The Seer's words still echoed in Marcel Jekz's mind as the temple doors shut behind them.
"Leave. Now."
He didn't have time to ask what she meant.
The sky above Ashvein bled.
What should have been morning was cloaked in twilight. A crackling darkness spread like ink, crawling from the horizon and consuming the once-proud city in a stifling haze. Fires burned along the skyline. Screams replaced birdsong. The ground quaked underfoot.
"Marcel!" Lira shouted, grabbing his arm and pulling him backward just as a massive stone crashed where he'd been standing.
Marcel stared wide-eyed. "What… what is this?"
A name rose in the chaos, spoken by terrified voices and panicked guards alike.
"Seravos."
The name itself felt heavy. A presence, suffocating and ancient.
The figure floated into view over the collapsing rooftops, garbed in charred robes that hissed like fire consuming parchment. His staff, gnarled and pulsing with dark light, tapped against the air and summoned tidal waves of undeath. Corpses tore free from cobblestones, moaning as they took up rusted weapons and turned on the living. Shadows formed into monstrous sentinels—twice the size of any man, with eyeless faces and blades for fingers.
"Is that…?" Tarin whispered.
Marcel's breath caught in his throat. His limbs felt leaden. Just standing in Seravos's presence made it hard to breathe, like the world itself was being crushed.
[System Alert: High-tier anomaly detected. User mental integrity at risk.]
The words shimmered before Marcel's eyes, invisible to the others.
[Corruption risk: 8%. Advise caution. Memory activation will increase strain.]
But he needed to understand. Just a glimpse. He focused on Seravos.
"Memory," he whispered, invoking the shard.
Time cracked.
For a moment, Marcel saw into the past—Seravos standing amidst another battlefield, Burnscar Gully, hundreds of bodies rising at his command. Opposing him was an old man in plain robes, calm and terrible. The memory surged, trying to flood Marcel's mind.
[Corruption: 12%...]
Marcel staggered.
"Marcel!" Lira caught him, blood trailing from his nose.
The whispers were louder now. Begging. Offering. You could stop this. Just let us in.
"No."
With sheer will, Marcel severed the link. The past slipped away, but knowledge remained. "His guardians—they don't obey sound. They follow heat and movement."
He turned, eyes sharp despite the pain. "We have to move. Stay low. Slow."
A warrior of Ashveil slammed into the wall beside them, blood spraying. His eyes met Marcel's. "He's—he's toying with us. This isn't conquest. It's punishment."
Marcel nodded grimly. He could feel it too.
Across the city, Ashveil's defenders fought valiantly. Magic and steel clashed against the undead, but they were falling, overrun. Fires consumed whole districts. A bell tower collapsed, sending debris through the air like shrapnel.
Lira chanted a ward to protect them from the falling embers. Tarin, teeth gritted, slashed at a crawler trying to bite through a child's leg, lifting the bleeding boy onto his back.
"Where's the rest of the Guard?" Lira yelled!!
"Gone!" one soldier shouted. "We were split in the first wave. This isn't a siege—it's a massacre!"
Marcel turned again toward Seravos.
The necromancer hovered high above it all, arms raised as if conducting an orchestra of despair. Guardians stalked the alleys. The dead surged forward. His staff pulsed again.
[System Alert: User emotional levels spiking. Recommend disengagement.]
[Corruption: 16%...]
"I need to see more," Marcel growled.
But he couldn't. Not now. His mind swam. Blood dripped from his ears.
"We need to survive first."
He grabbed Lira and Tarin, and together with a scattering of Ashveil's last defenders, they moved—broken, burning, but not yet gone.
Behind them, the city fell.
---
Chapter 34 – Embers of Ash, Whispers of Memory
Smoke coiled through the broken streets of Ashveil as Marcel and his team raced through the shattered outskirts, flanked by weary warriors. Behind them, the city still burned—crimson fire against a blackened sky, and screams lost in the wind.
A rankled breath escaped Tarin as he stumbled forward, bleeding at the shoulder. "We won't last like this…"
"We have to," Marcel said, his voice hoarse, but firm. He turned, eyes glowing faintly, his hand brushing the shard beneath his collar. It pulsed—alive, hungry. "Just a little further!"
Around them, figures moved—men and women from the Ashveil Defense Forces, survivors. Some bore silver emblems of A and B rank. Others limped with broken weapons and ash-covered faces. They'd held off Seravos's horde for as long as they could before retreating became the only option.
The Memory shard pulsed again.
> [Memory Activation – Warning: Target's Class B+]
Mental Strain: Moderate | Corruption Risk: 12%
Proceed?
"No," Marcel muttered under his breath, clutching his temple. "Not now."
He felt it—those whispers, eager to rise. Images not his, voices long dead. The shard wanted to speak. To show him something. But even in the chaos, he knew the danger. One wrong use, and it could overwrite who he was.
They broke into the forest edge beyond Ashveil. The trees, darkened by ash and shadow, offered concealment, but not rest.
Lira helped one of the younger C-rank scouts to her feet. "We have to keep moving. Seravos isn't finished."
Behind them, the skies cracked open with dark lightning—summoned guardians still swarming the air like vultures made of bone and hatred. Each beat of their wings churned a gust of dread.
Tarin paused, glancing back. "How can one man summon that… that nightmare?"
"He's more than a man," Marcel replied, eyes narrowing. "He's a calamity. And that staff of his—it's not just a conduit. It's a key."
They marched under a blood-orange moon, heading toward a fallback camp set up beyond the valley. Word had spread—Seravos had vanished again, as suddenly as he came, leaving behind only ruin.
---
Meanwhile, in the 9th Domain – City of Mireholt
The grand stone hall of Mireholt trembled as a blinding blue shimmer filled its center. A teleportation circle burned itself into existence, runes spinning wildly as cost-crystals shattered one after another.
With a final pulse, the circle released its passengers—Captain Velka and his war-worn contingent.
"Report!" Velka barked, eyes sweeping the crowd. His golden armor was scorched, and half of his cloak was gone.
A scout rushed forward. "Sir—Mireholt is barely holding. The local forces are stretched thin. But your arrival… it's rallied the people."
Velka nodded grimly. "Send word to the City Lord. I want defensive wards tripled and a sweep for voidbeasts across the southern perimeter. We've to stabilize the city quick.
Behind him, the A-rank warriors fanned out—familiar faces, all bearing wounds. Some knelt to the earth, kissing it in thanks. They Survived the horror known as Seravos at Burnscar Gully and the were grateful.
But there were no signs of The Hollowrider, Breakmaw, or the Bleakflame Wyvern. Not that the really cared but love keeping tabs to not be caught unaware.
They had vanished without a trace upon entering the 8th domain, Velka frowned.
Elder Vess turned to his second. "Still nothing?"
"No sir. No sightings. No flares. It's like they were… swallowed."
Elder Vess jaw tightened. "Then let's pray the boy got my letter. We can't afford to lose him now."