They called it a mercy—the kind that comes with rope, fire, and silence.
Lucien Caelum knelt on broken stone, wrists shackled, knees bleeding. The winds screamed over the execution scaffold atop the Sanctuary Spire, high above the capital city of Elarion. Around him, chanting priests wore masks of silver and ivory. Holy light cracked across the sky like judgment itself.
"By the decree of Her Radiance, Empress of Light," the High Inquisitor boomed, "you are sentenced to death for heresy, necromancy, and defilement of divine law."
Lucien's head bowed. Not in submission—but to hide the blood dripping from his smile.
They were right about one thing.
He had broken the law.
He just hadn't finished what he started.
The noose swung above him, gleaming white-hot with divine magic, thrumming with the power of the Pantheon. No escape. No plea. No miracle.
But no one noticed the cold creeping from beneath the stones.
Not yet.
Hours Earlier.
They came for him in the night.
Torchlight blazed through the ruined chapel where he had been hiding—what was left of the orphanage he once called home. Priests with glowing swords. Paladins in goldsteel armor. None of them spoke. Only the clicking of metal boots on marble, and the thunder of the divine in their wake.
Lucien didn't resist.
Not because he couldn't. But because he had finally found it.
In the crypt beneath the chapel, under a shattered statue of the God of Mercy, he'd unearthed a relic wrapped in iron chains and bones—the object of his dreams, nightmares, and the ancient texts he'd bled to decipher.
A crown. Forged of obsidian and charred gold. Its design wasn't ornamental—it was skeletal. A ring of twisted bone. Inlaid with runes written in the tongue of the dead.
It whispered as he touched it. Not in words, but in sensation—cold, endless, familiar.
Home.
They didn't let him keep it.
Dragged him to the spire. Locked it away in the reliquary vault, laughing as they did.
But it didn't matter. The moment he touched it, the bond had formed.
Something had stirred.
And now, as the noose was lowered, he felt it awaken again.
"Lucien Caelum," the Inquisitor intoned, "do you repent your sins before the Pantheon?"
Lucien raised his eyes.
Stormclouds churned above like boiling tar. The shattered moon bled red through the clouds.
His lips curled.
"No."
The winds died.
The priests hesitated.
Then the scaffold exploded.
A burst of black flame surged upward from beneath the stone platform, shattering it into burning fragments. Screams rang out as paladins were hurled back, armor melting mid-air. The noose turned to ash.
Lucien didn't fall.
He hovered—arms outstretched, the wind howling around him. Black energy coiled from his chest, where the spectral outline of the Crown of the Dead now hovered, reborn in smoke and starlight. The shackles shattered with a crack like thunder.
And something rose with him.
A figure—tall, feminine, wrapped in flowing embers and smoke. Her eyes opened: molten gold. Her hair, fire. Her armor, cracked obsidian edged in flame runes. A crown of black iron rested on her head.
The first queen had awakened.
"Ardana Vyre," Lucien breathed, recognizing her face from the forbidden texts. "The Flame Tyrant."
She looked down at him from midair like a goddess reborn.
"No," she said, her voice like a burning battlefield. "I was a tyrant in life. In death, I am free."
The priests tried to flee.
Ardana raised one hand.
The entire upper level of the spire ignited in a wall of dragonfire. Screams turned to ash in seconds. Paladins boiled inside their armor. The Inquisitor's mask melted into his skull.
Lucien floated down through the smoke and blood, landing amidst the ash-strewn ruin.
His bare feet touched scorched stone.
He was alive.
Untouched.
And the Crown pulsed on his brow, half-visible, bonded to his soul.
He turned toward Ardana, who stepped beside him, flames curling at her heels.
She looked at him with curiosity—and hunger.
"You're not what I expected," she said.
"Neither are you," Lucien replied.
The entire spire groaned. Holy bells fell silent.
The capital watched from below, frozen in terror.
Lucien smiled as he looked out over the city that had tried to erase him.
The gods had drawn first blood.
He would return the favor.
Later That Night.
Lucien sat atop the broken throne inside the half-collapsed crypt beneath the chapel. The crown was now fully visible, hovering just above his head, its skeletal design shifting in the torchlight.
Ardana stood across from him, leaning against a pillar that sizzled from her heat.
"You took a risk, summoning me first," she said, inspecting her gauntlets. "Flame doesn't follow easily."
"I didn't choose," Lucien admitted. "The Crown did."
She looked at him sideways. "It chose me because you need war."
"Do I?"
Ardana smiled slowly. "You want revenge. You want a kingdom. You want to kill gods. That's war. And that's me."
Lucien didn't answer.
Because she was right.
He looked at his hands—scarred, shaking, still warm from the Crown's energy. He wasn't a priest. He wasn't a warrior.
But he had power now.
And five more queens to find.
Meanwhile…
Far above, in the celestial citadel of Luminaris, the Seven Empress-Goddesses stood in a ring of starlight.
One throne now stood empty.
The Empress of Light raised her scepter.
"The Anathema has risen," she said coldly. "The Dead King breathes again."
The others remained silent.
Until the Empress of Fate opened one eye, her voice distant.
"No," she whispered. "He does not breathe. He burns."
🖋️ End of Chapter 1
📣 CTA (Call-to-Action):
Lucien has claimed his first queen—and drawn the blood of the divine.
But the Crown of the Dead is hungry, and the gods do not forgive.
⚔️ Which Empress do you want to see awakened next?
🖤 Add Crown of the Dead to your library, and let the soul war begin.
✅ Next Up: Chapter 2 – "Ashes and Oaths"