking. "And gods help me… I've been alone ever since. But i still love the captain he was there in the highs and in the low's."
Gareth's telekinetic hold faded completely. He placed a hand on Marcellus's shoulder, firm, steady.
"You're never alone," Gareth said softly.
For the first time, Marcellus looked at him — really looked, past the boy, past the powers — and saw the truth in his eyes. His lips trembled, then pressed into a tight line as tears cut through the soot on his face.
The ship swayed gently around them, the chaos of the fight giving way to a fragile silence.
And in that silence, for the first time in years, Marcellus allowed himself to grieve.
For two days, Gareth forced him to face it.He did not let Marcellus turn away from the flame, did not let him bury his terror in jokes or anger. He dragged him—sometimes by word, sometimes by sheer will—back to the fire. Back to the memory. Back to the wound that had never closed.
Marcellus resisted. He fought with everything he had. He cursed Gareth, shoved him, nearly struck him more than once. But Gareth held firm, unyielding, until the old man's defenses finally cracked.
On the second night, Marcellus collapsed. His body fell heavy to the floor, but his mind was pulled inward—sinking, spiraling, until the ship, the sea, and Gareth all vanished.
He opened his eyes to fire.
The inferno of his past stretched endlessly, a hell without escape. Flames roared higher than mountains, the screams of his wife and child echoing in every ember. Time twisted.
Days bled into weeks, weeks into years. Decades. Centuries. He relived the burning of his family over and over, each time as raw and merciless as the first.
It broke him. Again and again, until there was nothing left but ash.
And yet—beneath the ruin, something stirred.
In the void, where corruption and despair sought to swallow him, Marcellus clenched his fists.
He fought. At first, small, desperate flails against shadows. Then harder, faster, stronger.
He clawed at the flames, he struck at the screams, he refused to be their prisoner.
And then he saw him.
The cult leader.The face he had never forgotten—the one who held the torch, the one who smiled as his family burned.
Marcellus roared and launched himself forward. He punched. Again. And again. And again. Days passed. Months. Years. Time itself became meaningless as he struck, screamed, bled, and struck again. Eons might have passed in that endless battle, but he never stopped.
Until finally—the figure shattered.
Marcellus fell to his knees, gasping, as the void collapsed around him. His eyes snapped open in the real world, but they no longer held just grief. They burned with something new, something alive.
His irises cycled violently—red, gold, silver, violet, every shade and color—until they settled into a searing, molten glow.
Fire licked along his hands. His breath came out as smoke. The very ability he had hated, the very thing that had destroyed him, now answered to him.
Marcellus had ascended.And his unique ability… was fire.
The reflection of his pain.The curse that had become his weapon.
Gareth sat cross-legged on the floor, watching in awe as Marcellus's flames coiled and flickered in his palms. For the first time, they weren't wild or destructive—they danced as though they belonged to him.
Gareth couldn't hide his grin. "It worked. Gods, it actually worked."
But then the smell of ash hit him. His eyes darted to the side—what remained of the book he had been using, pages of notes and teachings, was nothing but a pile of blackened flakes.
Burned to nothing by Marcellus's uncontrolled first flare.
Gareth's joy snapped into anger. He shot to his feet. "Do you realize what you just did? That book—those were—"
Marcellus cut him off with a low voice, steady and calm in a way Gareth had never heard before.
He raised one flame-lit hand, studying it as though weighing its meaning.
"Fire takes, boy. It doesn't give." His eyes glowed molten as he slowly clenched his fist, the flames vanishing into embers. "It took my family. It took my peace. It took everything I once was."
He looked up at Gareth, and for a moment the weight of his years, his pain, his loss burned brighter than any flame. Then—he smiled, faint but real.
"But now… it gives me power. Power I never asked for, but power all the same. And for that, I'm thankful."
The silence stretched, broken only by the creak of the ship and the hiss of a lone ember falling to the floor. Gareth's anger ebbed, replaced by something heavier, deeper—respect.
Marcellus leaned back against the wall, his voice almost a whisper.
"Remember that, Gareth. Even curses can be turned into weapons. Even the fire that scars you can light the way forward."
Two weeks later.
The New Ones cut through black waters under a sullen sky, the waves strangely subdued, as though the sea itself dared not disturb the silence. The crew had grown restless, the hum of laughter and song replaced by low voices and watchful eyes. Even the gulls had vanished days ago.
Gareth leaned against the railing, wind tugging at his hair. The last fortnight had been grueling—training, pushing Kael and himself harder, watching Marcellus settle into his new power. But nothing had prepared him for the sight that now rose on the horizon.
The island loomed like a scar on the sea. Its cliffs were jagged, obsidian black, and twisted trees clawed at the sky, their branches warped into unnatural shapes.
A mist curled around its base, thick and violet-tinted, shifting as though alive.
"Cursed island," Kael muttered beside him, arms crossed. His sharp eyes never left the shore.
"Nothing good comes from places the gulls refuse to fly."
Marcellus stood a few paces back, the faintest ember glowing in his palm as if unconsciously called forth.
His jaw was tight.
"That's where they are," he said. "The weapons. Old, bound things. They're said to drink the blood of whoever holds them… and whisper promises no sane man should hear."
Gareth felt his chest tighten. "And we're supposed to take them?"
From behind, the heavy tread of boots echoed across the deck.
Captain Belmarius emerged, his cloak whipping in the wind.
His gaze was fixed on the island, but his voice carried to every soul aboard.
"We don't take them. We claim them.
The cursed steel of the Old World belongs to us now. To me.
To this crew. And if the island resists—" His lips curled into a grim smile. "—then we'll remind it who truly curses whom."
A shiver ran down Gareth's spine as the ship drew closer, the mist beginning to curl over the bow like reaching fingers.
The cursed island shuddered as Gareth raised his hand.The treasure chest — iron-bound, blackened by salt and centuries — trembled where it sat atop the altar of jagged stone. The runes carved into its surface flickered, like veins of dying fire.
With a grunt, Gareth pulled. Telekinesis surged like a tide, wrapping the chest in unseen force. It screeched as it slid across the altar, stone grinding against stone, until with one final lurch it soared across the gap and slammed onto the deck of the New Ones.
The moment it landed, silence fell.
The mist that had cloaked the island peeled away like smoke. The blackened trees straightened, leaves returning to their branches. The air lost its weight, gulls cried overhead, and for a fleeting heartbeat, it was as though the island had never been cursed at all.
But the chest pulsed.
A low, throbbing hum filled Gareth's ears, louder than the sea, louder than his own heartbeat. He staggered, clutching his head as the whispers clawed into his skull. His vision blurred — the faces of the crew wavered, their mouths moving, but no sound reaching him.
Instead, a voice coiled inside his mind. Ancient. Venomous. Certain.
"You are chosen, boy. But know this: the captain shall betray you… for her daughter."
The words slithered deep, sinking like hooks into his chest. Gareth's hand trembled. He stumbled back, his telekinesis flickering, the chest vibrating in time with the whispers.
His eyes darted to Captain Belmarius at the prow — his jaw set, eyes hard as steel. For the first time, Gareth felt the faintest crack of doubt in the bond that tied them.
The chest pulsed again. The corruption wasn't done with him.