A/N: Sorry for the delay, been through alot in the last couple days. Also had to plan out this arc a little bit more. I swear in one weak my world was flipped upside down, some crazy ass shit. Anyway heres the beginning of arc 2!
The wind shrieked past his ears like a thousand ghosts howling in unison. Smoke curled around the edges of the clouds, heavy and black, painting the horizon in shades of ruin. And in the center of it all, flying, barely, was a boy with wings made of fire and ash, blood streaking down his side, and the weight of a dead city on his back.
Riven Caelum didn't look back. Not because he wasn't curious. Not because he didn't care. But because he knew if he turned around, if he even caught one glimpse of what Wyrmsreach had become, he might never be able to fly again.
His muscles screamed with every beat of his wings. The Lunarian appendages, once hidden under cloaks and shame, now burned freely behind him. Molten feathers left a trail of gold and crimson through the sky. He flew low, just above the crashing waves of the sea, skimming the water like a dying star.
He was healed from the crypt, not all the way though, just enough to survive.
"You ever think," he muttered through cracked lips, "that maybe fate's got a boner for irony?"
The only answer was the wind, and it slapped him like it agreed.
Wyrmsreach was gone.
Not just ruined. Not broken. Gone. Flattened beneath the full might of a Buster Call, justice, they called it, handed down by men in white coats who wore honor like a mask and burned children alive with a smile. The same Marines who'd smiled when they dropped hellfire on an already dying city.
He coughed, the taste of smoke still thick in his throat. His lungs rattled. His ribs felt cracked. His cloak was torn to ribbons and barely clung to his frame, revealing sun-scorched skin streaked with soot. One of his wings was badly burned, the feathers half-melted.
And yet he kept flying.
Because stopping meant dying. And if he died now, everything, Slade's sacrifice, the crypt, the fruit, the kids, would have been for nothing.
He had no map.No destination. Just instinct and fury.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, a voice that sounded like Slade's grunted ass voice, "When everything burns, boy, fly toward the cold. Fire'll only eat you if you let it."
So he flew. Toward the darkening horizon. Toward the unknown. Away from the flames.
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The crash came suddenly.
One moment he was gliding. The next, his vision blurred, wings spasmed, and the sky turned sideways. His strength gave out all at once, body, mind, power, like someone had pulled the plug.
He fell.
The ocean hit like concrete. Cold. Brutal. And Weakening.
He skipped across the surface once, then sank like a stone.
Underwater, the world became muffled and slow. A distant thudding echoed in his ears, his heart, maybe. Or something else. Maybe the Devil Fruit was still trying to keep him alive. Or maybe he was just too stubborn to die like this. Not after everything.
His limbs flailed weakly, fire sputtering out from his fingers. A dim glow radiated from his chest, like a sun trying to break through heavy clouds. Bubbles escaped his mouth.
Not like this... not yet...I will not die to drowning, thats some weak shit.
He kicked. Fought. Rose.
The surface broke around him like glass. He gasped, sucking in air and salt and smoke. His wings flared once, propelling him toward the nearest spit of land, a jagged, tooth-like island no bigger than a village square.
He dragged himself ashore.
Wings hanging limply behind him, like a wet bird.
It wasn't elegant. It wasn't heroic. It was desperate.
Face first in the wet gravel, he coughed and spat and bled.
And then he laughed.
It was a dry, rasping sound. The kind of laugh you let out when the world was so thoroughly fucked that crying wasn't enough.
"Ten outta ten landing," he croaked. "God i'm good.
No one laughed with him.
Good.
He wasn't in the mood for company.
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Time passed. Maybe hours. Maybe longer.
The sun began to rise again, a weak, orange thing smeared behind clouds. He huddled beneath a patch of rock, wings folded, breath shallow. His mind reeled with images, flames, screaming, stone collapsing, Slade yelling at him to run.
And underneath it all, a new, burning heat pulsed through his veins.
The Solis Solis no Mi.
The Sun Sun Fruit.
He didn't even understand what this fruit meant yet. Not really. One moment he'd been in that crypt, standing before an ancient statue bathed in sunlight, a fruit in his hand. The next, there were wings of gold. Flame that didn't burn. Eyes glowing like miniature suns. And power, more power than he'd ever known, roaring through his body like wildfire. It made him think, what type of fruit does this?
But now it was quiet. Distant. Hard to reach.
He flexed his fingers.
A tiny flicker of golden flame danced at his palm, then faded.
"Great," he muttered. "Godlike power and I can't even light a campfire."
Still, he wasn't dead.
So... small victories huzzah!
Eventually, hunger and instinct forced him to move. He scavenged the rocky island, more like a glorified reef, for anything edible. Seaweed. Crabs. Bird eggs. It wasn't much, but he'd eaten worse in Wyrmsreach.
There was a time he'd once bitten a rat in half because he hadn't eaten in four days. Compared to that, raw crab was five star dining.
He made a fire. Barely. Not with his powers, those still sputtered and choked, but with rocks and frustration. As he sat by the flame, hands outstretched, warmth on his face, he found himself speaking.
To Slade. To the kids. To the dead.
"I don't know what I'm supposed to do now," he whispered.
The fire crackled in response.
"But I swear... I'm not done. Not yet."
He looked up at the sky.
The sun was breaking through the clouds now, pale and soft. Nothing like the fires that had consumed the city. Nothing like the glow he'd felt when that power had surged through him.
He clenched his fists.
"I'm gonna figure this out. Gonna get stronger. Smarter. Meaner. You hear me, old man? You better be watching, 'cause I'm gonna make them pay."
His lips twisted into a half smirk.
"Right after I stop smelling like dead fish."
Dark humor was all he had left.
Well... that, and fire.
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The sea was calm the second morning.
Too calm.
The kind of silence that made Riven's skin itch, like the world had paused to see whether he would make it or not. No birds. No wind. Just the whisper of tide on jagged stone, and the dull, distant ache of his own breathing.
He lay curled under a crooked ledge of rock, half buried in ash and dried blood. His cloak was long gone. His pants and boots were somehow still together, seems durable. The wound across his side stitched hastily with a piece of fishbone and twine, festered. Every breath was fire in his ribs.
And yet he was alive.
Somehow.
Against logic. Against fate.
Against the world.
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He moved only when he had to.
Dragging himself across the reef, picking limp crabs from tidepools and smashing them raw between his teeth. Drinking from puddles left by rain. Using his wings, heavy and cracked and burned, like limbs, like shields, like a cloak against the wind.
Once, he tried to fly.
A stupid idea.
His back screamed in protest the moment his wings stretched, muscles tearing anew. The effort sent him crashing into a jagged coral shelf, blood blooming in the water like black ink. He lay there a long time, staring up at the sky through the water's trembling surface.
"I'm not done," he said to nobody.
Salt in his mouth. Smoke in his lungs.
His voice didn't sound like his anymore.
On the third day, the wreck came.
It came with the tide, bits and bones of a shattered boat, drawn to the reef like driftwood to a flame. A ragged sail flapped uselessly in the water. Splintered beams jutted out like broken ribs. There was no sign of a crew. No signs of battle.
Just ruin.
He watched it for a while from his perch above the tide pools, a wary glint in his eye.
Might be bait.
Might be cursed.
Might be his only damn chance.
Riven clambered down, grit in his teeth, pain in every step. He made it to the wreck by dusk. The tide hissed and foamed at his ankles. He yanked a plank free and used it to pry open a half-buried crate wedged against the rocks.
Rotten biscuits. Dried squid. Soggy maps. A cracked barrel of rum that leaked like a wound.
He tossed them aside.
Then, under a tarp, something else.
A journal.
Leather bound. Singed at the corners. The emblem on the front was half burned, but he could still make out the mark, a lion devouring the sun.
He opened it with trembling hands.
The ink was smeared, but not unreadable.
"Saw fire on the horizon. Sky went red. We thought it was volcanic, but then the Captain said… no, it was worse. A Buster Call, maybe. Or something else."
"Didn't look natural. Didn't smell right, either. More like judgment."
"We turned starboard. Tried to outrun it. But the light... the light followed."
"Some of the crew went blind."
Riven read the page three times.
Then he flipped further.
"We passed the island three days ago. Nothing left but smoke and bone. Wyrmsreach is gone. Hell itself burned through it."
He felt his hands shaking.
He gritted his teeth and closed the book.
So that was how the world saw it.
Not a rebellion. Not a fight.
Not a cry for justice.
Just an unexplained firestorm.
Another footnote in the Grand Line's book of forgotten tragedies.
He laughed. Bitter and hollow. The sound didn't even echo.
"Cheers to that," he muttered, raising the leaking rum barrel. He let the warm liquor burn down his throat. For a moment, it masked the taste of bile and blood.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist and stood.
There was more to find. Maybe more to burn.
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That night, the flames returned.
It started in his chest.
A slow thrum. A heartbeat that didn't belong.
Then the warmth came, golden and slow, like the kiss of sunrise beneath his skin. His veins shimmered. His breath turned to steam. He stumbled back from the edge of the cliff as the glow intensified.
Then his hand caught fire.
Golden. Pure. Radiant.
Not orange. Not red.
Sunfire.
He screamed, not in pain, but in something close to awe. He couldn't extinguish it. Couldn't control it. The flame twisted and danced across his skin, coiling up his arm like it knew him, like it was remembering its rightful vessel.
Riven fell to his knees.
His wings flared instinctively, glowing at the tips.
And then, in the haze of heat and light, a figure appeared in his mind.
Not real.
Not fully.
But powerful.
Wreathed in fire, crowned in gold, eyes that split the heavens.
It looked like him.
Older. Sharper. Divine.
And smiling with something between pride… and warning.
The voice, if there was one, came from deep inside, echoing in the back of his brain.
"You are not ready. But you are chosen."
Then silence.
A hand appeared fingers stretched towards his face, as if trying to grab him.
He woke soaked in sweat.
Shaking. Shivering.
But the fire was gone.
His hands trembled as he looked at them, veins still glowing faintly in the darkness. The skin was unburned. No wounds. But he felt different.
He felt branded.
Marked.
As if something ancient had carved its name into his soul.
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The storm came on the fifth night.
Thunder split the sky. Lightning shattered the black. Rain poured in sheets that stung his skin. Riven stood atop the jagged rocks, cloakless, shirtless, arms spread.
Letting the storm try to drown him.
Daring it to do worse.
A ship.
Small. Swift. Dark hulled. No sails, no colors.
But moving fast.
Riven narrowed his eyes. His cutlass was still sheathed in the wreckage, wrapped in torn cloth to keep the salt from eating the steel. He limped toward it, gripping the hilt with both hands.
He had no idea who was on that ship.
Bounty hunters? Marines? Pirates looking for scraps?
Didn't matter.
He stood on the cliff edge and grabbed a piece of driftwood from the wreck, a torch. He doused it with rum, wrapped it in sailcloth, and touched it to the embers still smoldering in his palm.
WHOOMPH.
The torch roared to life, a golden flare that lit up the entire cliff.
A beacon.
Or a warning.
He didn't care which.
"Come on, assholes," he muttered, voice rough. "Let's see what the world thinks of a fallen god."
The torch hissed in the rain.
Behind him, his wings curled tighter, flame licking the edges again.