❖❖❖
They traveled for six days through the Blackpine Mountains.
Kaen barely spoke.
Mira rode on the old ox-cart behind them, her skin pale, her breath shallow. Every night, Kaen wrapped her in blankets and kept the fire low — not ordinary fire, but the crimson Soulfire he had somehow awakened. She never said a word. But sometimes, when she opened her eyes, he saw glimpses of her — the real Mira — fighting to stay human.
Master Daizo, walking ahead, remained a stone.
"What exactly are the Ashen Blades?" Kaen finally asked on the fourth night.
Daizo sat by the fire, sharpening his massive sword. "We are the wall between light and rot. Soul-wielders. Trained to destroy the Gloamspawn — and whatever spawns them."
"Why do they come?"
Daizo paused. "The world is broken. Fear, grief, hatred — they seep into the earth like poison. In some places, it pools. Festers. And when it's strong enough, it births the cursed."
Kaen looked at his hands. "Then why me? Why Soulfire?"
"You survived a curse touch without becoming one of them," Daizo said. "That means the fire chose you. But it's not a gift. It's a burden."
Kaen looked at Mira, asleep in the back of the cart.
"I'll carry it."
❖❖❖
On the seventh day, they arrived at Bladestone Hollow — an ancient fortress carved into the side of a mountain, hidden by mist and warded flames.
Statues of fallen warriors lined the path. Some were missing heads. Others bled ash from their eyes.
Inside the gates, Kaen saw dozens of warriors in gray, black, and crimson armor — some training with Soulforged weapons, others meditating beneath flame-trees whose leaves glowed like dying embers.
Each bore a scar, a story, and a fire in their eyes.
"These are the last of us," Daizo said. "You'll train with them. Bleed with them. Maybe die with them."
Kaen gripped the hilt of his broken katana. "Good. I plan on killing with them too."
❖❖❖
Mira was taken to the Silent Wing, a place where the cursed were either healed or... put to rest.
"I'll get her back," Kaen said, but the healers only gave him soft, sad eyes.
Daizo led him into the inner sanctum — a ring-shaped arena surrounded by flame-torches and Soulburned sigils. Waiting inside was a woman clad in silver-black robes, her eyes hidden behind a cloth wrap.
"This is Master Kira, head of training," Daizo said. "If you want to stand among us, you start here."
Kaen bowed.
Master Kira didn't bow back.
Instead, she unsheathed two curved Soulsteel blades and tossed Kaen a wooden practice sword.
"You want vengeance?" she said. "Then earn it."
What followed was not training.
It was war.
Kaen was beaten, broken, tossed, and humiliated over and over. Every time he fell, he stood again. Bloodied. Shaking. But never yielding.
By the third day, he managed to block one strike.
By the fifth, he struck back.
By the tenth, his Soulfire awakened again — and this time, it didn't just wrap his hands. It bled into the wooden sword, igniting it into a flame blade for a heartbeat.
He collapsed from exhaustion.
Master Kira looked down at him and said, "You're not weak. Just reckless. And reckless makes good kindling."
Kaen smiled through broken lips. "Then I'll burn bright."
❖❖❖
That night, Kaen dreamed of fire.
Of Mira — eyes glowing violet, mouth open in a silent scream, chains of ash binding her to a throne of bones. The sky burned purple. The ground bled black.
A voice whispered in the flame:
"You cannot save what is already lost."
He awoke in a cold sweat.
But when he rushed to the Silent Wing, Mira was gone.
❖❖❖
He found her near the Soulwell — a deep chasm of flickering light where Soulblades were forged.
She stood barefoot, her arms wrapped in bandages. But she looked… alive. Pale, yes. But her voice was hers.
"Kaen…"
He didn't speak. Just ran to her and pulled her into a hug.
"I thought I lost you," he said.
"I'm not whole," she whispered. "I hear them in my dreams… calling me."
Kaen looked at her eyes. The violet had dimmed, but not disappeared.
"I'll find the source," he swore. "And I'll end it."
From the shadows, Daizo watched — and frowned.
❖❖❖
Later that week, the call came.
A nearby village — Reedlight Crossing — had gone silent. No messengers returned.
Gloamspawn activity suspected.
Daizo led a team of five. Kaen was chosen to go.
As they prepared to leave, Master Kira handed Kaen a new blade — black hilt, glowing red steel, etched with the flame sigils of Soulburn.
"Your fire lives in this now," she said. "Name it."
Kaen stared at the sword. Then whispered:
"Emberfang."
They rode into the mist.
The hunt had begun.
And Kaen Ryo, the boy who lost everything, was no longer running.
He was becoming a blade.
✴️ END OF CHAPTER 2