Ash fell like black snow.
The once-golden forest of the elves now stood silent — a graveyard of charred roots and smoldering soil. The moon hung cracked behind the drifting smoke, its pale light fractured by the lingering ripples of the explosion.
A single figure stirred amid the wreckage.
Clark.
His body trembled, one arm missing, skin flayed where the stormlight had seared through. Blue and crimson light flickered beneath his skin — the remnants of two warring souls refusing to let go.
He coughed once, blood and steam spilling from his lips. "Sylwen…"
The name tasted like ash.
He looked down — and there, not far from him, lay the elven prince. Sylwen's armor was shattered, the glow of his divine seal extinguished, his body unmoving save for the faint, ragged rise and fall of his chest.
Clark staggered toward him, every step sinking into scorched soil. The crimson tendrils that had once obeyed him now hung limp and lifeless from his back, twitching like dying nerves.
