Julian Volkov stood frozen in the shadows of an alley, watching the town tear itself apart.
The fires had multiplied in the time it had taken him to cross from one rooftop to another, from escape to... this. What had started as isolated flames in distant districts had spread like a disease, consuming buildings, streets, and entire sections of Zarethun in hungry orange blooms. The smoke was so thick now that it turned the sky into twilight, reducing visibility to mere dozens of meters. Through the haze, he could see soldiers moving with purpose, water mages working in coordination with the town watch, trying to contain the inferno before it consumed everything.
His first instinct had been right: run. Get out. Disappear into the forest and don't look back.
But something had shifted during those chaotic minutes on the rooftop with Alan and Arthur. Some fundamental assumptions about how the world worked had cracked.
They aren't after me.
The realisation settled like a stone in his chest. Arthur flying overhead, the evacuation orders, the systematic sweep of the town, none of it had been about Julian Volkov and his ｢Photographer｣ skill. They'd been hunting something else, someone else, and that someone had set half the damn town on fire in the process.
Which meant the destruction, the panic, the screaming, it wasn't directed at him. He wasn't important enough for this level of violence.
The thought should have been comforting. Instead, it made everything worse.
People were still trapped in there. He could hear them, distant cries of those who hadn't made it out before the evacuation, those buried under rubble or trapped by flame. Most had escaped, yes, but 'most' wasn't 'all'.
It's not your problem.
The military was his enemy, the Empire that hunted him, the soldiers that would execute him on sight if they discovered what he was. Why should he risk anything for them? They wouldn't come running to save him; they'd come running to kill him.
But the town... even if he'd only been here for a little over two weeks after fleeing Cerberus, even if it was just a waypoint in his endless running, he'd been here, he'd lived here, breathed this air, walked these streets, and eaten in these taverns.
Could I do nothing?
The familiar paralysis crept over him, the weight of indecision that had plagued him since arriving in this world. Every choice led to failure. Every path was a minefield. When he'd chosen to work for Cerberus, he'd failed; when he'd chosen to flee, he'd failed; when he'd chosen to fight Luthern, he'd failed spectacularly. The safest option was always to do nothing, to let others decide, to accept whatever came next.
But people are dying...
And if he chose to help and failed at that, too? Well, he was already used to failure; he'd gotten good at it, in fact. Maybe it was time to fail at something that actually mattered.
"You! Boy! Move!" A rough hand grabbed his shoulder and shoved him forward. Julian stumbled, his invisibility skill flaring instinctively before he caught himself and let it fade. A watchman in smoke-stained clothes was herding stragglers toward the eastern gate, his movements sharp with urgency. "Go! Evacuate now!"
"Wait a minute!" Julian called out, the words already leaving his mouth before he could overthink them. "I'm a water mage. I can help."
The watchman froze for a fraction of a second, his eyes narrowing with confusion. A water mage? Here? In the middle of an evacuation? But there was no time for questions, no time to parse the strangeness of this moment.
"Damn it, I will think about that later," Julian muttered, more to himself than to the watchman.
The older man's expression shifted from confusion to grim determination. He pointed toward the nearest fire, the gesture urgent. "Start there. Careful with your output; there might still be people inside some of those buildings. Don't bring them down on top of anyone."
Julian didn't wait for more instructions. He broke into a run, his legs carrying him toward the flames before his mind could catch up and convince him to stop, to hide, to run away like he always did.
The heat hit him like a physical blow as he approached the burning building. The facade was already crumbling, the wooden frame glowing orange at the edges. Through the broken windows, he could see the inferno inside, consuming everything, furniture, walls, the very structure itself, reducing to ash and embers.
Julian raised his right hand, gathering mana with practised precision. Multiple lines of light circled around his fingers before beginning to form intricate patterns, one large outer circle and a smaller inner one. Between the two circles, runes materialised, glowing with soft blue light. The symbols seemed to pulse with his heartbeat, drawing mana from deep within his core and channelling it outward through his palm.
The drain was immediate and intense. He could feel his reserves depleting with each passing second, the magicules flowing out of him like water through a broken dam. The runes grew brighter, more defined, and then—
The spell was released.
A concentrated stream of water burst forth from his palm, thin and pressurised, cutting through the air like a blade. It struck the base of the flames where they fed hungrily on wooden supports, and the sound that followed was like a scream, the fire hissing and retreating, beaten back by the onslaught. Steam rose in thick clouds, carrying the smell of char and ash and things burned beyond recognition. The temperature dropped noticeably in the immediate area, the water's cold a shocking contrast to the heat that still radiated from deeper within the building.
The circles and runes vanished once the spell had accomplished its purpose. Julian's hand dropped to his side, trembling slightly from the exertion.
This will take some time.
He raised his hand again, drawing on his reserves, reconstructing the circles and runes. Again and again, he cast, moving methodically from one section of the building to the next, attacking the flames with grim determination. Around him, the chaos of Zarethun continued, screams of fear from panicking citizens, organised shouts of orders from the watchmen, the constant crackling roar of the fire consuming everything it could reach.
He lost himself in the work, the simple mechanics of it. Find flame. Suppress flame. Move to the next flame. Repeat. Cast. Drain. Recover. Cast again.
It wasn't heroic. It wasn't even particularly effective, for every section of fire he extinguished, two more seemed to spring up elsewhere in the town. But it was something. It was action instead of paralysis, choice instead of surrender.
And for now, that was enough.
...
In another part of the town, two watchmen stood before a house that was literally collapsing in on itself.
The foundations had been eroded by heat and flame, the support beams reduced to charcoal. The roof was already caving inward, sending cascades of burning debris down into the interior in a shower of sparks and embers. It was a death trap. Anyone inside was already gone, or should have been.
The watchmen had exchanged a look of grim resignation and were already turning away when a figure burst past them.
"Wait—!" one of them called out, but the young man was already gone, disappearing into the smoke and flame like a ghost stepping through a veil.
"Is he insane?!" the second watchman shouted after him.
There was no answer. Just the roar of the fire and the terrible sound of a house dying, its wooden skeleton cracking and groaning as gravity reclaimed it piece by piece.
The watchmen stood frozen, unsure whether to follow, unsure whether it even mattered. A rescue attempt in that inferno was suicide. No one could survive in there. No one—
A figure emerged from the smoke.
He moved with surprising speed, given the chaos, his footsteps quick and careful, and the reason became clear as he came into view: he was carrying people. Three of them, draped across his shoulders and back with the practised ease of someone trained in rescue work.
A tall teen with curly brown hair, barely singed despite having just been inside a burning building. His clothes were torn in a few places, but there were no burns visible on his skin. No ash clinging to him. No sign that he'd just walked through an inferno.
"These three need immediate care," he said, his voice surprisingly calm and steady. "Minor burns, mostly smoke inhalation. Get them to safety."
The watchmen snapped out of their shock and quickly moved to take the survivors, their hands moving fast to relieve Elrik of his burden. Their movements were efficient, trained; they'd done this before, many times, just never with someone walking calmly out of an actively collapsing building.
"Thank you," one of them breathed, genuine gratitude in his voice. "You did enough. More than enough. Get yourself to safety. Now."
But before Elrik could move away, one of the three people he'd rescued, an older man with singed hair and burns along his left arm, opened his eyes. They were unfocused, heavy with smoke inhalation and exhaustion, but they found Elrik's face and locked onto it with surprising intensity.
The man's mouth moved, forming words that came out as barely a whisper. "Thank you... You saved... my family..." His eyes, despite their weakness, held genuine gratitude. Not the polite thanks of someone offering courtesy, but the profound appreciation of a man who'd stared into the abyss and been pulled back from the edge.
Then his eyes slipped closed again, consciousness fading, but not before Elrik caught the full weight of that look. The thanks. The recognition.
He had saved lives.
The moment lasted only seconds, but it burned itself into Elrik's mind like a brand. The weakness in the man's eyes contrasted sharply with the strength of his gratitude. Someone's father. Someone who would get to live another day, go home, and hold his family again because Elrik had acted.
"You're welcome," Elrik whispered, though the man was already unconscious and couldn't hear him.
One of the watchmen placed a hand on Elrik's shoulder. "Get to safety. Now. That's an order."
Elrik nodded, but he was already looking past them, already scanning the street for the next danger, the next opportunity to act.
"Wait! You can't—" one watchman tried to grab his arm, but Elrik was already moving, dodging between burning wreckage with agility that seemed almost unnatural for someone his age.
He turned his head left and right, assessing. Not all the houses had burned yet, but the number that had was increasing. Collapsed roofs, burning interiors, walls that could give way at any moment. The fire was spreading faster than the water mages could suppress it.
"If anyone needs help, I'm here!" Elrik shouted into the chaos, his voice carrying across the street.
His answer came not as a human voice, but as an explosion.
It came from somewhere to the north, a massive BOOM that shook the ground beneath his feet and sent a plume of smoke and fire spiralling into the sky. The sound was so loud, so visceral, that for a moment it seemed to eclipse even the roar of the surrounding fires. Debris rained down in a scattered arc, and somewhere in the distance, more screams joined the cacophony.
The source, Elrik thought, his mind working with the simple, focused clarity of someone who'd stopped overthinking and started acting. Whatever's causing this, if I can stop it...
He didn't finish the thought. He just turned toward the sound and began to run, his legs carrying him toward danger instead of away from it. The watchmen called out in alarm behind him, their voices swallowed by the noise of the collapsing town, but Elrik didn't hear them anymore.
He ran through streets choked with smoke and ash, past buildings that were burning or already burned or in the process of burning, following the sound of the explosions like a compass needle. His body moved with an efficiency that surprised even himself, his feet finding purchase on unstable ground, his path intuitive and sure.
He didn't know what he'd find when he got there. He didn't know if he could actually help. He only knew that the explosions were causing this, that stopping them might stop the fire, might save more people.
It was a desperate, probably foolish assumption. But it was better than doing nothing.
The warmth in his right palm, the mark of his contract with the Guide, seemed to pulse with his heartbeat as he ran, almost like it was synchronised with his efforts. But Elrik barely noticed. His focus was absolute, his determination singular.
Keep running. Help. That's all that matters right now.
He pushed northward, toward the forest edge, toward the sound of the explosions, toward whatever was waiting for him there.