Ashvale felt wrong in the way a wound feels wrong: quiet, closed, but not healed. Smoke lingered in the air, the kind that never cleared, no matter how the wind turned.
Riel stood beside Kaelith, Seris, and Varen in the center of the square as the elder, a frail woman whose hands trembled even when still, explained their plight.
"They come with the dark," she said, her voice quivering. "Not beasts, not men. Shades that whisper in dead tongues and drag away the living. We bury what we can find… when there's anything left to bury."
Kaelith gave her a reassuring smile. "Then rest easy, Elder. We'll see your dawn come."
Her eyes softened for a moment, as if she wanted to believe him, then she turned away.
They spent the afternoon preparing. Kaelith carved radiant sigils into the earth with his claymore, the great blade burning with soft lunar light. Varen marked doors and alleyways, tracing circles of floating script that hovered briefly before sinking into the wood. Seris coated her gauntlets in oil, testing short bursts of flame that hissed and curled around her fists.
Riel strung his chain through his hands, feeling the cool metal hum faintly against his skin.
As the sun dipped toward the horizon, the world seemed to hold its breath. The golden light that had barely managed to pierce Ashvale's gloom began to dim, swallowed by a slow-creeping gray. Long shadows stretched across the cracked fields, twisting unnaturally as if reaching for warmth they could no longer feel. The air grew still, too still. Even the wind seemed to retreat, leaving behind a silence so absolute it made Riel's pulse sound deafening in his ears.
Then came the cold. A biting, marrow-deep chill rolled through the village like a tide, frosting the grass and the wooden fences with thin veins of ice. From the treeline, the mist thickened, shifting, writhing, breathing. Within its depths, shapes began to stir.
First came whispers, faint and broken—pleas, cries, fragments of words that did not belong to the living. Then the shadows peeled away from the fog, taking form: hollow silhouettes with eyes like dying embers and mouths that opened to release a soundless scream. The ground beneath them seemed to rot where they drifted, each step leaving a trace of frost and decay.
Riel felt the faint tug on his chain, the cold metal pulsing with dim light as he wrapped it tighter around his arm. Kaelith's claymore hummed low, the edge catching the last ray of the dying sun. Varen traced glowing sigils into the air, symbols of wisdom burning pale blue against the encroaching dark, while Seris's hands shimmered with a faint ember glow.
Kaelith smirked faintly. "Well. Guess the elder wasn't exaggerating."
Seris cracked her knuckles. "Finally."
Varen and Riel said nothing.
Then the first shade lunged.
Kaelith stepped forward in one smooth motion, his claymore cutting through the air in a wide arc. The blade met the creature, splitting it into lightless mist. Seris followed with a burning punch that turned another to smoke.
Riel swung his chain. It snapped through the air like thunder, coiling around a shade's neck before he pulled hard. The thing's body twisted, warping, dissolving in a hiss of black vapor. He turned, spinning the weapon again, the links glowing faintly gold as he struck another from behind.
Varen's staff pulsed. Circles of divine text spun into existence midair, then fired spears of white light that burned holes through the fog.
"Nice trick," Seris shouted over the sound of battle.
Varen didn't look at her. "It's not a trick if it works."
Kaelith laughed, sweeping his sword through three shades at once. "You sound like Daen."
"Then stop talking and fight like him," Varen shot back, the glow around his staff intensifying.
Riel didn't join in. His focus narrowed to the rhythm: swing, pull, strike, breathe. Every impact sent tremors through his arms, his muscles burning, his breath turning sharp and shallow. The shades didn't stop coming.
They moved wrong, jerking forward in half-steps that made their limbs bend the wrong way. The mist around them thrashed with every strike, shrieking without sound. When Kaelith cleaved one, the pieces crawled together before melting away. Riel's chain wrapped around another's arm, tearing it off before the rest of the body sank into the ground like smoke sinking through water.
A wall of frost burst beside them as three shades struck together. Varen slammed his staff into the earth, runes flaring outward in a ring that shattered their advance. White light flashed through the fog, carving silhouettes in negative flame. Seris charged through the gap, her gauntlets flaring orange as she drove both fists into the air, scattering burning embers that rained over the square.
"Behind you!" she shouted.
Riel turned just in time to duck beneath a grasping claw. He rolled, his chain whipping upward to catch the shade's face. The weapon burned gold where it touched, tearing through shadow like fabric. He rose again, sweat dripping from his chin, breath harsh in his throat.
Kaelith met him with a grin that was half-exhaustion, half-delight. "Kinda, still easy?"
"Ask me when they stop bloody multiplying," Riel said.
The ground shuddered as another surge came. Dozens now. Too many. The air felt thick with their presence, a suffocating weight pressing down on the village. Every motion grew heavier, every breath harder to take. Seris's flames burned brighter, but her strikes slowed. Varen's runes began to falter, flickering as the script unraveled in the wind.
"They're feeding on something," Varen muttered, slamming his staff into the dirt again. "The mist's not natural."
"Then burn brighter," Seris snapped again, her words more desperate than mocking. She spun, both fists blazing, cutting through a crowd of shades before the fire dimmed to embers.
Kaelith surged past them both, his claymore flaring like a falling star. Each swing split the air with blinding arcs of light, the blade cleaving through three, four, five shades at a time. "Keep up!" he called, voice strained but wild with energy.
Riel drove forward beside him. His chain whistled through the fog, looping around one shade's leg, yanking it down before smashing another across the chest. The metal links sparked with faint luminescence, glowing brighter with every impact. He barely noticed the shallow cuts forming on his arms, or the dull ache spreading across his back.
The fight became a blur of motion and exhaustion. Steel sang, runes flared, and flame painted the dark in wild orange light. Shadows twisted and screamed in silence, their faces flickering between human and hollow.
A claw caught Riel across the shoulder, tearing through cloth and drawing a shallow line of blood. He spun, countering with a kick and a swing that tore the shade apart. His breath came fast, sharp, unsteady. His chain dragged across the dirt, slick with frost.
Kaelith's laughter carried through the chaos. "Now this is a proper welcome!"
"You call this a welcome, you're insane!" Seris yelled, launching herself into another shade, her fist burning white-hot.
Varen's voice cut through, steady even as sweat ran down his temple. "Focus! Break formation and you'll be overrun!"
They tightened ranks instinctively, the four of them standing back-to-back as the shades swirled like a storm around them. The air shimmered with light and heat, every swing and rune a desperate attempt to hold the line.
Riel lost count of how many they destroyed. The mist seemed endless, birthing new horrors with every passing breath. His limbs grew heavy, his lungs burning. Still, he moved—swing, pull, strike, breathe—because stopping wasn't an option.
Then the horizon began to change.
A faint line of light appeared beyond the rooftops, spreading slow and fragile across the black sky. The shrieking grew louder, rising to a piercing pitch. The shades began to waver, their forms thinning, unraveling. The first rays of dawn touched the square, and the shadows scattered like ash in the wind.
Riel's final swing cut through nothing. The chain clattered against stone as silence fell.
The whispering faded, leaving only the hiss of dying flames and the rasp of their breathing.
Riel dropped to one knee, his chain clinking softly against the ground. His arms trembled with exhaustion.
Seris leaned against a wall, chest heaving, her gauntlets still smoldering faintly. "If that was easy," she panted, "I'd hate to see difficult."
Kaelith let his sword rest against his shoulder, grinning through fatigue. "I've had worse mornings."
Varen's runes dimmed completely as he lowered his staff. "They'll be back. Whatever binds them isn't broken."
Riel followed his gaze beyond the rooftops. There, in the thinning mist, he saw it—the faint silhouette of a temple rising on a distant hill. Its form blurred by fog, its spire bending like a question against the sky.
The sun's light touched it, and for a moment the air shimmered, as though even the light hesitated to touch its stones.
"Guess we know where to start," Kaelith murmured.
Riel said nothing. The chill in his bones hadn't faded with the dawn.
The shades were gone.
But Ashvale still didn't feel alive.