Kael Ryse awoke to stillness.
No wind. No birds. Just the faint hum of the cave walls around him, vibrating like something unseen had recently passed through.
His fingers curled against cold stone as he sat up, head pounding. For a few seconds, he didn't move—just breathed, letting the silence seep into his bones.
Then came the memory. Not of a crash or impact, but of horns—deep, echoing, ancient. A voice followed. No… several voices. Mocking, excited, otherworldly.
He looked down at his arm. The skin burned faintly, marked by a silver-blue symbol that pulsed with a heartbeat not entirely his own.
"Say status," one of the voices had said.
Kael swallowed.
"Status."
A translucent screen appeared, curved like digital glass.
Name: Kael Ryse
Age: 24
Core Level: Awakened
Class: None
Titles: [Legacy]
Attributes: Strength [12] | Agility [14] | Endurance [15] | Intelligence [10] | Perception [13]
Status: Stable
Talents: [Survivor's Instinct], [Terrain Navigation], [High Altitude Conditioning]
He stared, blinking.
He wasn't dreaming. He wasn't dead.
He stepped out of the cave.
The world had changed.
Forests now grew in valleys that were once barren. Lakes shimmered in craters he didn't remember existing. His plane—a lightweight solo glider—was smashed across jagged stone thirty meters below, its wings bent like broken arms.
Kael didn't linger on it. He was already scanning the environment.
"Map," he said quietly.
The interface shifted.
A semi-transparent overlay of terrain bloomed before him. Mountains. Hills. Valleys. Rivers. All interconnected now—a single, massive landmass. Dozens of colored dots blinked across the projection.
Then he saw it—beneath [Titles], a new one had appeared.
[Legacy]
You are a 3rd-generation descendant of the Tower.
Trials are three times harder.
Rewards are three times greater.
Legacy Traits:
– ???
– ???
– ???
– Inheritor of Daelos
• Wind Affinity: +5%
• Movement Speed: +10%
Kael stared at the screen.
And the silence stretched.
He lowered the map overlay, eyes scanning the horizon.
Tian Shan range. Kyrgyzstan. Southern slope. Near the border...
The landmarks weren't exact anymore, but his memory pieced together the geography. He'd flown through here before. Trekked through it more than once. The terrain had changed, but the bones of the land remained.
Kara-Doruk. Black Summit. Should be southeast.
A village nestled between ridgelines. Kael had stayed there once. Traded for water and dry bread. It might still be standing. And if it was…
That's the first move. Shelter, supply, people.
He brought the map back up, tracing a faint projected path.
There—a blue dot halfway between here and Kara-Doruk.
[Trial: Wind Path Run]
Reward: Agility +2
Legacy Bonus: +6
Type: Movement
Status: Unclaimed
"Could be worth the detour," he muttered.
He locked the path.
And he ran.
Scene 3: Wind Path RunThe path wound downward, leading into a narrow gorge where the air changed. It became thinner, drier—charged. The kind of atmosphere he only felt at the top of peaks before a storm.
A curved stone arch jutted from the canyon wall, half-covered in moss. It wasn't man-made, but it wasn't entirely natural either.
He stepped beneath it.
[Trial Initiated: Wind Path Run]
Dash through all wind gates before time runs out.
Difficulty: Easy
Reward: Agility +2
Legacy Modifier: +6
Bonus Tip: Trust the wind.
The trial zone bloomed ahead—a narrow ravine filled with floating gates made of compressed wind. They shimmered like glass and hummed like tension cables strung in the sky.
The countdown began.
3:00
Kael exploded forward.
The first few gates were effortless. A sprint. A dodge. Leap. Slide. The wind pushed at his back, speeding him up, guiding his limbs like a dance partner.
By the halfway point, the terrain grew treacherous—uneven boulders, gusts from the side. One gate hovered over a narrow ridgeline with a twenty-meter drop.
He didn't hesitate.
1:00
The final stretch loomed. The incline was steep, wind howling against him now. His lungs burned. His legs screamed.
He ran anyway.
He dove through the final gate just as the timer hit red.
Trial Complete
Agility +2
Legacy Bonus: +6
Skill Unlocked: [Balance Step]
Passive footing correction on uneven or unstable terrain
Kael coughed, steadying himself.
Wind tugged at his jacket, almost playfully.
The path to Kara-Doruk waited ahead.
He kept walking.
Kara-Doruk stood as it always had—weathered, quiet, hidden by shadow.
But it felt different now. Like the land around it held its breath.
Kael passed the outer homes cautiously. One was burned. Another sat empty, its roof caved in. But smoke still rose from the center of the village.
He heard a voice.
"Stop there. Hands up."
Kael turned. A man—rugged, tired—held a farming scythe like a blade. Behind him, a girl clutched the frame of a doorway.
Kael raised his hands.
"I'm not a threat."
His words came out clean. Local. Too local.
The man squinted. "You speak like us."
Kael blinked.
System's doing, he thought. Auto-translation.
"Name's Kael. Crashed nearby."
The man slowly lowered his scythe.
"Rahim. You're the first outsider we've seen since it all fell apart."
Kael followed him to the village square. Only a dozen people remained. Tired. Thin. Alive.
They shared food with him. Dry meat. Rice. Goat milk.
When he finished eating, Rahim brought up the red light.
"A few of our men went north. Toward the glowing place. Haven't come back."
Kael opened his map.
[Red Site: The Watcher's Cairn]
He nodded once.
"I'll go check."
Kael left Kara-Doruk before the sun dipped too low.
The trail north was familiar—half-mountain, half-memory. The path wrapped around old ridgelines and collapsed terraces, the kind that held history beneath them.
He moved fast, checking the map as he walked.
Red sites. Blue sites. Black. Gold.
Dots spread like constellations across the newly forged world.
Some part of him knew even then—this wasn't just about survival. Not anymore.
Kael climbed the northern ridge slowly, boots grinding against loose stone. The wind had picked up again, whistling low like a flute carved from bone. He crested the final rise and froze.
Two men lay sprawled at the base of a hill—still breathing, but pale and unmoving. Their bodies were rigid, eyes open but unfocused, like sleepwalkers caught mid-dream.
The cairn stood above them.
A ring of black stones encircled a domed mound. Old carvings covered its outer layer—spirals, wolves, sun symbols, antlers, stars. Kael recognized the style: Turkic funerary glyphs, preserved through oral history and tribal memory.
"This place wasn't meant to be disturbed," he muttered.
Then the air cracked.
A pulse of cold swept out from the cairn's center, and a figure emerged—withered yet solid, cloaked in antlered robes, his face hidden by ceremonial bone paint.
The shaman raised his hand.
"You have not stepped into the circle yet," he said, his voice deep and distant. "Good. That means I can still speak."
Kael didn't move.
"They entered willingly," the shaman continued, gesturing to the two fallen villagers. "I offered them the Trial of the Wolf. To enter the underworld, reclaim their spirit, and return. But their light has dimmed. They are trapped."
Kael's breath caught in his throat.
"What kind of trial is this?"
"A real one," the shaman said. "My guardian—an old white wolf, eldest of the peaks—was stolen from me by spirits of the lower realm. He guards the threshold now. But the seal grows weak. If the wolf falls, the gate opens. And that cannot happen."
As he spoke, Kael's map blinked.
[Trial: The Watcher's Cairn] – Red Site Trial Activated
Type: Survival
Objective: Recover the two villagers' spirits and escape with the Wolf Guardian
Time Limit: Unknown
Failure: Permanent spiritual entrapment of all three targets
Reward: +5 to Willpower | Ability Unlocked: [Spirit Walk]
Hidden Quest Unlocked: Seal the Gate to the Underworld
Reward: Additional +10 Willpower, Talent: [Spirit Sense], Item: [Kam's Bracelet]
The air grew heavier. The world shimmered. A black doorway cracked open in the center of the cairn like a fissure between worlds. Kael didn't hesitate.
He stepped inside.