The highlands stretched before Ashren like a wound upon the world—scarred hills, jagged ridges, and valleys where even the grass refused to grow. Here, the air was thin, brittle, and choked with the memory of forgotten wars. Ancient siege engines lay rotting beneath the cliffs, their wooden frames turned to bone-white husks. Ashren moved through them like a phantom, barely disturbing the dust. His destination: Varneth.
He had heard the name first from the cultists in the ruins of the sun god's monastery. Their blood-inked lips whispered it like a curse and a prayer. Varneth: the summoner, the binder, the traitor priest who had bartered with something older than the Abyss for power. The one who had sent the demon fragment into the Ritual of Binding. The one responsible for his curse.
Now, Ashren sought him.
But Varneth was not a man easily found.
The city of Kaelmark clung to the cliffs like a tumor. Iron walls. Spiked towers. Smoke belching from chimneys day and night. A city built on industry and secrets. Ashren arrived at dusk, hood drawn, eyes scanning.
[System Notification: Mental Resistance Check Passed - Illusion Ward Neutralized. Hidden Gate Revealed.]
He found the hidden gate in the cliff face north of the main road—a thin crack behind a waterfall. The water burned faintly where it touched his skin. Warded. But not against him. The System's corruption pulsed faintly beneath his ribs, counteracting the barrier. He stepped through.
A tunnel. Black stone and silence.
At the end, a single chamber, candlelit. Three figures knelt in a triangle. One turned. Eyes black. Mouth stitched shut.
"Ashren Vale," the figure rasped in a voice not his own.
Ashren did not speak.
"Varneth welcomes you. But not yet. Trials await. Memories must bleed."
[System Alert: Challenge Initiated - Path of the Hollow Flame.]
The world shifted.
Ashren found himself in the past. Not his own. A battlefield. Thousands of corpses. A shattered sky above. Demons screamed across the heavens.
He was inside another's body—taller, armored in obsidian and blood. A general. A vessel. The first to be bound.
The System pulsed.
[Objective: Survive the Collapse. Retain Fragment.]
Ashren fought. Hours blurred into slaughter. Fire fell like rain. His blade screamed in his hand. And in the final moment—a flash of light. Betrayal. Varneth. The first summoner. Laughing as the vessel burned.
Ashren screamed with another man's voice as the world ended.
Then he woke.
The tunnel was gone. The chamber gone. He stood in a temple—new, unburned. People walked the halls. Priests in silver robes. All unaware.
A vision again? No. The System pulsed erratically.
[Time Displacement Detected. Temporal Shell Active. Duration Unknown.]
He was in the past.
Varneth was here.
Ashren moved through the temple with the silent grace of death. He listened. Watched. Waited. And when the sun set, he followed the high priest.
Varneth.
Not yet twisted. Not yet corrupted. A man. A visionary. He preached salvation through sacrifice. Unity through blood.
Ashren followed him into the sanctum.
"I know you," Varneth said without turning.
Ashren tensed.
"Not your name. But your presence. A vessel of pain."
Ashren stepped forward. "You made me."
"No. You made yourself. I only opened the door."
Ashren raised his hand. The air screamed with power. But the System locked him.
[Temporal Integrity Warning: Killing Varneth Here Will Collapse Anchor. Consequences Unknown.]
Ashren growled. "Then give me a name. A path."
Varneth turned. His eyes were still human. Sad, even. "North of the Veilgrove. Beneath the ruins of Ormath. You'll find what you seek. But beware the Waking Flame. It does not dream kindly of you."
The world burned again.
He awoke in Kaelmark. No tunnel. No candlelight. Just blood on his hands and voices in his head.
[New Location Unlocked: Ormath, Temple of Embers.]
[System Integration: Abyssal Core Sync 9%]
He moved quickly. North. Through ruined roads. Across broken bridges. Avoiding cities now—they knew him. Word spread. Demonbreaker. Cursed One. Varneth's Bane.
Along the way, he met others.
A boy with no tongue who saw truths in dreams. A knight exiled for loving a monster. A priestess who bled black and wept for the dead.
Each joined him. Not as friends. Not yet. But as orbiting souls, drawn to his gravity.
And then, Ormath.
The ruins were alive. Not with people. With flame.
A city once swallowed by the earth, now exhumed by hunger. Fire that did not consume. That only watched.
Ashren entered alone.
The System pulsed.
[Final Trial Initiated: Waking Flame.]
A voice filled the air.
"You carry stolen power. You are not meant to survive."
Ashren replied, "That's why I did."
The flame took shape—a titan of molten skin and eyes like supernovae. Ashren fought. Not with brute force. But with memory. He unleashed stored pain. Each strike fueled by years of screams. Each step laced with sacrifice.
He burned.
But he endured.
[System Alert: Abyssal Core Stabilized - 15% Integrity. New Skill Unlocked: Soulflame Surge.]
The titan fell.
And in its place, a door.
Behind it: a throne. Empty.
And a message.
"Varneth awaits in the city where gods fell. The Ashen Crucible. Bring your hate. You'll need it."
Ashren turned.
His companions waited in the shadows.
"What now?" the knight asked.
Ashren looked east, where black lightning split the horizon.
"Now," he said, "we end this world or save it. One chain at a time."