The Valley of Thorns was no taphor.
It sprawled before them like a scar carved across the world—black, cracked soil where no grass dared grow, and towering spires of petrified bone twisted into cruel, jagged arches. The air was dry, thin, laced with the copper tang of forgotten sacrifice.
Raen stepped over the corpse of a broken angel-statue, one of hundreds half-buried in the ash. Their faces were carved in agony, mouths eternally open as if still screaming.
Lyra gripped her cloak tighter. "These aren't sculptures."
"No," Raen said. "They're remnants. The first victims of the Dead Na sealed below."
Her skin prickled. "What kind of na could petrify an entire army in death?"
Raen said nothing.
Because he already knew.
---
As they descended the slope, the whispering began.
It wasn't a voice. It was thousands.
"Valor."
"Murderer."
"Unwritten."
"Raen Raen Raen—"
He stumbled. The mark on his chest throbbed like fire under his skin. The stolen Divine Nas within him surged, writhing.
The closer he drew to the monolith hidden in this realm, the more unstable the stolen fragnts beca—like they feared being devoured by sothing older, purer, and far more dangerous.
Lyra steadied him. "Talk to ."
"It's inside," Raen managed. "Beneath the thorns. Buried in a tomb wrapped in the threads of the Nomasphere itself."
---
The Power System Deepens: Threads of Na
As they neared the core of the valley, Raen taught Lyra what he had never told another soul.
"You know the hierarchy of Nas," he said. "But you don't know what binds them."
She frowned. "Magic?"
"No," Raen said. "Magic is a tool. A consequence. What binds the universe is Threading—invisible cords of truth spun from the Nomasphere. Every Na has a thread connecting it to the world. Cut it, and reality forgets it ever existed."
She paused. "You an soone could cut my Na and I'd... vanish?"
"Not just vanish," he said. "Be unwritten. Like you never were."
Her breath caught.
"That's what the gods fear. That's why they created faith. Temples. Worship. Every ti a mortal speaks their Na, it reinforces their Thread. Makes them harder to cut."
Lyra's voice was a whisper. "So killing a god... isn't just a fight."
Raen nodded. "It's an assassination. A taphysical erasure. That's why I need the Dead Na below."
---
They reached it at last.
The Tomb of Thorns.
A twisted pit surrounded by spiral thorns the size of towers, curling like ribcages over a black crater. In its center was a stone seal—circular, carved with a symbol that no human language could hold. It shifted the longer one stared at it, always becoming sothing new, sothing forgotten.
Raen knelt, placing his hand upon it.
And the world convulsed.
---
The Threads snapped into view—dozens, hundreds—radiating from the tomb in jagged golden strands. One passed directly through Raen's chest. Another pierced Lyra's shadow.
The sky above the valley darkened unnaturally, clouds spiraling in reverse.
From the seal ca a voice.
Not loud.
But absolute.
"WHO SPEAKS THE NALESS WORD?"
Raen didn't hesitate.
"I am Raen Valor," he said, standing tall. "Bearer of the Demon God's Mark. Devourer of Five Divine Nas. I speak not for worship—only war."
A pause.
Then—
"THEN BLEED, NA-EATER."
---
The seal exploded upward in a vortex of black fla and shadowlight, casting Raen and Lyra back. From within the pit erged a figure.
It was humanoid.
But not human.
Its body was wrapped in bindings of scripture—threads of written language that crawled and twisted like worms. Where its face should have been was only a blank mirror, reflecting Raen's own expression—terrified, resolute, broken.
Lyra whispered, "What is that?"
Raen answered with a voice that wasn't fully his.
"The Bound Na. One of the Seven that even the gods feared."
---
The battle began in silence.
No scream.
No roar.
Only the shiver of Nas snapping across the battlefield as the Bound Na lashed out, scripture-threads lashing through the air like blades. Raen moved fast, faster than a mortal should—his blade drawn, wrapped in shadows and stolen divinity.
He cut through three of the threads—
And scread.
Not in pain.
In recognition.
Because the thread he cut wasn't just divine. It was his own Na. His own childhood. His first love. His guilt.
Each strike cost him mory.
Each defense was a battle against forgetting why he fought at all.
---
Lyra chanted.
Blood spiraled from her arms into a circle of fire and binding—a new spell, one she'd learned not from the book, but from Raen's example.
She threaded herself into his fight.
Not as a mage.
As a tether.
Each ti Raen faltered, her magic anchored him. Each ti he bled, she scread his Na, forcing it to stay real.
"RAEN VALOR!"
"RAEN VALOR!!"
But the Bound Na shifted.
Its mirror face turned to her.
And whispered.
"Lyra's Na is weak."
Her heart seized.
Then, her shadow twitched.
And sothing else stepped free from it.
---
To be continued...
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