The battlefield was painted in shadow and dust.
Smoke curled from the shattered torches, the air thick with the tallic scent of blood and burnt soil.
Master Vince stood in the middle of the ruins, his fists still faintly steaming each breath forming a small cyclone that twisted the ashes beneath his feet.
The last of the Voidborn collapsed, its corrupted form dissolving into black mist that the wind carried away.
He turned his head, scanning the trembling villagers behind the barricades.
"Are you all okay?"
No one spoke for a mont until the youngest of the guards, his hands shaking around a cracked spear, whispered,
"Y-yes… you saved us"
The Taishin master nodded once, wiping the sweat from his brow. His knuckles were split open, veins throbbing beneath hardened skin.
But his eyes calm, sharp betrayed no pain.
He took a breath.
And then he felt it.
A vibration beneath the earth.
Not from footsteps from sothing alive.
Vince's expression shifted, a faint frown cutting across his face.
The villagers noticed, and silence fell again.
"Everyone," he said quietly, "step back. Now."
The ground cracked open.
A deep, wet pulse echoed through the dojo grounds. From the torn soil, a faint red light began to seep upward glowing veins spreading like roots beneath the earth.
The villagers gasped.
"The… the Shard!"
A crystalline fragnt rose slowly from the crater beating like a heart.
Each pulse carried a strange vibration that rippled through the bones, the kind that made one's soul shiver.
Vince's jaw tightened.
"So this is what they were guarding…"
anwhile The night in Veyl Academy was calm, too calm.
The wind outside Khael's dorm carried the faint whisper of bells from the courtyard shrine, and the silver lanterns along the walls flickered against the soft hum of the Vein barrier surrounding the academy.
Khael sat by his desk, a single candle burning beside scattered parchnt sheets.
His handwriting was sharp, deliberate notes, diagrams, and strange battle scenarios sketched in detail.
At the top of the page, in neat ink, read:
"Eclipse Simulation: Kaen's Resonance Arc."
He leaned back, stretching his hand with a quiet sigh.
The faint shimr of dragon-scale pattern along his wrist caught the light.
"…The next art… should fall on Seravelle, Day 12."
His voice barely broke the silence.
The candle flickered, as though the room itself was listening.
He turned his gaze to the wall calendar pinned beside his bed handmade, with small marks on each date.
Months of the Year
Ignisoul – Fla Affinity
Seravelle – Wave Affinity
Thundros – Storm Affinity
Gaelmir – Stone Affinity
Florene – Bloom Affinity
Lunira – Mixed Affinity
Umbraen – Shade (Forbidden) Affinity
Verdyn – Bloom Affinity (Peak)
Varkrul – Storm / Fla Hybrid Affinity
Noctvale – Voidrot Affinity
🗓️ Days of the Week
Dawnsoul · Veinday · Handrest · Echoeve · Drifthollow · Shadowend
Khael's finger traced across the numbers until he found the current date.
Ignisoul, 20th Day.
He exhaled slowly.
(We're still far from Seravelle… but ti feels like it's moving faster.)
Outside, the moonlight painted a silver arc across his floor. He could hear the faint laughter from Kaen and Kenji sowhere down the hall probably arguing about who broke the training dummy again.
For a brief mont, it felt… normal.
But inside his chest, the faint thrum of the Dragon Vein pulsed quiet, steady, but never still.
It was as if sothing deep within him was waiting.
He picked up his quill again, writing one more line on the parchnt:
"If the next resonance appears on Seravelle 12… then it's not random. The Shinrei tides are shifting."
Khael paused.
His hand trembled slightly.
A flash of Isen's voice echoed in his head:
"Rember, Khael,balance is not peace. Sotis, it's the silence before the storm."
He leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes, letting the candlelight dance across his thoughts.
(I hope nothing happens… but with how quiet it's been… maybe that's what scares the most.)
The sound of the clock ticked one, two, three.
The night deepened.
Outside, sowhere beyond the mountains, a faint rumble answered his unspoken thought like distant thunder rolling across the horizon.
anwhile The chamber pulsed with low, rhythmic light each beat echoing like a living heart.
Crimson shards floated in the air, suspended in black mist that shimred with fractured reflections of faces long gone.
The scent of scorched incense filled the voided room.
Lucere stood before the altar, his pink wolf-cut hair catching the faint glow of the shards.
His sharp grin twisted as he stared into the reflection of his many selves within the crystal mirror.
Around him, figures of the Hollow Nine erged one by one, silhouettes carved from shadow and will.
Among them stepped a man with orange hair, wild and alive like flickering fla.
His eyes were razor-sharp, his expression unreadable.
This was K, the Tactician of the Hollow Nine, the mind behind countless silent massacres.
Lucere turned slightly, voice smooth but cold.
"K. What of the village? I trust you've already… prepared sothing fitting."
K adjusted the collar of his long coat, a faint smirk tugging at his lips.
"I already sent the right guy."
Lucere raised a brow, his grin widening.
"I saw that Vince — the Master of Taishin — is there. The Wandering Fist himself."
He leaned closer, his tone dipping into amusent.
"What's the probability that person will win against him?"
For a heartbeat, the chamber was silent.
Then K's smirk sharpened into confidence, the flicker of orange light reflecting in his eyes like fire.
"One hundred percent."
Lucere chuckled softly a low, dangerous sound that echoed across the chamber.
"Oh? You sound awfully sure."
K looked up, his gaze steady.
"I don't make moves unless they end the ga."
Lucere turned away, looking into the mirror once more.
The shards pulsed faster, the faint image of the Shard of Flesh appearing in the reflection.
His voice lowered into a whisper, dripping with sothing between awe and nace.
"Then let's see, K… whether your 'perfect move' can kill a legend."
The light dimd, and in the next instant, the mirror cracked.
A surge of dark energy rippled outward, scattering motes of red light that danced like embers through the void.
Far away, in the distant village Vince guarded, a faint tremor stirred beneath the soil, the prelude of sothing vile taking shape.
To be continue
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