The silence that followed the impact was not peace—it was the echo of a world that had just been shattered.
Sareth's body lay crumpled at the foot of the broken pillar, a grotesque silhouette amidst scorched stone and smoke. His armor, once a symbol of invincibility, now clung to him in molten fragments, fused with flesh. His limbs jerked in spasms, muscles twitching uncontrollably. A faint, eerie glow radiated from the veins along his neck, pulsing like dying embers. Every breath he took sounded like a struggle against something deeper than pain—against his very soul tearing apart.
Kael stood still, heart pounding in his ears. He had seen destruction before. He had seen the Vorms devour entire platoons. But this—this unraveling of a man from the inside—was different. It was intimate. Tragic. The air smelled of burnt ozone and blood. His stomach churned. This wasn't a victory. It was a funeral in slow motion.
Sareth was alive, yes—but only barely. His fingers dug into the scorched ground, as if he were trying to hold onto reality, clawing his way back from an abyss that had no bottom. His once-proud frame now trembled with each breath, ribs rising like cracked glass under the weight of something monstrous. Veins—blackened, pulsing with tainted energy—throbbed under his skin like they carried more than blood.
Then he moaned. A low, broken sound, too warped to be human. And in it, Kael heard not just pain—but terror.
Kael took a step forward. Just one. But it felt like crossing into the unknown. His legs trembled—not from exhaustion, but from something colder, deeper. He had seen Sareth at his peak, commanding storms of energy, standing unshaken before abominations. But now he saw something else entirely. Not strength. Not wrath. Only collapse. And yet, beneath that, something lingered.
Was this what awaited them all if they reached too far? If they touched the threshold of power meant to stay buried?
"Captain?" Kael whispered, his voice dry and uncertain, almost childlike in the vast emptiness of the ruined square.
No one else moved. The other soldiers had frozen in place, weapons lowered, eyes wide with dread. Even Declan, always composed, had gone rigid beside him, his blade trembling slightly in his grip. Naelys stood like a statue, her glaive clenched so tight her knuckles had gone white. The air was thick with tension, as if the world itself was holding its breath.
Then Sareth raised his head.
Slowly. Painfully. His eyes—once sharp, commanding, near divine—were now pitch-black voids, swirling with fragments of something ancient and wrong. There was recognition in them. But there was also loss.
He tried to speak. His lips parted—but instead of words, a stream of black bile spilled out, hissing where it met the stone. The stench was vile, like rot and metal. His throat convulsed, his face contorted. Was he trying to call for help? To scream a name? Or to issue a warning?
And then—he screamed.
It was not human. It was not rage. It was something raw, primeval. A roar that echoed through the ruins like a beast crying from the depths of its cage. The walls shook. Birds, hidden in the hollowed bones of buildings, scattered in a frenzy. Even the Vorm, though badly wounded and bleeding, recoiled. It sensed the shift. It sensed the breaking.
Sareth clutched his skull with clawed hands—yes, claws. His nails had elongated, curved like talons. His entire frame vibrated, caught in an unnatural metamorphosis. A twisted mutation. From his spine, something sharp began to emerge—an osseous protrusion that writhed like a serpent before snapping back into his flesh. His skin bubbled in places, as if rejecting itself.
Whispers filled the air.
Kael didn't know where they came from—whether from the ruins, the air, or inside his own skull. But they were there. Soft. Cold. Seductive.
— Join us… You wanted this…
— This is not betrayal. This is freedom.
— Give up your name. Accept ours.
Sareth screamed again, louder. His back arched, muscles tearing beneath the skin, bones cracking like dry branches. His sweat had turned black, dripping from his brow like ink. He collapsed to his knees, chest heaving. A being caught between man and something unspeakable. His mind—his will—was still in there, struggling. Drowning.
Kael took another step. The rational part of him screamed to stop. But his heart pulled him forward. There was still something inside Sareth—some spark. Some plea. He felt it. A thread, however thin, of humanity refusing to die.
A hand seized his shoulder. Declan.
"Don't," he said, voice low and tense. "Don't do it. He's too far gone. That thing down there… it's not him anymore. Not really."
Kael's breath caught. His fists clenched. He wanted to believe. He wanted to believe that people didn't just vanish into darkness. That even when the body twisted, when the soul cracked—something endured. Something good.
"I saw it," Kael muttered. "I saw him fight it."
Declan's grip tightened. "And now he's losing."
Still, Kael didn't look away. He couldn't. Sareth's eyes—however warped—still held something. A flicker. A memory. The man who stood before them during the trials. The man who demanded strength, not cruelty. The captain who fought to shield them from the Vorm with everything he had.
He wouldn't believe it was all gone.
Not yet.
Not while that look remained. That quiet, pleading look—buried beneath the void. A look that said: help me.