The dawn hung low and grey, like smoke refusing to fade. The Fourth Division moved in silence, boots crunching over shattered gravel as the world ahead stretched into a lifeless ruin. There was no laughter, no chatter—only the soft echo of wind brushing against the old walls of the dead city they were entering.
Lucien followed near the back of the line, his black coat swaying slightly. The mark on his left palm burned faintly beneath the leather of his gloves—a whisper of something he didn't understand, a reminder of the night of his initiation. No one had asked him about it since. They all assumed he had formed a contract with the Daemon.
He let them believe it.
It was easier that way.
"Eyes forward, rookie," a tall man grunted ahead of him—Darius, the squad captain. His voice was low and coarse, like stones grinding together. "You see anything strange, you report. Don't play hero."
Lucien nodded once. "Understood."
Behind him, the other members of the squad murmured among themselves. Most of them still didn't know what to think of him. The Fourth Division wasn't known for its kindness. It was a unit built from failures and monsters—people who had done too much or survived too long. For Lucien to be placed among them after only one initiation was… abnormal.
Their mission was simple on paper: investigate the source of multiple disappearances in the ruins east of the capital. But Lucien knew better. There were no "simple" missions under the Dominion's banner. Every order had an undertone—an unseen current dragging them toward something darker.
The air grew heavier as they passed beneath the arch of broken stone marking the city limits. Once, this had been a thriving district. Now it was a corpse—ashen streets, hollow buildings, windows like empty eyes.
Darius raised a hand. "Stop."
The squad froze.
Lucien felt it then—a pulse beneath his skin. The world itself seemed to breathe, slow and deliberate, like the city was alive and watching them.
"Do you feel that?" one of the scouts whispered.
Before Darius could respond, a low sound crawled through the air—a distorted hum, layered with whispers. Shadows pooled at the corners of the buildings, taking shape like melted glass.
"Contact!" someone shouted.
The things moved—limbs wrong, faces nonexistent. Wraiths, perhaps once human, now hollow echoes. The Fourth Division moved like a storm—steel clashing, spells igniting the gloom in bursts of white and red.
Lucien stood still.
He could feel something stirring within him, something deep and ancient responding to the chaos. The mark on his palm pulsed again, the faint lines glowing beneath his glove.
He clenched his hand tight.
No.
He wasn't going to use it—not here, not now. Whatever that mark was, it wasn't his power. It belonged to something else. Something that had been inside the barrier during his initiation.
"Lucien! Cover the flank!" Darius's voice broke through the haze.
Lucien blinked, nodded, and moved—though in truth, he didn't strike a single blow. He simply stood near the crumbled arch, watching the others fight. The creatures seemed to… avoid him. Their heads turned toward him, twitching, before pulling away like the scent of him burned their existence.
When the final shadow dissolved into mist, silence fell again. The squad regrouped, breathing heavy, armor marked with soot and blood.
Darius approached, his eyes scanning Lucien. "You didn't lift a hand."
Lucien hesitated. "There wasn't a need. They didn't come near me."
Darius's gaze lingered, suspicion flickering in the depth of his stare. "Hmph. Maybe your Daemon frightened them off."
Lucien didn't answer. He only nodded and turned his gaze back to the empty city, to the horizon thick with grey light.
But inside, something throbbed—like a heartbeat echoing from beneath the world.
He could feel it again.
The mark on his palm wasn't dormant. It was waiting.
---
That night, as the Fourth Division made camp in the ruins, Lucien sat a distance away from the fire. The others laughed quietly, their exhaustion easing with meager warmth. He, on the other hand, traced the faint symbol beneath his glove. The skin around it shimmered faintly under moonlight—like a living sigil.
He closed his eyes.
And for a moment, he wasn't in the camp anymore.
He was standing somewhere else—somewhere vast and cold, where the sky bled darkness and the stars were wrong. He heard it again—the whisper that came from the barrier during his initiation.
"You refused me, yet you still bear my mark. Curious… mortal."
Lucien didn't answer. He couldn't. The voice wasn't truly there—it was within him, between thought and silence.
Then, like a wave fading, the connection broke.
He was back in the camp again. The fire crackled, and the others hadn't noticed his brief absence.
Lucien looked at the flames for a long time. He felt nothing—no fear, no wonder. Only a quiet certainty that this power—whatever it was—was not the Daemon's gift.
It was something older.
Something that had used the Daemon's rejection as a door.
---
The mission ended the next morning. The Fourth Division reported "success" and returned to the capital. Darius filed his report, noting only minor resistance and minimal casualties.
Lucien walked among them silently, as though nothing had changed.
But the truth was—
Something had begun to wake.