Time did not exist within the Soul Prison. No sun to mark the days, no moon to mourn the nights. Only the endless black—a void thick with the echoes of agony and the heavy, metallic scent of souls long broken. Yet, in that timeless abyss, something stirred.
Kael Draven stood beneath the shattered remnants of his soul's last restraints. The chains that had bound for what felt like years—decades, maybe...lay in molten ruins at his feet. His hands trembled, not from weakness, but from the unfamiliar sensation of freedom. Kael breathed without a leash on his essence.
A low hum vibrated through the chamber. The walls of the Soul Prison shimmered, alive with unseen eyes and ancient whispers.
Then it spoke again.
"You broke the chains."
Kael clenched his fists, staring up at the dark nothingness above. "Why are you helping me?"
The voice—no, the echo—rumbled with a tone both cold and solemn.
"Because you broke the chains. The prison only speaks to those who defy it. Most scream. But you....You roared."
A pause. Then a slow, deliberate declaration:
"Now... you are worth forging."
Kael's breath caught in his throat.
Forging?
The word struck something deep. A memory of a forge back in the capital, of molten metal, of swords baptized in fire. But this... this was different. He wasn't being reforged into a knight or a general. This was something raw. Elemental. Primordial.
"Who are you?"
The echo did not answer right away.
"I am the first. The forgotten. The one they locked away when the world was young."
"I was a Titan. Now, I am a voice. I am fire. I am the will this prison could not kill."
Kael swallowed hard. "You're... trapped here too?"
"My body is ash. My soul, scattered. But pieces of me remain. And now, you will carry one. You will become one."
The chamber shifted. The darkness peeled back, revealing corridors of twisting light and echoing voids. Fractals of Kael's own soul drifted through the air like broken glass, reflecting old memories—the betrayal in the throne room, Ashura's cry, the moment he collapsed.
"Come," the voice said. "Your training begins."
Kael stepped forward. The corridor narrowed, funnelling him into a space made of light and glass. Mirrors towered above him, endless and shifting. In each reflection, he saw himself—but twisted, fractured, different.
One Kael was screaming. Another knelt, bloodied and weeping. The third had burning eyes and smiled like a beast.
"These are your echoes," the Titan's voice whispered. "Versions of you that could have been. Parts you buried. Parts they tried to kill."
One reflection—the beast—stepped out of the mirror and lunged at him.
Kael met it head-on.
They clashed like titans, soul against soul, mirrored flame crashing in bursts of ethereal fire. The beast was ruthless, fighting like rage incarnate. But Kael—real Kael—fought with focus. Precision. Fury tempered by will.
He slammed the beast into the glass and roared. "You're not me!"
"I am every piece they broke!" it bellowed.
He paused. Then, slowly, he offered a hand.
"Then let's put them back together."
The beast grinned.
It became him.
He also went ahead and absorb the other two reflection.... It took time but he did it.
After the battle, Kael collapsed into a river that hadn't been there before. Water—or something like it—rose around him. Memories flooded him like a tidal wave.
Ashura's blood on stone.
His brother's betrayal.
His own screams as the Soul Prison swallowed him whole.
He couldn't breathe.
"Do not drown in your past," the echo commanded. "Wield it."
Kael screamed beneath the flood. The memories were anchors, dragging him down. But instead of pushing them away, he reached deeper. Pulled the pain into himself. Let it fuel him.
He rose from the depths, soaked in memory—but no longer crushed by it.
He didn't cry. He burned. And the river evaporated around him.
He was then taken to a place, A chamber of fire.
Pillars of soulflame towered around him, blue and gold and void-black.
The echo appeared—its first manifestation.
A figure made of smoke and starlight, crowned with fire. A Titan in form, though blurred, broken.
"One trial remains," it said. "Forge your soul. Choose your fire."
Three flames hovered before him:
The Blue Flame of Clarity: sharp, focused, but cold.
The Gold Flame of Wrath: burning, wild, consuming.
The Black Flame of Echoes: silent, heavy, eternal.
Kael reached out.
And chose all three.
The chamber cracked.
The flames surged into him, not as separate forces—but as one.
His soul flared. Light pulsed from his chest in waves. The Titan's echo watched, silent, as Kael became something new.
Something impossible.
"You are ready," it said. "But this prison is vast. Time flows differently here. You must master your fire—and yourself."
In fact kael himself doesn't think he has a body to go to even if he wanna leave.
Kael stood tall, body glowing with soulflame.
"How long?"
"Years. Maybe more. The world outside has already moved on."
Kael clenched his fists. "Let it. When I return... I'll burn it all down."
The echo chuckled. "I don't think you even have a body anymore"
"Well you can always build a new one , Now again—from the beginning. Break yourself. Rebuild. Repeat. Until you are a god among ashes."
And so the training began. Days, months, years—it didn't matter. Time bowed to purpose.
Kael fought reflections. He drowned and surfaced. He shattered and remade his soul.
And far away, beyond the prison's reach... The world whispered of his death.
But fire was coming.
And with it, Kael Draven.