Zeke hit the ground hard. The impact tore the breath from his lungs and sent him rolling through ash and rubble. The world slammed back into focus—sound, heat, the stink of smoke and blood. He coughed and pushed himself upright, blinking through the haze. The air was thick with soot. The sky burned a dull red above, like an ember that refused to die.
He looked around. The landscape was unrecognizable. The once-green valley was now a wasteland of cracked earth and molten scars. The altar was gone, reduced to a crater glowing faintly with dying magic. Stone fragments jutted from the dirt like the bones of a dead god.
Zeke staggered to his feet, hand instinctively going to the revolver at his hip. The gun was scorched, the barrel warped from heat, but it still sat there—faithful, waiting. His other hand pressed against his chest. The mark was still there, still warm beneath his shirt, pulsing softly like a second heartbeat.
"Hell," he muttered, squinting into the wind. "Guess I'm back."
Movement caught his eye. Shapes through the dust—human shapes. He raised the gun halfway before lowering it again.
Seraphine.
She limped toward him, armor dented and blackened, a long cut running from her temple to her jaw. Her eyes were sharp, alive, and filled with disbelief as they met his.
"Zeke," she said, voice ragged. "By the gods—you're alive."
He gave a rough grin. "Wouldn't be the first time someone's been wrong about that."
Behind her came what was left of the company. No more than a dozen men and women, all hollow-eyed and broken, their armor in pieces. Some leaned on spears as crutches, others carried their wounded across the field of ash.
Seraphine stopped before him, scanning his face as if to make sure he was real. "We thought you were gone. The explosion—"
"Yeah," he cut in. "Wasn't exactly gentle. Don't ask me how, but I woke up in… somewhere else."
Her gaze narrowed. "Somewhere else?"
Zeke hesitated. He looked up at the sky—the same red light flickering through cracks in the clouds. "Let's just say it wasn't Heaven."
She studied him for a long moment, then nodded once. "Then we both survived places we shouldn't have."
They stood in silence. The wind carried the smell of burned earth and blood. Somewhere in the distance, metal clattered as a survivor scavenged weapons from the dead.
Finally Zeke broke it. "How bad?"
Seraphine's jaw tightened. "The worst. The valley's dead. Most of the villages too. We stopped the dragon from breaking through, but the cult…" She trailed off, turning toward the far ridges.
Zeke followed her gaze. At first, he thought it was smoke drifting across the hills. Then he realized it was movement. Thousands of small dark shapes moving like a tide.
Cultists.
They filled the horizon—armies upon armies gathering again beneath banners of black and crimson. Even from here, Zeke could hear their chanting, low and rhythmic, carrying on the wind like a funeral drum.
He spat dust. "Guess we didn't finish the job after all."
Seraphine's eyes were hard. "The altar was just one of many. The dragon's followers were never going to stop. We broke the head, but the body still writhes."
Zeke holstered his revolver and looked down at his hand. It trembled slightly. He flexed it until the shake stopped. "Then we cut it off again."
A faint smile touched her lips—tired, but real. "Still talking like you've got all the bullets in the world."
He glanced at his empty belt. "Bullets or not, I can still shoot straight."
They began walking toward what remained of the ridge. Every step crunched over bone and glass. The wind moaned through the ruins, stirring torn banners that clung to shattered spears.
At the edge of the crater, they stopped. The center still burned faintly, lines of red light pulsing in the ash. Zeke could feel it through his boots—the faint hum of something alive under the earth.
Seraphine crouched beside the rim, brushing ash from a fragment of stone. It bore a familiar pattern: runes shaped like those that had burned on the dragon's chains. "The portal's residue," she murmured. "It's still bleeding energy."
Zeke frowned. "You mean it could open again."
She didn't answer. Her silence was answer enough.
The surviving soldiers gathered behind them, quiet and hollow. One man dropped to his knees, whispering a prayer to gods that hadn't saved them. Another stared blankly at the horizon, where the cult army swelled larger by the minute.
Zeke pulled the bandana from his neck and tied it tighter over his mouth. The air reeked of death. "So what's the play, Commander?"
Seraphine rose slowly, her eyes locked on the valley. "We regroup. We find whoever's left. And we make them pay."
He nodded once. "Reckon that's reason enough to keep breathing."
She turned to him then, her expression unreadable. "You saw the dragon, didn't you? Before the light took you."
Zeke hesitated, then met her gaze. "Yeah. And it saw me."
A flicker of unease crossed her face. "Then it's not over."
"No," he said quietly. "It ain't."
The wind picked up, scattering ash through the air like snow. The red light from the broken portal pulsed once more, faint but alive, beating like a dying heart.
Seraphine called out to the survivors, rallying them with what little strength she had left. They gathered their weapons, formed ranks, and began the long, limping march out of the crater.
Zeke followed last, his boots dragging through the dust. Every few steps he looked back at the valley—the endless tide of cultists moving in the distance, their torches like rivers of fire.
The mark on his chest burned faintly again, a quiet warning. He pressed a hand to it, jaw tight. Somewhere out there, in the space between worlds, that damn dragon was waiting. Watching.
He muttered under his breath, "You'll have to wait your turn."
Seraphine called his name, and he turned to catch up, his silhouette vanishing into the haze beside hers.
Behind them, the wind shifted. The chanting from the valley grew louder—thousands of voices crying out to something unseen, something patient.
The earth trembled. The ashes stirred.
And in the far distance, beneath the veil of smoke, the red glow of countless torches began to rise.