It was the morning of the tenth day of the eighth month when the sun rose without courage over the East.
The smoke from the walls still climbed, slow, like prayers lost in the cold air.
No bell tolled.
No commander shouted orders.
Only footsteps echoed — soldiers gathering bodies, mothers searching for names among the dead, children sitting on the ground, arms wrapped around trembling knees.
The elders prayed — not for victory, but for peace.
High on the wall, Éreon watched it all, unmoving, like a statue carved by chaos itself.
Footsteps approached behind him.
Éon stopped a few meters away, dust and dried blood still marking his face.
He didn't speak.
He only breathed — heavy, like a man carrying a corpse inside his chest.
Éreon didn't turn his head. He only asked, without emotion:
"Are they all gathered?"
"Yes," Éon answered quietly.
Silence.
The wind dragged ashes around them.
Then Éreon spoke:
"How are you?"
Éon hesitated.
His breath faltered for an instant.
The scream — that one single scream — still vibrated in his mind.
He tried to answer — but nothing came.
Éreon moved only his eyes, glancing sideways, without pity, without surprise.
"You have until the next dawn to pull yourself together," Éreon said. "After that, there will be no room for weakness."
A heartbeat.
Another.
Then came the sentence — cold as steel drawn before sunrise:
"Sometimes it's not the strong who kill the weak... it's the spared weak who one day kill the strong. Mercy is risk — and risk is a luxury we cannot afford."
Éon closed his eyes for a moment — not in fear, but in pain, like one who recognizes a truth too cruel to deny.
Éreon continued, steady, giving no space for fragility:
"The strong reign because they bury even what might become vengeance. Remember that."
And he turned his gaze back to the horizon — still, like a man who had already accepted the price of everything.
The silence still weighed when Éreon frowned, like someone who feels the air shift before the storm.
"So… it seems they've finally arrived," he murmured, without breaking his stare at the horizon.
Éon looked at him, confused, then followed Éreon's gaze — beyond the broken walls of silver and bronze, where the road dissolved into dust and ash.
There, distant, small silhouettes trembled under the pale sun.
They did not march — they dragged themselves forward.
Human shapes, but twisted, slow, like shadows that had forgotten how to be men.
A murmur rose among the soldiers below — fear and expectation crushed together in every throat.
Éon swallowed hard.
"Those… are ours," he said — more doubt than certainty.
Éreon didn't answer.
He only took one step forward, the black cloak shifting like an echo of storm.
The pale morning light touched his eyes — which gleamed in deep violet, as if the chaos of the previous day still burned within.
Without a word, he climbed onto the parapet of the wall.
The wind blew.
Ashes danced around him.
And then he jumped.
He didn't fall — he hovered, descending in a single, controlled, almost silent movement, purple energy swirling around his hands and feet like filaments of living power.
The ground cracked lightly when he landed — not from impact, but from presence.
The golden gates of the wall stood behind him.
Ahead, the survivors approached — human shadows against a ruined field.
A pebble — just one — rolled off the edge of the wall and hit the ground a few steps from Éreon.
He glanced at it from the corner of his eye, as if confirming something.
In the next instant, the air distorted.
The pebble vanished.
And Éon appeared in its place, form snapping back into shape with a violent pull of space — as if he'd been torn from one point and thrown to another.
The same pebble now rested atop the wall, unmoving, where Éon had been a second before.
He drew a deep breath.
Éreon didn't turn his head.
He stared at the horizon, silent, posture steady, violet energy crawling under his skin like restrained fire.
The soldiers murmured, uneasy.
The silhouettes grew closer.
And the world seemed to hold its breath.
They came close enough for faces to emerge through the dust.
There was no glory in them.
No strength.
No war in their eyes.
Only the exhaustion of those who had given everything — and were still asked for more.
When they were ten steps from Éreon, they stopped.
Not by command.
Not by fear.
But because the body simply wouldn't go further.
One of the young men — maybe a captain, maybe just the least wounded — tried to straighten up. His armor was missing half its chest, torn away as if bitten by something no steel should ever face.
He lifted his eyes to Éreon.
He didn't speak.
He didn't need to.
Less than two hundred souls — and not a single voice.
Young faces with eyes far too dead for their age.
The dust kept dancing.
The wind kept dragging ashes.
One youth took a step — brown eyes, brown hair — stumbled and fell to his knees before Éreon.
His hand clutched something: a torn banner fragment, stained with dried blood and something darker.
A second step echoed behind him.
Different.
Steady, despite the weight.
Karna emerged among the survivors, shoulder bleeding, broken bow clutched in his hand. Dust covered half his face; the other half carried a faint smile — tired, but alive.
He stopped beside the fallen youth and looked at Éreon.
"This isn't quite the entrance I wanted," his voice came out rough, stripped of its usual mockery, holding only a cracked humor through pain, "but we're here."
The survivors behind him, even exhausted, seemed to hold themselves up only by that presence.
He didn't command by strength.
He commanded because no one else had managed to stand.
Karna lifted his gaze, steady.
Serious.
Unmasked.
"We lost… almost everyone," he said quietly. "Because of me."
Silence fell heavy.
Ash crossed the air like dead snow.
Éreon's eyes finally moved — just enough to meet Karna's.
"Where is the girl?"
Karna didn't answer right away.
His jaw clenched.
A second of hesitation — not fear, but pain.
Before he could speak, Éreon exhaled slowly and turned his gaze to the weary survivors.
"Later," he murmured, voice cold, contained. "We'll speak of that elsewhere."
The golden gates behind Éreon groaned open, as if the metal itself carried mourning.
The survivors began to walk inside.
Dragging steps.
Silhouettes more like shadows than soldiers.
Karna stayed still for a moment, looking at Éreon, searching for something in that impenetrable face.
Éreon tilted his chin slightly, without gentleness.
"I want your explanation. Make sure your words are worth more than the blood they cost."
The violet energy glimmered in his eyes — slow, threatening, like a storm held back.
Karna drew a long breath.
"You'll have them," he said, low and firm. "All the ones I owe… and maybe a few I don't."
Then he turned to help the fallen youth rise, guiding him through the gates.
Éreon stayed there, motionless, like a sentinel the world dared not touch.
The dust fell slow.
The wind died.
And the silence was almost sacred.
Hours later, the great hall smelled of burnt wax and old iron — echoes of a fire that hadn't yet gone out inside anyone's memory.
The throne stood at the center like a monolith; Éreon sat upon it, legs crossed with the calm of one who practices waiting and judgment as ritual.
His hands rested, still, on his knees.
His eyes, when they moved, were two wells where light broke into violet — lilac pupils swirling with the glow of a distant, hypnotic, threatening vortex.
At his right, Éon stood rigid — guard, brother, shadow.
At his left, Sèsinmè, the fierce-priestess, her cloak immaculate, gaze of steel, hands clasped as if praying for a punishment not yet pronounced.
To one side, the Agojies — women of measured steps, spears grounded, eyes tracking every motion.
To the other, Éreon's soldiers — armed, their stance ready for battle, not reception.
They formed a corridor leading to the throne.
Karna entered at last, face and shoulder stained, dust clinging to his skin.
Still, he walked firm; the few who still recognized him aligned at his sides.
When he reached the center of the corridor, he stopped, met Éon's gaze for a heartbeat — recognition and guilt — and lifted what remained of his dignity.
Éreon raised his chin, and the air in the hall seemed to tighten.
"Tell me, Karna Suruya," he said, voice low and sharp as a blade. "What happened to my messenger? And why has what was meant to be our reinforcement from the marquisate arrived in this state?"
The violet in his eyes spun, clearer than any warning.
The sentence was neutral to its final thread — then became a direct threat.
"Remember: if your answer fails to satisfy me, you risk paying with your life, here and now."
Karna breathed — long, heavy. The easy smile was gone; only weariness and a hard resolve remained.
"They called themselves Blackthrones."
Éreon didn't blink.
Only the violet glow — now darker, deeper — flickered in his pupils, as if some ancient flame had been fed.
"Blackthrones…" he repeated, each syllable dragging something old — maybe memory, maybe hatred. "So they've decided to act again."
Silence fell absolute — heavy, inevitable, like the omen of revelations to come.
Éreon tilted his head slightly, tone sharp as a blade still sheathed:
"And what was your part in this, Karna? How exactly did you allow the 'reinforcement' to arrive reduced to shadows and bones?"
Karna's throat moved in a dry swallow — not from fear, but from memory.
"To understand my guilt…" he said, voice low, steady, "I have to start with the first attack."
Silence seemed to brace itself to listen.
"I'll tell you everything."
The violet light in Éreon's eyes pulsed — slow, hungry — as if truth itself were sustenance.