The warmth of the stone was an anchor against the storm.
The world had ended. And yet, the stone's warmth lingered in Kaen's palm as he walked, a soft, insistent pulse. It was a heartbeat not his own, a steady rhythm against the cacophony of a world gone mad. He had no name for what it was, no understanding of where it came from. But in the suffocating silence of the new dawn, he knew one thing: it gave him the strength to keep moving. And he needed that strength, because a solitary, desperate thought was the only thing keeping him from collapsing into the ash.
Riku was waiting.
The air itself tasted of death. Orvale, once a city of life and laughter, now lay before him like the bleached skeleton of a colossal beast. Streets that had bustled with merchants and children were now choked with rubble, each step a sickening crunch of shattered glass, splintered wood, and blood that had long since dried into the cobblestones. The scent of smoke still clung to everything, a bitter, acrid tang that coated his tongue and burned his lungs. He walked, a solitary figure in a land of the dead, his gaze fixed on the ground, trying not to look at the silent bodies that lay in their final rest. The world he knew was gone. But Riku… He had to reach her. She was a single, flickering lantern in the endless dark, and he would not let that light go out.
He remembered her laughter, a sound like a silver bell ringing in the twilight. He remembered the fierce, protective look in her eyes when she'd stand up for him. He remembered the way her dark hair would catch the sunlight, shining like a polished gemstone. These memories, once so beautiful and commonplace, were now sharp knives, twisting in the wound of his grief. They were a constant, tormenting reminder of everything he had lost.
And yet, they were also the fuel that kept him moving, a fire in his veins that burned hotter than the acrid smoke in his lungs.
***
The ground trembled.
Kaen's frantic pace came to an abrupt, jarring halt. He pressed himself against the leaning remnant of a broken wall, his body rigid. The light, the hope, the fear—it all vanished, replaced by a single, primal instinct for survival. A shadow, vast and terrible, fell across the street, swallowing the morning light whole.
It was one of them.
Scaled in obsidian black, its monstrous form blotted out the sky. This was no mere animal—it was a creature of the Nightfall, a living instrument of the apocalypse. Its jaws, lined with teeth like shattered daggers, could have crushed a house to dust. Its heavy steps sent tremors through the ground, a slow, methodical march through the graveyard of the city. Its head, a grotesque parody of a reptile's, lowered as it sniffed the air, a deep, rumbling growl escaping its throat. It was hunting. Searching for life.
Kaen dared not breathe. Every muscle in his body was a wire pulled to its breaking point. His skin crawled with a cold sweat that had nothing to do with the morning air. He clutched the stone in his hand, its warmth the only thing tethering him to the living world. The air was a thick, cloying blanket of terror. He could hear the creature's slow, rasping breaths, the low drag of its tail across shattered cobblestones. He was so close he could almost feel the heat of its body, a primal, suffocating furnace of malice.
The beast's head turned. Its black, intelligent eyes scanned the devastation. Closer. Closer. Kaen could see the glint of blood smeared along its snout, a horrifying testament to its prey.
*Don't see me. Please don't see me.*
The silence stretched, agonizing and eternal. The air itself seemed to tighten around him, suffocating him. He could almost feel the beast's gaze on his skin, a suffocating weight.
Then—distantly, somewhere deeper in the ruins, rubble collapsed with a loud, hollow crash.
The beast's head snapped toward the noise, its focus broken. With a guttural snarl, it turned, its tail smashing through the wreckage of a home like a thunderclap as it lumbered away, vanishing into the smoke-filled horizon.
Kaen slumped forward, his body trembling, a tremor that went deeper than exhaustion. His lungs burned as he finally drew a ragged, desperate breath, the taste of ash and terror filling his mouth. That had been too close. Far, far too close.
***
The path to Riku's home was no longer a path at all. It was a treacherous obstacle course of shattered stone and twisted metal. Trees lay torn from the earth, their twisted roots reaching skyward like the skeletal hands of the dead. Walls and beams collapsed across roads, forcing Kaen to climb, crawl, and squeeze through jagged openings. Every movement scraped his skin raw, leaving thin, red trails of blood. Splinters dug into his palms, and his clothes tore on jagged edges of what used to be his neighbor's roof. His body screamed in protest, but he pressed on, driven by a desperate, frantic need.
Because every time he faltered, every time despair threatened to weigh him down, her face rose in his memory. Riku's laugh. The way she'd scold him for picking fights, her eyebrows furrowed in a way that always made him want to apologize, even when he wasn't wrong. The way she always believed in him, a steady, unyielding faith that had been the foundation of his world.
*I can't lose her too. I won't.*
He would not let the Nightfall claim her. He would not let the whispers of guilt and failure take this last, beautiful thing from him.
***
At one turn, Kaen stopped.
Before him lay a sight that tore into his chest, a fresh, agonizing wound.
Two children—a boy and a girl—lay still, their forms cold and lifeless. Their small, grubby hands were reaching toward each other, their fingers just barely brushing even in death. Their eyes were wide, staring, frozen in terror at a sky that had betrayed them.
Kaen's knees buckled. A wave of nausea swept over him. This wasn't just a grim scene; it was a mirror. It was his siblings. Lyra and Sera. Their last, desperate embrace. The memory, so raw and painful, had been shoved to the back of his mind. Now, it was a searing brand.
His throat tightened until he could barely breathe. The whispers came again, crawling through his mind like maggots.
*"You should have saved us."*
*"Too weak… always too weak…"*
*"You said you would protect us. You promised."*
The voices swirled around him, a storm of accusations. His head pounded. The world tilted. He was drowning in their words, in the suffocating weight of his failure.
*"Stop…"* he whispered, clutching the glowing stone to his chest.
The warmth flared, bright and steady, a powerful counter to the icy grip of despair. Gentle. Unwavering. The whispers dulled, fading into a low hum. The voices receded, pushed back by the pure, humming presence of the stone.
His breath steadied. His trembling slowed. The stone was not just a light—it was an anchor. It was a lifeline in the sea of his grief.
And he clung to it, forcing his legs to move once more, to walk past the tragic reflection of his own family, his eyes burning with a new, fierce resolve.
***
Finally, through the haze of smoke and ruin, Kaen saw it.
Riku's home.
It stood at the top of a small hill, a beacon of impossible hope. It was battered, its walls scored and blackened by soot, but it was still standing. A thin wisp of smoke curled from a broken section of the roof, a faint, fragile sign of life. It was there.
Hope surged in his chest so sharply it hurt. His legs moved before his mind caught up, carrying him into a desperate run. He scrambled up the hill, his boots finding purchase on loose stones and shattered earth.
"Riku!" he shouted, his voice raw, breaking on her name. "Riku!"
His cries echoed through the ruins, a desperate, frantic sound swallowed by the unbearable silence.
The closer he came, the tighter his chest grew. Each step was heavier than the last, a brutal war between hope and fear. The memory of his dead family and the sight of the glowing house fought in his mind. The whispers threatened to return. The terror of the dinosaur's hunt. But the stone pulsed in his hand, a constant, comforting rhythm.
*Please… please be alive. Please don't be gone.*
***
At last, he reached the house. The front door hung loose on its hinges, the wood splintered, a faint, dark smear of blood across its surface.
Kaen stopped, his breath ragged, his body screaming with a mixture of exhaustion and raw terror. He reached for the doorframe, his hand trembling so violently it was a wonder he could even touch it.
Inside, shadows waited. Silent. Still.
He swallowed, his throat dry as bone, the silence a roar in his ears.
"…Riku?"
Only silence answered.
And then—from within the darkness—something shifted.
A sound. Small. Subtle. The scuff of a boot against wood.
*Alive.*
Kaen's heart lurched. A gasp of relief tore from his throat.
He pushed the door open, the splintered wood groaning a final, mournful cry. He stepped into the darkness, his hand still clutching the glowing stone, his eyes wide, straining to see.
The air inside was stale, thick with smoke, but it was not the cold, dead silence of the streets. It was a tense, expectant silence, filled with the presence of another living soul.
And from within the shadows, a figure moved.
The boy who had lost everything stood at the precipice of finding something. Or losing it forever.