Three weeks after Ashborne began to blossom, the reports started reaching Selena and Dante as they traveled the wastelands, sparking life where ash had accumulated. Rumors at first, carried by refugees fleeing eastward, speaking of someone gathering followers in the territories beyond the Hollow. Someone charismatic, powerful, wielding authority that shouldn't exist in a world where decree had been burned away.
By the time they heard the name, it was already too late to prevent what was coming.
The Last Rebel.
The title alone was a provocation, a twisted inversion of everything Selena and Dante represented. Through the eternal flame, Selena tried to sense what this figure was, tried to understand how someone could rise to power so quickly in a world supposedly freed from hierarchy. What she felt made her blood run cold.
