The western cliffs rose like jagged teeth against the pale morning sky, their shadows long and sharp over the barren rock. Mist clung to the upper reaches of the stone like ghostly veils, shifting restlessly in the wind.
The trail had led them this far—half-melted prints, signs of occult markings long erased by time, and most damning of all, a scattering of charred bones arranged in a deliberate spiral.
"Still nothing," muttered Garron, the broad-shouldered warrior with twin axes strapped across his back. He kicked a loose rock down the slope and watched it tumble. "No campfires, no movement. Just old bones and fog."
"We're being watched," said Vin quietly. She knelt beside a scorched patch of earth, fingers brushing along a melted sigil. Her brows drew together in a deep frown. "There's something wrong with the air. It's too… still."
Her staff drawn and humming softly with latent mana. Her eyes scanned the skies, wary.
"There's ambient magic here," she murmured, tightening her grip. "Strong… and old. Not Apostle work. Older than that."
Joran, leader of Howlspire, stood atop a nearby ridge, wind tousling his short dark hair. His cloak snapped behind him, eyes narrowed toward the higher reaches of the cliffs.
"We've come too far to back down now," he said. "If the Crimson Apostle was ever here, we're closing in."
Garron glanced at him. "And if he wasn't?"
"Then we kill whatever's taken up residence in his place."
Garron grunted. " I just don't like the silence. Place feels like a crypt."
Vin turned her eyes skyward.
A beat of stillness passed.
Then the wind changed.
Then—
A sound split the sky.
Not thunder. Not anything natural.
It was a roar—a raw, ancient scream—so loud and deep it shook the marrow in their bones. Birds scattered. Stones vibrated. The cliffs themselves seemed to shudder in recognition of what approached.
Vin's spell faltered. Garron flinched, hands flying to his ears. Even Joran froze for half a breath.
Then it came.
A titanic shadow tore through the mist above, wings wide as siege towers, body black red as molten obsidian. Its scales glimmered with sickly crimson veins, pulsing like arteries of fire. Its maw split open—rows of blade-like teeth glinting—and a heat washed down like a tidal wave.
From the heavens, it dived.
Impact.
The cliffside exploded. Chunks of stone flew in all directions. Dust swallowed the air. A shockwave cracked the ridge beneath them. Garron was flung backward. Varra's barrier shattered with a metallic screech.
The beast rose from the crater, wings spreading—bigger, more grotesque than any dragon they had heard of in story or record. Its roar still echoed in the sky, a declaration that this land belonged to it.
Joran spat out blood, eyes locked on the massive silhouette rising through the smoke and dust.
Garron stumbled beside him, wide-eyed, trembling. "Wh–what the hell is that?!"
Joran's voice came out hoarse, almost disbelieving.
"It's a fucking DRAGON!"
That word—dragon—hung in the air like a curse.
Above them, the monster let out another roar, its wings splitting clouds, its maw glowing with gathering flame.
Vin, barely standing, whispered in horror, "What's a dragon doing here…"
No one answered.
The beast's wings stirred the dust like a rising storm. Its glowing eyes scanned the cliffs below, as if weighing which insect to crush first.
Garron staggered upright, his voice dry with bitter dread."…We should've waited for the one from the Academy. Just one more body might've made a difference."
Joran didn't look away from the monster above.His grip tightened on the hilt of his blade."…Too late for that now."
The dragon lunged.
A wall of flame burst from its maw, carving a swath of destruction across the cliffside. Vin barely raised a barrier of condensed mana before it struck—shattering like glass under the heat. Garron dove, rolling behind a jagged outcrop, while Joran threw a dagger charged with lightning at the creature's eye.
It didn't even flinch.
Its tail lashed out, smashing through stone like kindling. Garron was caught by the shockwave and sent sprawling. Vin coughed blood, her ribs cracked, her staff flickering and failing to channel the next spell.
"Keep moving!" Joran shouted, blade drawn, darting toward the creature's leg. His sword scraped against one of the crimson-black scales, leaving barely a scratch. The heat radiating from its body was unbearable.
This wasn't a fight—they were being burned away.
Yet they fought.
Again and again they struck, flanking, distracting, blasting. For all their strength, their tactics, their coordination… nothing pierced the dragon's defenses.
They were A-rank adventurers. Elite among mortals.
But this thing?
This was a calamity.
Far below, in the outskirts of Kirra…
He stood quietly at the edge of Kirra, head tilted against the wind.
The town was quiet—no recent signs of the adventuring party he'd been assigned to meet. A few merchants vaguely recalled three individuals passing through days earlier, heading north toward the cliffs. They hadn't waited. They hadn't even left a message.
Soren turned his head slightly, listening to the distant howling wind.
He wasn't surprised.
People rarely waited for the blind man.
He'd heard it enough—"He'll catch up." "He won't be much help anyway." Spoken behind backs or passed in confident whispers. It didn't matter whether Howlspire had said it or not. People like them often did.
And it never changed anything.
With a quiet breath, he adjusted the pack on his shoulder and began walking—alone—toward the cliffs.
Because regardless of their opinion of him, the mission had to be completed.
---
By the time Soren reached the western cliffs, the world had already begun to burn.
He felt the air warp with heat, heard the thunderous roars echoing off the mountains, smelled smoke and blood on the wind.
A battle.
He adjusted the grip on his cane and continued forward, following the vibrations in the earth like a trail of violence.
His foot crunched through scorched bones. The ground trembled under distant impacts. When he finally arrived at the broken ridge, the heat nearly forced him back.
He didn't need eyes to know what towered before them.
The sound was enough. The weight of it in the air. The deep, guttural growl like a forge brought to life.
A dragon?!
Soren's eyes—though closed—widened inwardly at the revelation. This was not the Apostle. Not the subtle foe they had expected!
"This is seriously bad," he muttered under his breath, voice low and tense.
He moved without hesitation.
Stepping carefully onto the crumbling ledge, his hand brushed away a swirl of ash.
Still he did not draw from the Eye of Ruin.
Still holding back—because if he unleashed its power now, he didn't know what side effects it might unleash upon him.
Below, Garron staggered under a devastating blow from the dragon's claw, barely managing to raise an arm in defense.
Suddenly, a pulse of shimmering mana burst from Soren's outstretched hand, weaving through the air like liquid light.
The blast of energy slammed into the dragon's claw mid-swing, slowing its deadly arc just enough.
Garron stumbled backward, gasping but alive.
"Who—are you?!" Joran shouted, eyes wide as he turned to see Soren descending into the fray.
Soren's voice was calm but firm. "I'm your plus one for this mission. But we don't have time to talk."
The dragon's tail slammed down, shattering boulders. Garron roared, swinging his twin axes in a desperate strike, sparks flying as the blades skittered across the dragon's obsidian scales.
Vin summoned a barrier of flickering light, intercepting a gout of molten flame. She chanted rapidly, sending a pulse of mana toward Joran, who dodged a wingtip blast and countered with a quick slash.
Nearby, Soren's hands traced sigils in the air, drawing on his own mana. A blast of concentrated energy shot forth, striking the dragon's flank with a sharp crack. The beast recoiled slightly, surprise flickering in its glowing eyes.
"Keep pushing!" Soren's voice was calm but steady, as he summoned another wave of arcane force to shield Garron from a crushing tail swipe.
The four fought in brutal tandem—Joran darting in for slashes, Garron pressing heavy blows, Vin weaving protective spells, and Soren firing magical strikes and barriers. But the dragon's raw power and age-worn fury overwhelmed even their best efforts.
The dragon had grown tired.
Its movements slowed—not from exhaustion, but from disinterest.
The game was over.
With a low, rumbling growl that made the cliffs quake and the air vibrate, the beast straightened its neck, wings spreading like thunderclouds blotting out the sun. Smoke coiled from its fanged maw, and a heat so pure and merciless began to build that the very rocks beneath their feet began to glow red.
The dragon's roar rose to a thunderous crescendo as it pulled back its massive head, energy gathering in its maw—an apocalyptic dragonfire ready to incinerate them all.
It had decided to end it all.
No more toying. No more watching the insects squirm.
Vin stood trembling, blood on her lips, her last barrier hanging by a thread. Garron was on one knee, axes half-sunken in the dirt, chest heaving as he coughed up smoke. Joran's blade hung limp at his side, his legs barely holding him up.
And yet the three stood—bracing for a death they could no longer stop.
The dragon inhaled.
And the world ignited.
A storm of dragonfire surged forward—an all-consuming, apocalyptic torrent of light and death, large enough to erase them from existence.
In that moment—
A figure moved.
Soren stepped forward, silent amidst the chaos.
No war cry. No desperation.
Only a whisper under his breath, a sound so low it was nearly swallowed by the roar of fire. His coat billowed as mana surged, dust spiraling around his feet.
Then—
A hum.
Not from the world, but from within.
Soren opened his left eye.
He saw the world again through Ruin.
Mana surged through his body, then narrowed—sharpened—into a single point.
The eye.
He try to remembering.
That night.In the forest.When everything vanished.
The ground. The trees. The air.Swallowed whole.By a hunger that wasn't his.
Gluttony.
And as the dragonfire came, roaring like a falling sun—
Soren focused his eye.
The air warped.
From the depths of his cursed eye, a singularity was born.
A swirling black hole, concentrated and ravenous, burst forth—a sphere of collapsed mana and darkness that howled with unnatural hunger.
It met the dragonfire head-on.
And it devoured it.
The inferno, so immense it could have razed mountains, twisted violently as it was sucked inward. Flames bent against their own nature, clawing at the edges of the vortex, only to be consumed by the pure black abyss!
Garron's jaw dropped, eyes wide with disbelief. Vin staggered back, staff trembling in her grip. Even Joran froze mid-strike, his breath caught in his throat as the impossible unfolded before them.
The dragon reared back, its massive head tilting.Its molten eyes, once burning with wrath, flicked down to meet the vortex in Soren's gaze.Its pupils constricted.A jolt.The slitted eyes widened—snapping open in primal shock.But in the depths of its gaze, no fear. Only recognition.As if it knew that eye.