The chamber beneath Kireth'Vael was older than the city itself. The roots that formed its walls were fossilized conduits of ancient power — curled, knotted, and whispering in their sleep.
Dren stood at its center.
His boots rested on cracked obsidian floor, burned long ago by something far stronger than fire. Veins of soft-blue light pulsed beneath the glassy surface — not from any source above, but from within. It was a pulse. A direction.
The woman known only as Siras knelt beside one of the old channels carved into the wall. She was Lorebound — part scholar, part whisperer of old truths — and had taken it upon herself to guide him here.
"This is where the old magic sleeps," she said, brushing dust from the etched stone. "The kind that once pushed back Titans. The kind this kingdom has forgotten how to fear."
Dren remained silent.
The air was electric. Not from him. From it — the buried presence that seemed to breathe through the roots, watching him from within the walls.
He stepped forward, lightning sparking quietly across his arms. "What is this place?"
Siras glanced up. "A listening chamber. Before the city rose, this vault heard the voices of the planet. It heard pain… and power. Now it waits for a new voice."
Dren stared at the wall — the spiral pattern flickering faintly now, barely visible to the untrained eye. And yet it pulled at him like a thread wound through his chest.
"Where is it?" he asked. "The source. The ancient magic."
Siras walked to the edge of the chamber and laid her hand on a flat stone slab embedded in the wall. Glyphs bloomed at her touch, unfolding like flower petals under light.
A projection formed in the air — a map, faint and shimmering, showing the vast mountain ranges far to the north, beyond the reach of Kireth'Vael's borders. One stood taller than the rest: a broken fang of white stone, jagged against the clouds.
"There," she said. "The Vault of the Hollow Star. That's where the convergence lies."
Dren took a step toward it.
But just as he did—
SLAM.
The chamber door burst open.
Two armored guards stormed in, crystal-blade rifles drawn, visors glowing with mirrored light.
One pointed directly at Dren.
"You. The King has summoned you. Now."
Dren's eyes narrowed. Sparks arced across his shoulders, his muscles tensing with instinct — but he didn't move.
Siras rose, alarm on her face. "He's not ready. He only just—"
The guard cut her off. "The Council doesn't care. A storm erupted the moment he entered this chamber. They think he brought it. And they demand answers."
Dren raised his hands slowly. His eyes never left the guards.
"Fine," he said. "Take me."
⸻
🏛️ The King's Hall
The throne room of Kireth'Vael was nothing like the vault below.
It was clean, pristine — woven from living crystal that spiraled upward into light-drenched branches above. A tree grew through the center of the palace, its roots glassy and veined with glowing amber. Nobles lined the edges of the chamber, whispering from behind leafwoven veils. Soldiers stood like statues, every inch of them gleaming in regal armor, decorated in ribbons of deep emerald and violet.
At the far end, upon a throne of blackened rootstone and hollow bone, sat King Vaelorn — tall, armored in ceremonial garb, his face painted with the linework of old war victories. His crown was no circlet, but a layered collar of scorched metal and feathers, draped around his shoulders like a relic of some forgotten conquest.
He raised one hand, palm down. The hall fell into absolute silence.
Dren was marched before him — still unbound, but surrounded by blades.
King Vaelorn studied him for a long moment, his voice cutting through the air like a blade.
"You fell from the sky," he said.
"I crashed," Dren corrected.
"You broke our wards. Lit the heavens on fire. Sent a panic through the city."
"Wasn't trying to," Dren muttered.
"And now," the king continued, "you whisper to roots. Stir old power. And walk unburned through lightning."
He stood.
The air changed. Everyone in the room tensed.
"You carry the mark of an Ashborn," Vaelorn said. "And you carry it without permission."
Dren's eyes sparked.
The king's voice dropped an octave. "You should not exist."
And then — a signal.
The guards moved.
Two stepped forward, swords drawn.
King Vaelorn gave the sentence without ceremony.
"By the will of Kireth'Vael, you are declared a threat to our realm. You will be executed by first light."
⸻
Lightning cracked across Dren's back.
He didn't fall. He didn't flinch.
Instead, he laughed once — cold, breathless.
He raised his eyes to the king, and something shifted.
The storm answered.
Sparks licked his boots. His shoulders. His spine.
Then — he opened his arms.
BOOM.
Lightning erupted outward in a blinding sphere.
The guards were thrown back. Cracks raced up the walls. The nobles screamed. And Dren rose from the floor, hovering a foot off the ground, eyes blazing gold, power coiling like a serpent around him.
"You want to kill me?" he said, voice echoing with raw voltage. "Then try."
He thrust his hands skyward.
The palace shook.
Far above — clouds split open. Thunder rolled. The sky lit with branching veins of pure lightning as the air tore itself apart.
Dren exploded upward, blasting through the crystal dome, shooting into the air like a comet of yellow flame.
The kingdom below screamed in panic.
And above it all — he laughed.
Not from cruelty.
From release.
From the terrifying, overwhelming truth that he was no longer afraid.
Dren tore through the clouds like a god flung into the heavens.
Lightning didn't follow him — it welcomed him. The storm above Kireth'Vael wasn't born of weather, but of will. His will. Yellow arcs danced along the vapor trails he carved into the sky, coiling around his shoulders, dancing between his fingertips, flaring in sharp bursts across his eyes like they were trying to burn their way out of him.
The storm cracked once.
Then again.
And then — it screamed.
Below, the city panicked. Soldiers poured from towers. Alarms, ancient and low, howled through the capital like horned wolves. Civilians rushed into temples, beneath arches, into tunnels. Word spread like flame: The Ashborn has risen. The sky has turned on us.
But Dren wasn't thinking about them.
Not yet.
He hovered high above the capital, arms wide, lightning swirling in wild, concentric rings around him. It felt… too easy. Like the lightning was guiding him now. Feeding off his anger.
He looked down.
He could see the throne hall — half its crystal dome shattered from his escape. The king had probably fled. Or died. He didn't care.
A thought crossed his mind.
He could end this city.
Right now.
A hundred-thousand volts cracked from his knuckles. The air around him warped, heatless but deadly.
His breath came faster.
He grinned.
"Look at them run," he muttered, voice echoing inside his head. "Terrified of the thing they tried to kill."
Another arc blasted from his chest — involuntary, instinctive, pulsing with pressure. The clouds responded — a great fork of gold and white split the sky from horizon to horizon. He turned, slowly, in mid-air.
And then—
He saw himself.
Reflected in a glint of floating glass — a shard from the shattered dome still suspended by wind and charge.
What he saw made him freeze.
His eyes were blazing gold. His veins glowed like wire. His mouth was twisted in something between rage and joy.
He didn't look human.
He looked like something lost.
And for the first time… the storm began to pull back.
The smile faded.
The arcs slowed.
Below, he saw people scattering. Not soldiers. Children. Families. Faces twisted in panic, running from the screaming sky. His storm. Him.
He blinked.
Then shut his eyes.
And everything snapped silent.
Just for a second.
Then he exhaled — and dove.
⸻
The wind howled as he rocketed through the clouds, carving a path of dissipating light behind him. The storm scattered like leaves in his wake, drawn back into the sky as if recognizing he no longer wished to wield it.
He didn't know where he was going.
He just knew he had to leave.
And he didn't stop flying until the mountains found him.
⸻
🏔️ The Peak of Silence
The mountain was the tallest in view — a jagged spire of black stone capped in snow and whispering winds. Dren touched down hard on its peak, boots skidding across frozen rock until he dropped to one knee.
No thunder here.
No people.
No voices.
Only him.
Steam hissed from his skin. Lightning still ticked faintly across his shoulders like dying sparks from a fire long burned. His breath fogged the air, but he didn't feel cold.
He sat.
Alone.
Hands resting on bent knees. Head lowered.
"I don't even know what I am anymore," he whispered.
The snow fell quietly around him.
The storm he had called no longer followed.
He was just a man again. But a man who could tear a city in half if he forgot himself for even a moment.
This isn't survival anymore, he thought. This is something else. Something worse.
He didn't notice the rumble at first.
Not until the rocks began to tremble.
Not until the mountain roared.
And then—
It came.
⸻
🦍 The White Beast
From a crevice halfway down the slope, a thunderous figure emerged — massive, brutal, ancient. A great white ape, its fur streaked with scars and jagged ice, its forearms the width of boulders.
It didn't charge at first.
It just stared.
A predator recognizing something new.
Dren stood slowly, eyes wide.
"What in the hells…"
The beast snorted steam, then moved.
It reached into a snowdrift and pulled a boulder the size of a caravan — pitted, jagged, perfectly round on one side.
It wasn't random.
It had saved this rock.
And now, with one grunt of massive muscle, it hurled it skyward — right at Dren.
Dren barely had time to react. He jumped, lightning sparking instinctively in his legs — a volt dash upward. But he miscalculated. The rock caught him mid-air, clipping his ribs.
CRACK.
Everything went black.
He didn't remember falling.
⸻
He woke only for seconds.
Sky. Snow. Falling.
Then: impact.
Something broke.
He skidded across frost-covered stone, over the edge of the cliffs — and tumbled down into a field of half-frozen brush and moss at the mountain's base.
Everything spun.
Everything hurt.
And then— darkness.
⸻
🌿 The Quiet Below
Voices.
Not thunder. Not beasts.
Human.
He felt warmth on his face. Smelled fire. Heard soft feet on dirt.
"He's alive," someone whispered.
"Get water. And the old salve."
"Where did he fall from?"
"No idea. But did you see the sky when he hit?"
A pause.
Someone touched his shoulder.
"He's not like us."
And finally—
Sleep.
They found him at the edge of the western woods, sprawled across the rocks like a corpse thrown from the sky.
The snow around him had melted in a strange ring — as if the lightning in his blood still breathed. His body was torn, battered, one arm twisted beneath him. A faint static crackled from his fingers, twitching every few moments like the remnants of a shattered storm.
The villagers didn't speak at first.
They just stood in silence, staring at the figure in the crater.
One of the boys, no older than ten, reached forward to touch the edge of the blackened grass. His fingers stopped just shy of the body, trembling.
A hand caught his wrist.
Yama.
"Don't," she whispered. "Not yet."
⸻
Three of the men formed a stretcher from bark struts and rope. Another wrapped Dren's head with soft cloth, careful not to touch the still-sparking streaks along his jaw. As they lifted him, his body slumped but didn't wake. One of them murmured, "He's heavy for someone so thin."
No one replied.
They walked in silence.
⸻
🛖 The Hut of First Fire
They laid him in the old hut — the one built into the hill beneath the oldest tree, where no one had lived in seasons.
The fires inside were still cold. One of the elder women lit the braziers, casting shadows across the walls. She sprinkled dried moss over the flames. The smoke turned blue.
Dren didn't stir.
The healer applied salves, ground from root and resin. She didn't ask who he was. She didn't speak to him at all.
They dressed his wounds in silence, then placed a copper bowl beside him filled with clean water. No one drank from it. It was for him, and only him.
When they left, they shut the hide flap behind them. The wind howled outside.
⸻
🌲 The Fear Beneath the Pines
That night, around a low fire beneath the pines, the elders gathered. Snow fell gently on the wooden circle. No one smiled.
One man finally broke the silence. His name was Korrin.
"We should not have brought him here."
Another elder nodded. "He fell like the last one did. Fire in the sky. Power in the bones."
Yama stirred the fire. "That was a lifetime ago. And we all paid the price for it."
"They burned the orchard," said one. "The stream never healed."
"No birds nested for three winters," whispered another.
Korrin stared toward the hut on the hill. "And now another outsider. Another weapon."
Yama didn't speak.
She simply fed the fire another handful of moss.
The flame burned pale and low.
⸻
None of them saw the sparks still twitching in the sky above.
None of them noticed the lightning crawling faintly across Dren Mako's fingertips… like a dream trying to wake him.
But not yet.