The fire was still.
But not silent.
Inside Auren's chest, it swirled—not wild like before, but steady… focused.A quiet beacon from something older than the stars.
That night, while Lyra slept nearby, Auren dreamt.Or perhaps, remembered.
He stood not as a boy, nor as a soldier…But as a Knight of Kharon.
Clad in the same radiant armor, gleaming with white-silver etched in divine red, though now heavier.Worn.
Not rusted, not broken—burdened.
Before him stood the First Temple of Ashreth.
It was not made of stone.
It was made of skylight — floating obelisks tethered by prayer and song, bound together by divine will.And in that temple, the gods did not sit.They stood in silence.
All of them.
Watching him.
"You dare," one of them said.A woman's voice, like wind through dying leaves.Eyes glowing gold. Veins made of constellations.
"You wear our flame. But it listens only to you.""Because I earned it," he replied.
He did not kneel. He did not bow.
The silence grew heavier.
A boy no longer.
A weapon.
"We did not grant it to be used against our will," another god hissed.His mouth was smoke.His eyes, twin eclipses.
"Then you should not have made it need me," the knight said.
Suddenly—he saw it.
Not the dream.Not the temple.
But the war.
Cities made of crystal, shattered.Dragons the size of mountains bleeding stars as they fell.Elven lords corrupted by dark ink that bled from the earth itself.And in the center—a throne made of chained gods.
He heard himself scream.
He heard his own name, not as "Auren", but the name the world once cried out in hope.
"Valekai Draganoth, Flame of Kharon!"
He saw himself lead the final charge.A sword not gold, but pure white flame.A cloak not red, but black and torn by the void.Behind him, marched those who called themselves the last—The Karmic Vanguard.Dwarves bearing relics older than time.Elves who had bound their souls to stars.Dragons who had forsaken their names for vengeance.
And they fought.And they died.And he stood alone atop the mountain when it was done.
Not in victory.
In judgment.
The dream shattered.
Auren woke screaming, hand glowing with flame, burning a symbol into the earth beneath him—
A glyph shaped like a broken crown pierced by a sword.
Lyra rushed to him, but stopped when she saw his eyes—wide, wild, and glowing.
"He's not sleeping anymore," Auren whispered."He's watching."
He did not say who he was.
But he knew.
A name not uttered in a thousand ages.A name that turned divine blood to ice.
Vaerzhul.
"When gods fear what they once forged, it is not the forge that failed… but the gods themselves." — Chronicles of the Final Flame, Fragment I