The North was always cold, but tonight the air carried a sharper edge—as if the wind itself had drawn steel.
Snow sifted through the Wolfswood in slow, endless spirals, blanketing the earth and swallowing every sound. The world smelled of pine and frost and distant smoke. Behind me, the walls of Winterfell had long since vanished into the dark. Only the faint glow of its torches clung to the horizon, a handful of dying stars.
I should have turned back hours ago.
But something in the woods had called to me. Not a voice, not a sound, more a…pressure. A pull. It had begun as a faint hum behind my eyes during sword practice earlier that day, a strange rhythm hidden beneath the clash of wood and steel. By supper it had grown to a low throb in my bones, demanding movement, coaxing me into the night.
It didn't feel like madness.
It felt like purpose.
My boots crunched softly over the snow. Breath steamed in the moonlight. The forest stretched wide and empty, yet the hum guided me unerringly, deeper into a world of shadow and frost.
Then it appeared.
> [VOID-LINK: ACTIVE]
Systems: Minimal Functionality
I stopped so abruptly the snow groaned beneath me.
The words hovered in the air before my eyes—lines of pale blue light, crisp and perfect. Not written on a tree. Not scratched in snow. Simply there. Waiting.
I blinked. The words remained.
> [Excalibur – Ready]
Possession Mode: Standby
The name struck like a hammer through my skull.
Excalibur.
And with it came a flood of memory—no, data—flashing across my mind like lightning.
Golden towers rising against a starless void. Vast halls of marble and gold where masked figures whispered in a language of commands and power.
A child—me—suspended in a chamber of white light, nerves alight with energy older than suns.
And war.
War without banners or honor: ships of steel tearing each other apart across an endless black sky; warriors in living armor moving faster than thought; machines screaming as void energy consumed them.
I staggered to my knees, clutching my head as the forest spun.
The memories came like shattered glass, each shard cutting sharp and vanishing before I could hold it.
A single word rose through the chaos like a buoy in a storm: Orokin.
It carried the weight of empires and the taste of betrayal.
The hum inside me swelled to a roar. My heart pounded. My breath came fast and shallow.
And then—
A howl shattered the night.
Low. Long. Too many throats.
I jerked my head up. Yellow eyes gleamed between the pines—two, four, eight, a dozen—circling in the darkness. Direwolves. Bigger than any hound, lean with winter hunger.
Another howl answered, closer this time.
The pack tightened its ring.
My hand went to the hunting knife at my belt. A dull blade, fit for carving meat, not surviving a pack of northern wolves.
The blue words pulsed once, brighter.
> Activate.
The choice wasn't mine.
Light detonated across the clearing, pure and cold as a falling star.
Armor blossomed around me in a single breath—plates of silver-gray sliding into place like they had always belonged.
A visor snapped down, sealing me in darkness and blue glow.
The knife fell from my hand, useless.
The wolves flinched, hackles rising as the air itself shivered with energy. Their hunger faltered, replaced by a fear older than memory.
I moved.
Not as flesh and bone, but as Excalibur.
Speed flooded my limbs. The world slowed to a dream.
The first wolf lunged, a blur of teeth and muscle. I twisted aside in a motion so clean it felt rehearsed, energy blade flicking from my wrist in a burning arc.
The creature landed hard, eyes wide with shock at a movement it could not track.
Another leapt from the left. I pivoted, sliding across the snow in a streak of light, the sword humming with barely contained void energy.
The wolf crashed into a tree where I'd stood a heartbeat ago.
I did not strike to kill.
The frame knew restraint.
My blade hissed past fur and bone with surgical precision, a warning more than a wound.
The pack hesitated. Snarls faltered. Instinct screamed a truth no beast could name: this prey was something far beyond their world.
One by one, they backed away, tails low.
Then they turned, melting into the forest until only pawprints and silence remained.
I stood alone in the clearing, chest heaving.
Snow hissed against the armor's heat. The visor displayed a new line of text.
> [Memory Integrity: 17%]
Reconstruction Ongoing…
Seventeen percent.
Not enough to tell me who I had been.
Just enough to remind me what I could become.
The frame dissolved into motes of blue light, folding inward until only a boy remained—snow-dusted, breathing hard, a dull hunting knife at his feet.
The cold hit me like a slap, reminding me I was flesh again. I scooped up the knife and stumbled back toward the distant glow of Winterfell.
---
The castle slept beneath a blanket of moonlit frost when I returned.
Torches guttered along the battlements, their flames too weak to challenge the night.
The guards dozed behind their cloaks.
No one noticed the bastard boy slipping through the postern gate, silent as a shadow.
My chambers were small—a cot, a chest, a single narrow window that leaked silver light. I barred the door and leaned against it, breath fogging in the chill.
"Open Inventory," I whispered.
The air rippled.
A lattice of pale blue light unfolded before me, perfect lines forming a floating grid of empty slots.
In the center, a single icon pulsed faintly: Excalibur, operational.
Below it, a smaller tab flickered amber.
> [Resource Detected: Dragongrass Sample]
Organic Catalyst – Low Grade
I stared at the scrap of weed clinging to my boot. The system had scanned it, catalogued it, and assigned a purpose.
A laugh escaped before I could stop it. Not magic. Not some old god's favor.
Technology.
"Crafting menu," I said.
Blueprints bloomed across the grid—ghostly outlines of Warframes, weapons, and tools. Most were locked behind material requirements I didn't recognize: Void Trace, Alloy Cell, Ferrite.
But one node pulsed faintly.
> [BASIC COMPONENT: Alloy Cell]
Required: Organic Catalyst (1) + Iron Shavings (2) + Void Trace (0/1)
I reached into my pocket. The hunting knife I'd carried all evening still bore a dusting of black iron filings from sharpening.
The system pulsed.
> Iron Shavings: Acquired (1/2)
My fingers tightened on the knife. Not enough, but it worked.
Real. Tangible. Repeatable.
Another line of text shimmered into existence, colder than the winter wind.
> [Recommendation: Resource Expansion]
Suggested Scan Zone: Winterfell Crypts – Valyrian Alloy Signatures Detected.
Valyrian.
The word struck like a hammer.
I'd heard the maesters speak of it in hushed tones—steel that drank dragonfire, blades that never dulled, forged in the dying days of Valyria. Rare as moonlight. Priceless.
The system wanted me to scan it.
To harvest it.
I closed the menu with a thought. The lattice collapsed, leaving only the soft creak of wood and the distant call of wolves.
Outside, Winterfell slept on, unaware that something older than magic had awakened within its walls.
I lay back on the cot, staring at the beams of moonlight crawling across the ceiling.
Seventeen percent memory.
A single functioning Warframe.
A world that believed steel and fire were the limits of power.
I could hide. Pretend to be nothing more than a Stark bastard.
Or I could descend into the crypts tomorrow night, follow the system's guidance, and take the first step toward rebuilding the arsenal of a fallen age.
The decision should have frightened me.
Instead, it thrilled.
Somewhere in the dark, a wolf howled again.
Not a threat this time.
A summons.
The Void hummed in answer.
---
The next morning would bring sword drills, sneers from the lord's trueborn sons, and the endless small humiliations of bastardy.
But tonight I lay awake, dreaming of light that burned brighter than any hearthfire, of weapons no king had ever seen, of an empire buried beneath the stars waiting to be rebuilt.
Winter was coming.
And I would be ready.