Ashen spent days and months he could not count, moving on torn feet, dragging his scarred and bleeding body toward one horizon: the nearest floating city. Every time he thought he was closer, the distance stretched again. When he looked behind him, the chains seemed endless, as if the earth itself refused to release him. Pain became his companion, hunger his weapon, and anger his power pushing him forward.
On a morning that did not look like morning, with the sky above covered in ash, he saw a cave on the side of a steep cliff. Entering it did not feel like a choice — the call was stronger than that. The whisper under his skin became a scream, as if something deep inside had called his name with a voice he had not heard since childhood.
When he got closer, an old smell reached him; like wood burned a thousand years ago, mixed with the scent of frozen blood. The mouth of the cave was dark, but it was not a simple silence. The air twisted and whispered. As soon as he stepped in, outside sounds faded, and inside sounds grew, turning into faint laughs, hidden breaths, and languages the mind could not understand.
Deeper inside, the whispers turned into repeated words, like a forgotten chant. They were not only understood — they were felt:
> "Between a drop of blood and a heartbeat, the ropes are woven that divide survival from death.
One step in the dark leads to thrones above, one step in the pit leads to eternal rest.
O bearer of fate, stop: there is only a thin line between life and death — whoever sacrifices it either wins or is destroyed."
Ashen heard this for the first time, but it struck his bones. It was not just a call; it was a measure of his soul. The words pressed inside his chest, then exploded with grief, joy, and fear.
He walked deeper like a madman. The passages changed: some wet with sweat of unknown origin, others covered with orange dust like burned bushes. The whispers spoke the names of his grandfather, his mother, and a brother who died before seeing the moon. On a wall, small carved lines appeared like burned heartbeats — and pain rushed through him, guilt that never left.
Then he entered the great hall. What he saw was a nightmare drawn on the edge of history: thousands of corpses lying in circles, row after row, eyes wide open, shoulders stiff as if their final will was locked. But all shared one thing: stabbed hearts, with their hands fixed on their chests, as if they stabbed themselves or were forced to.
The aura from the corpses was not normal. Strong waves pushed the air, pulled the feathers of a small bird, touched the human soul like strings being scratched. Ashen walked closer, each step shaking his spirit like crossing a bridge at the edge of an abyss. He knew — without proof — that they had been very strong, devoted to another struggle before death. Yet their end was the same: stabbed hearts.
In the center stood a bloody altar. Broken stones covered with vein-like lines and black stains shining faintly. On it lay a different corpse. Not deformed, not complete either. It looked like a bridge between reality and illusion; pale skin, surrounded by an ancient glow, as if guarded between two worlds. In its hand was a bloody dagger. The dagger was not just metal — its light shifted between reality and mirage, beating like a drum every second.
Ashen stepped closer. The dead stared at him. No one spoke, but whispers burst in his head: "Take the dagger… take it… don't fear." It was not temptation; it was an order from something older than time. He grabbed it — without knowing how. It was so cold his flesh rang like touching burning ice.
Then time twisted around him. His body shattered inside like a broken jar. Suddenly, he was standing at the center of the circle, as if he had replaced the altar, as if the corpse had shrunk to nothing. The corpse dissolved into red smoke.
The voice struck his ears, coming from the stone itself:
"If you want what you seek, touch the dagger to your heartbeat. Through it, darkness will lift, and the doors of the heart's world will open. But there is a trial — either victory or becoming one of the dead guardians."
He stood before the choice: stab himself and maybe die, or refuse and remain trapped, breaking slowly from inside. Fire burned in his eyes, not rising, not fading. Every memory of the victims, every image of his destroyed clan, pressed into his chest, turning into flames around the dagger.
A wind — if there was wind — carried more whispers: children laughing then screaming, weapons clashing, voices chanting his name: "Ashen… Ashen…" His vision blurred, his heart staggered, his mind swung between will and collapse. He knew there was a door behind the altar that allowed no return; one decision would change his life forever.
He stood long before the edge, gripping the dagger with shaking hands. Inside him raged mixed storms: the desire for revenge, deep fear, faint hope of regaining his right, and terror of becoming one of those who stabbed their own hearts.
As pain spread in his limbs and the whispers grew louder, another voice rose inside — not from the cave or the corpses, but from his old heart. A quiet echo asked: Are you ready to give your soul for a line between life and death?
He tried to answer, but the cave's silence swallowed every word.
Slowly, his steps led him toward the coming choice. He could not see its end, he could not know if he would choose life or death. He only knew the path had placed his feet on a line no balance could measure.