Rain fell silently on the ruins of Dornhal. Gray droplets splattered against the blackened stones of the palace, carving paths along the cracked walls. In the western wing, a single stone arch still stood—remnant of an imperial past now swallowed by time.
Kaelen walked slowly beneath it, his boots pressing into the ash-laced mud. Torchlight cast flickering shadows on broken columns. He didn't speak. He listened. Every corner of this place seemed to breathe, to whisper memories of broken oaths, lost battles, and dead loves.
Behind him, Maelis, his strategist, unrolled a hand-woven map.
"These are the cleared zones," she said. "The wells are operational. The black mithrel is unstable, but workable."
Kaelen halted, eyes fixed on the map. He pointed to a red circle drawn in rough black ink.
"And this?"
Maelis frowned.
"A subterranean chamber. Sealed. But it pulses—like a heart. I felt it through the stone."
Kaelen raised his eyes.
"No one goes in without me. Not you. Not the workers."
Maelis nodded without protest. There was something in her king's voice—sharp, irrevocable.
But what neither of them knew… was that someone had already gone down.
A man whose name appeared on no map.
Ceylen.
---
He moved through the walls like a ghost. The corridors beneath Dornhal hadn't felt a living soul in three centuries, but he already knew them. Every turn, every hidden stair, every collapsed hall—familiar. He didn't need light. His eyes, gold like ancient coins, saw through darkness.
The palace's foundations were vast. Not merely a refuge, but a forgotten sanctuary. Here, before the fall, emperors had bound their blood to the Empire through forbidden rites. Here, Kaelen was not the only one walking.
Ceylen paused before a door—an arch carved from raw obsidian, marked with broken runes.
He placed his palm on the cold surface.
"You haven't changed," he murmured.
The stone trembled beneath his touch. A shiver ran through the wall, and with a sigh of dust, the entrance opened.
Beyond it: a deep silence.
A circular basin dominated the room, surrounded by ivory pillars. At its center, a black sphere floated in a liquid dark as the void. The sphere pulsed—fractured. Wounded.
"The Heart of the Throne..."
He stepped closer, eyes fixed. This relic came from the Chamber of Azareth—an artifact that could measure the weight of a soul, judge a king before he reigned.
But this one had been used. And it bore a wound.
"Someone survived the trial..."
Ceylen straightened slowly. A new tension crept into his shoulders. Was Kaelen's fate already sealed? Or…
A whisper rose behind him.
"You shouldn't be here."
He didn't flinch.
"You're late, Lys."
A woman stepped from the shadows. Young, dressed like a simple steward, yet something in her presence was deeply unsettling. Subtle, but dangerous. She pulled back her hood, revealing a face etched with fatigue and hard clarity.
"You're pushing too far, Ceylen. You can't keep playing this game forever."
"And yet I'm still playing."
He turned to her, arms folded behind his back.
"You too, in fact. From loyal steward… to spy for the Chamber. Well done."
Lys approached with measured steps, eyes on the basin.
"Kaelen isn't like the others. He still believes he can save something. That he can rebuild without losing his soul."
"He's wrong."
"Maybe. But he doesn't deserve you pulling strings behind his back."
Ceylen smiled faintly.
"You don't understand me, Lys. I don't pull strings. I lay threads. It's up to him to cut or follow them."
She clenched her fists.
"You want him to fail."
"No. I want him to survive. And for that… he must earn the crown."
Lys looked away.
"He placed the crown on his head. That should be enough."
"No. It's never enough."
He looked back at the basin, troubled.
"He's the last hope of a ruined world. The final heir to a cursed empire. Do you think the flames of the past will spare a king just because he's 'good'?"
She looked at him, wounded.
"You're becoming what you once fought against."
"I am what the world forced me to become."
Silence fell between them. Even here, the rain echoed, like distant drums.
"And if I tell Kaelen?" she whispered. "If I tell him you're here… that you're watching… manipulating?"
"You won't."
"Why?"
He tilted his head, without anger.
"Because you love him. And you know he has to be strong. Even if it means hating me for it."
She turned away, shaken.
Ceylen stepped back, his shadow stretching across the ancient stones.
"Keep your role, Lys. Protect him. Guide him… or betray him, if you must. But let him face the fire alone. That's how steel becomes a blade."
Then he vanished into the dark.
---
Meanwhile, Kaelen stood in the collapsed throne room.
The silence there was absolute. The broken stones formed a crescent around the old dais. He looked up toward the gaping hole in the ceiling. Rain still fell—slow and cold—as if the sky itself wept for the forgotten story of these ruins.
He laid his hand on the marble, blackened by flames from another age.
"I can feel you… all of you."
He closed his eyes.
"The ancients. The traitors. The mad kings. The builders. You're here… in the veins of this crown."
His mind drifted. He saw the White City before its fall—the terraced gardens, children's laughter in the streets, songs rising from the towers. Then the fire. The chains. The blood.
The taste of iron in his mouth.
He opened his eyes. A spark burned within.
"I will not fall."
He drew his sword. The black blade thrummed with a low growl.
And somewhere far beneath his feet, another blade answered in kind.
To be continued…