Chapter 3: An Echo of Ruin
The dream was not a dream. It was a memory that was not his own.
Leander stood on a plain of shattered obsidian, beneath a sky churning with angry, bruised colors. Before him stood a figure of incandescent light and unbearable pride, his form radiating a power that made the very air hum. This was a god in his full glory, before the fall.
"You would deny me my rightful throne?" the figure—Azhoroth—boomed, his voice the sound of grinding continents. "I, who shaped the stars? I, who breathed life into the dust of this realm?"
Another presence, vast and formless as the sky itself, answered with a simple, final thought that reverberated through existence: *Your reign is ended.*
Azhoroth's light curdled, darkening with a rage so absolute it threatened to unmake reality. "Then if I cannot have it," he snarled, the words twisting into a curse that scarred the fabric of the dream, "I will ensure no one can. All will burn. I will make you watch."
The vision shattered. Leander jolted awake in his cot, his heart hammering against his ribs, the taste of ash and divine wrath on his tongue. The echo of the vow—*all will burn*—repeated in his mind, a poisonous mantra. It was no longer just a story. It was a memory etched into his soul.
He had to get out.
He stumbled from the small barracks room into the pre-dawn grey of Last-Hope. The city was quiet, but it was the quiet of a held breath. He made for the old archives, seeking the solitude of maps and silent knowledge. But as he passed a group of early-risers, a woman jostled him.
"Watch it—" she began, then her eyes widened in recognition. "Oh. It's you."
She didn't say it with gratitude. She said it with fear, pulling her child closer and hurrying away. Leander felt the weight of her gaze like a physical blow. He was no longer just a person; he was an event. A catastrophe.
He found Elpis already in the archives, a single candle illuminating her face as she stared at her hands.
"I can still feel it," she whispered, not looking up. "The heat, just under my skin. It's like a second heartbeat. I'm afraid to fall asleep, Leander. What if I... burn everything down?"
Before he could answer, the door flew open. Roric stood there, his face grim. "Leander. You need to come. Now."
He led them to the town's main gate. Captain Vorlik and a circle of guards stood around a lone figure kneeling in the dirt. It was the scout from the day before, the one who had reported the lost patrol. His eyes were wide, unblinking, and a trail of bloody tears had dried on his cheeks. He was muttering, the same phrase, over and over.
"He showed me... he showed me the truth..."
"What truth?" Vorlik demanded, his voice tight.
"The truth that we are just kindling," the scout whispered, a horrifying smile stretching his lips. "Kindling for his great, beautiful pyre."
A collective chill swept through the onlookers. This was the work of Pythios. This was the enemy's response. Not a frontal assault, but a poison in the well of their hope.
Vorlik turned his hard gaze to Leander. "He did this because of you. That... thing marked us. It marked *you*. And now my men are dying with smiles on their faces." He took a step closer, his voice dropping low. "I don't know what you are, boy. But your 'miracle' has brought a hell upon us that we weren't prepared for."
Leander said nothing. He looked from Vorlik's accusing face, to Roric's troubled one, to Elpis's fearful expression. He looked at the broken scout, a living testament to the fallen god's vow.
The pressure was building again, different from before. Not a power seeking release, but a crushing responsibility. Azhoroth's echo in his mind, the fear in the eyes of his people, the insidious work of Pythios—it was all a cage tightening around him.
He had shattered the world to save them. Now, he had to find a way to put the pieces back together before the one who started the fire used the fragments to cut them all to ribbons.
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Author's Note:
The stakes are rising. The enemy prefers to break minds rather than bodies. What do you think Pythios's next move will be?
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