The Hollow Spire loomed ahead like a broken god's finger, rising jagged and impossibly black against the stormlit sky. Lightning clawed across the clouds above it, but no thunder followed. Only silence — ancient and absolute.
Kael stepped toward it, the ground cracking faintly beneath each footfall.
Darric spat to the side. "This place reeks of death."
"It's older than death," Lyra said, voice hushed. "Older than the kingdoms. Maybe even older than the Veil."
Kael said nothing. But the Mark on his chest pulsed.
With every step closer, he could feel it — a hum beneath the earth, like a distant scream trapped in stone.
It knows me.
They reached the gate — or what remained of it. Once a bastion of sovereign power, the entry arch now hung broken, half-swallowed by black vines and sigil-carved stone. Above it, the remnants of an ancient emblem — a crimson sun split by a jagged line.
Kael's eyes narrowed.
He touched the symbol. The stone sizzled under his fingers.
"Go back," a voice whispered — not in the wind, but inside his skull.
He turned sharply. No one else had heard it.
It knows me… because it remembers what I was.
Inside the Hollow Spire, the corridors stretched downward in maddening spirals. Walls of obsidian flickered faintly with glyphs only visible in Kael's presence. At times, the tunnels narrowed as if trying to trap them. Other times, they opened into vast halls filled with statues — Sovereigns in poses of agony.
One chamber pulsed with faded red light. At its center stood an altar.
Kael approached it slowly. As he neared, a vision struck him — unbidden and violent.
Flashback – Unknown Memory
He stood alone in the Hollow Spire, much younger, maybe no older than thirteen. Blood covered his hands. The altar burned with searing light, and around him… bodies.
Children. His age. Their Marks had failed them.
And at the end of the chamber stood a woman with silver eyes, cloaked in red smoke.
"You survived," she whispered. "But survival has a price."
Young Kael screamed.
He snapped back, falling to one knee.
Lyra rushed forward. "Kael!"
He looked up, breathing raggedly.
"I've… I've been here before."
Darric frowned. "How? No one's stepped into this place in a hundred years."
Kael rose slowly, pain fading.
"I don't think I was ever meant to leave."
Suddenly, the room darkened.
The altar pulsed once — then exploded in shadow.
A massive figure stepped through the veil of smoke — armor forged from screaming souls, a weapon like a war-scythe etched with Sovereign glyphs. Its helm bore no eyes, only a bleeding mark that mirrored Kael's own.
A Black Host Champion — one of Malrik's inner guard.
"You should never have awakened the Hollow Spire, Crimson-blood."
Kael stepped forward, fire flickering along his blade. His eyes burned.
"You speak of awakening?"
Ashrend ignited.
"Then let me finish it."
Battle Engaged.
Darric moved left, trying to flank, while Lyra fired off a blessed arrow that ricocheted against the Champion's aura. It barely slowed.
Kael took the front.
The Champion charged — faster than its size should allow. Its scythe swept horizontally, shrieking with spectral wind.
Kael blocked — barely. The force hurled him back, smashing him through a stone pillar.
Blood smeared the ground.
But Kael stood.
"Crimson Brand: Infernal Bloom!"
The air around him combusted. Fire surged from the Mark on his chest, wreathing his body in crimson petals of flame. He dashed forward, faster now, sharper.
They clashed again — blow for blow. The scythe cut shallow wounds across Kael's side, but Ashrend responded, glowing brighter with every strike.
"Blazing Edge — Severing Spiral!"
Kael spun, unleashing a wide arc of slicing fire. The Champion stumbled, its armor cracking.
"You carry a power that does not belong to you!" it roared.
Kael's voice was calm. Cold.
"It was never yours to begin with."
With one final lunge, Kael drove Ashrend through the Champion's heart, then twisted. The creature screamed — not just in pain, but recognition — before it collapsed into withering ash.
Silence returned.
As the embers faded, a deeper sound echoed through the chamber.
Applause.
From the shadows beyond the altar, a figure stepped forward — robed in gray, face hidden beneath a porcelain mask etched with a jagged sun.
Kael turned.
"Who are you?"
The figure bowed.
"Someone who's known your name long before you did, Sovereign. We've been waiting for you."
The chamber trembled slightly. Lyra and Darric froze.
Kael narrowed his eyes.
The figure raised a hand — and from it, released a small, ancient token: a ring carved with the Crimson Sigil.
"You were born for more than this war. You were made to finish it."