Li Shen and Wei Min stood upon the rim of a blackened plateau as twilight devoured the sky. Before them stretched the Fields of Forgotten Flame—an endless expanse of scorched, cracked earth, pocked with craters, bone pyres, and rivers of slow-burning ember. The horizon shimmered with mirage-like heat, but no sun warmed the land. The warmth came from below—from fire that should have died centuries ago.
This was where the Thirteenth War of Heaven ended.
And where the Hollow King was born.
"This was once the Cradle of the Flameborn," Wei Min whispered. "Phoenix Monks and Firewrights died here. Not in defeat. In sacrifice."
The earth beneath them groaned as wind stirred the ash.
Far ahead, beyond smoke and heatwaves, a ruined fortress rose like a black tooth against the sky—Kher Talas, the Hollow King's last bastion.
Li Shen's new sword, the Nameless Edge, pulsed faintly in its sheath.
He stepped forward.
Each step into the fields brought visions.
Not illusions—echoes, pulled from the world's scarred memory.
The ash drifted around Li Shen and Wei Min like snow, but it did not touch them. Instead, it spoke.
"Return, Flameborn."
"This land remembers your name."
"Do not wake the slumbering blaze."
Li Shen slowed as they passed a field of charred statues—soldiers turned to stone mid-battle, each bearing the insignia of the Phoenix Monastery. One figure stood taller than the rest: a monk in mid-leap, twin flame fans frozen in motion.
Wei Min knelt beside the base. A single name was inscribed in shattered script:
"Master Kaorun."
"He was the last Flamewright," she said softly. "He burned the skies to keep the Hollow King from escaping."
"And now his sacrifice is buried in silence," Li Shen murmured.
He reached out and touched the statue's foot. The stone flaked away—revealing flickering embers still alive beneath.
The fire was not gone. Only waiting.
A storm of ash rose before them.
Figures emerged—ashen knights, their armor fused with molten glass, swords of volcanic rock clutched in skeletal hands. Their eyes glowed orange, not with life, but with duty. These were the Flame-Woken, forged by sacrifice and bound by regret.
Wei Min drew her mirrored glaive.
"They test all who dare to approach the Citadel."
"Then let them see what I've become," Li Shen said.
The first wave attacked in silence—three knights charging with blistering speed, weapons dragging fire behind them.
Li Shen moved.
Sword Form: Echo Shatters Before Dawn.
Sword Form: Ash Swallowed by Wind.
Sword Form: Petal Falls, Ember Waits.
He wove between their strikes, deflecting molten blades with graceful precision. The Nameless Edge left no trail, no gleam—only absence, unmaking whatever it touched.
One Flame-Woken raised a hammer of obsidian.
Wei Min lunged.
Glaive Form: Crescent Mirror Breaks the Flame.
She shattered its chest with a spinning slash, turning its fire inward until the figure imploded.
More came—twelve, then twenty, then an entire battalion.
The battlefield became a storm of flame and echo. Every strike Li Shen landed erased a wound in the land's memory. With each knight fallen, the ash grew quieter, as if even the dead watched in reverence.
As the last knight fell, a new figure stepped forth—a tall, cloaked man with eyes of molten gold and skin traced by glowing script. His staff was made from twisted root and emberglass. Chains of smoldering light bound his arms.
"So you carry the Nameless Edge," he said. "And yet you are not hollow."
"Who are you?" Li Shen asked.
"Once I was Yenruel, last of the Flamewright Prophets. I was bound here for refusing to extinguish the soul of fire. The Hollow King feared what truth might ignite."
He raised his chained hands. Fire danced between his palms, forming visions:
A young Hollow King, still mortal, betrayed by his kin and burned alive.
The Gate of Endings, sealed before the war to prevent the sword's return.
A blade buried beneath the world's soul, whose reawakening could rewrite the Song of Heaven.
"The Hollow King thinks himself beyond time," said Yenruel. "But your coming changes the verses. And the verse must complete itself."
He stepped aside.
"Go. The fire is with you. The flame remembers its heir."
They neared Kher Talas as dusk bled into a colorless night.
The only light came from the cracks in the earth—lava rivers that pulsed like veins.
The path to the citadel lay across the Shattered Stair, a once-sacred bridge now broken in places, held together by strands of molten chain and whispering prayer-flame.
Wei Min hesitated.
"This bridge once bore the palanquin of the Ashen Flame Queen. It now carries only ghosts."
They began to cross.
Beneath them, the molten rivers churned—faces briefly surfaced in the magma, screaming without sound.
Halfway across, the sky cracked.
A spear of black fire surged down from above, striking the bridge ahead.
Li Shen leapt through it.
Sword Form: Void Walks on Embers.
He emerged unburned, the Nameless Edge absorbing the flame's essence.
Wei Min followed—her mirrored glaive deflecting falling fire like a spinning shield of moonlight.
They reached the far side.
And the gates of Kher Talas opened with a groan.
Kher Talas had no guards.
Its halls were empty, echoing with chants spoken centuries ago.
Soot covered the walls like dried blood. Firelight danced without flame.
At its heart, a throne of fused bones and gold awaited.
Upon it sat the Hollow King.
But not alone.
Behind him stood the final three of the Ashen Pact—the Night-Singer, the Bone Architect, and the Mask of Silent Flame.
The Hollow King rose.
"So the blade has returned. And the boy carries it as if he understands it."
Li Shen stepped forward.
"The blade understands itself. That is enough."
"Then let it speak," the Hollow King said.
He raised his hand.
The throne room collapsed into a spiral of screaming flame and unlight.
And the final battle began.