Snow whipped through the shattered gates of Rimegarde like ghostfire, blowing over charred stones and frozen corpses. Where once stood one of the Dominion's proudest strongholds, there now remained a broken skeleton of frost and ruin.
Duncan stood upon the ramparts, his cloak billowing, eyes locked on the jagged mountain path ahead.
But it wasn't the wind he listened to.
It was the silence beneath it.
"You feel it too," Alra said, approaching.
He nodded. "The calm before the storm."
Kaelen joined them, his armor caked in ash. "Scouts returned. A Dominion courier caravan fled north before the explosion. They didn't head to another city."
Duncan glanced at him. "Where, then?"
"To the Obsidian Arx."
Even Alra stiffened. "That's a myth."
"Not anymore," Kaelen said grimly. "They crossed the Veilspine Bridge. That path only leads there."
The Obsidian Arx—fortress of secrets, locked behind storm-warded peaks. It was where the Dominion buried truths they didn't want to kill outright.
It wasn't a garrison.
It was a vault of darkness.
Duncan's jaw clenched.
"We move at dawn."
Before they left Rimegarde, Duncan gathered his officers in the frost-cracked chapel that once housed the Dominion's sunstone relics.
He placed a torn Dominion standard across the altar, now desecrated and scorched.
"This war has changed," he said, voice hard as the ice-laced stone. "We've crushed two thrones. But we've stirred something deeper. The Dominion is desperate. And desperate kings make dangerous choices."
He looked around the room—at Ironfang chieftains, Embersteel captains, even former Dominion tacticians who had defected.
"I won't ask you to follow me into the Arx. I'm telling you that I will."
Kaelen stepped forward without hesitation.
"So will I."
Alra followed. "There are answers there. Maybe truths we can use."
Others rose, one by one.
The rebellion wasn't just unified by vengeance anymore.
It was driven by purpose.
The march north was brutal.
Blizzards swept in faster than any natural storm. Ice serpents stalked the lower ridges, forcing the army to burn through three squads of war archers just to keep them at bay.
But the worst came at the Veilspine Bridge.
It was a single arch of blackstone—narrow, curved like a blade, with no railings and bottomless chasm on either side.
Duncan halted the column.
Alra studied the stone. "This isn't just architecture. It's a binding."
Kaelen nodded toward the far side. "Something's watching."
Indeed, at the bridge's end stood a lone figure—hooded, tall, with robes etched in lunar runes. He carried no weapon, but the way the mana curled around him spoke of power far beyond a common magus.
Duncan stepped forward alone.
The wind howled between them.
The figure raised a scroll.
It opened by itself, glowing faintly with shadowlight.
Then he spoke—not aloud, but into Duncan's mind.
"Turn back, son of ash. The path beyond this bridge leads only to ruin."
Duncan's hand hovered over his blade. "And yet you opened the scroll."
The figure said nothing, but the wind paused.
"The Arx is not a fortress. It is a sentence. And all who pass this threshold become bound to its truths. Even you."
Duncan stepped forward. "Then bind me."
The scroll ignited in the figure's hands, burning with silent black flame.
He bowed once.
Then vanished.
Crossing the Veilspine Bridge was like walking through a dream of stone and death. Each step echoed with memories Duncan didn't own—flashes of chained gods, of cities built in a single night and burned before morning, of weapons that could shatter the moon.
And behind it all… the beat of a heart not of this world.
When the last of the army crossed, the bridge vanished.
Literally.
The arch crumbled into motes of obsidian light, blown away by the storm.
No way back.
Only forward.
The Obsidian Arx stood atop a flat peak—a black pyramid-shaped monolith, rising into the snow-filled sky, ringed with broken chains the size of ships. Its walls bore no doors, no windows, just slits from which soft violet light pulsed like a heartbeat.
It didn't feel dead.
It felt alive.
And angry.
Alra's voice trembled. "This wasn't built by mortals."
Kaelen exhaled. "Then who?"
Duncan unslung his bow and checked the fletching. "Let's find out."
The gates opened before them.
Not with sound.
But with acceptance.
As if the Arx knew they were coming.
Inside, the air was warm, dry, and pulsing with slow, methodical energy. Carvings lined the walls—histories of wars fought before time, creatures born from stars, and kings who made pacts with the void.
And in the deepest chamber, they found a prison of mirrors.
Each panel reflected not a person—but a possibility.
Duncan stepped forward.
And saw himself on a black throne—crowned, cloaked in Dominion gold, watching his army kneel.
Another mirror showed him chained, broken, whispering secrets to an eyeless beast.
A third…
…showed nothing.
Just ash.
And silence.
Alra placed a hand on his arm. "These aren't futures. They're warnings."
Kaelen smashed one mirror with his fist. "Then let's stop playing reflections. Where's the truth?"
As if in answer, the floor beneath them shifted—unfolding into a spiral staircase descending into pitch-black.
Duncan drew his sword.
"Truth is always buried deep."
What waited below wasn't knowledge.
It was a recording.
A single glyph-lit chamber, walls covered in ancient Dominion script.
At its center, an obsidian sphere hovered—glowing with pulses of red and violet.
As they approached, it spoke.
"You seek the Dominion's soul."
"There is none."
The voice was both ancient and newborn.
"They were merely the first to kneel."
The sphere cracked—spilling light.
"This world does not belong to kings. It belongs to the silence beneath them."
The light exploded outward—flooding the chamber with visions.
Of the Umbral Chorus rising.
Of the beast-gods awakening beneath the skin of the world.
Of a war not between armies…
…but between fates.
And in the center of it all—Duncan.
Wearing a crown of ash.
Holding a blade of starlight.
And bleeding shadows from his eyes.
Then the light was gone.
The sphere disintegrated.
Duncan stood, heart pounding.
He didn't speak.
He didn't have to.
The war ahead wasn't just against the Dominion anymore.
It was against destiny itself.