The fire burned too brightly for a council night. Its smoke clawed upward, restless, as if even the heavens had grown uneasy at what was about to unfold. Sky-Torn sat in the circle's heart, wrists bound with red-dyed cord, and the tribe's eyes pressed on him heavier than any rope.
"Accusations of corruption," intoned the eldest, Ash-Singer, her voice like brittle pine cracking. "Consorting with shadow, bending prophecy, sowing dissent among the People. Do you deny these charges?"
The words landed like stones. He could feel them grinding against his ribs, but Sky-Torn forced his breath to steady. The Villain System stirred within him—always there now, like a second heartbeat.
[System Notice: Trial of Flames detected. Villain Path Opportunity unlocked.]Reward: +150 Villain Points if condemned.Penalty: -50 Villain Points if acquitted.Hidden Clause: Outcomes may be twisted.
The glowing text, invisible to all but him, mocked the council's solemnity. To everyone else, this was judgment. To him, it was mechanics, numbers shifting in a game only he had been chosen to play.
"I do not deny," Sky-Torn said, and a hiss ran through the gathered crowd. Mothers clutched their children closer. Warriors spat into the dirt. Yet his voice did not waver. "But I ask—what is corruption? Is it corruption to call out the blind path toward chains? Is it corruption to see what our ancestors truly whisper, rather than what you wish they spoke?"
The council leaned back like struck serpents. Only Wounded Bear, sitting two rows beyond, met his eyes. That gaze was no longer suspicion alone—it carried something like reluctant respect.
The flames crackled louder. Sky-Torn tasted ash on his tongue.
[Villain System: Conviction detected. +20 Villain Points.]
The voice in his head purred. He wanted to hate it, yet part of him relished the confirmation, the sense that destiny was measurable, not mist.
Ash-Singer raised a hand. "You twist words as you twist signs. The fire will judge. If it spares you, the council will listen. If it devours you, we will know the truth."
A murmur rose: the Trial of Flames, an ancient ordeal almost forgotten. Few survived. Most were ash before dawn.
The villagers dragged forward two blazing brands, forming a path of fire that led to the sacred circle's edge. Sky-Torn's bonds were cut, and the System's glow sharpened in his sight.
[Quest Accepted: Walk the Trial of Flames.]Condition: Cross without faltering.Optional: Harness forbidden power to bend the fire.
The crowd hushed. The flames licked upward, greedy. Sky-Torn inhaled deeply, and beneath the smoke, he caught the iron tang of inevitability.
He stepped forward.
The first flame kissed his ankle, a living serpent of heat. Pain surged—but then the System's pulse spread through him, a dark current winding into nerve and marrow. He whispered an old chant, one his grandmother had taught him not as spell, but as song. Now, it bent into something sharper, something the ancestors would never have sanctioned.
The fire recoiled. For a heartbeat, it parted like grass in the wind. Gasps erupted from the tribe.
[Villain System: Forbidden Invocation recognized.]+50 Villain Points. Skill Unlocked: Ember-Bend (Rank I).
Sky-Torn pressed forward, each step a battle. The flames twisted around him, shapes forming—faces in smoke. He saw colonizer helmets, pale visages grinning, the echo of iron muskets. He saw his own people, chained, their songs beaten into silence.
He staggered. His knee buckled, and heat surged against his chest. Pain roared, and the stench of singed hair rose. The crowd screamed. Children wept.
But then—he laughed. Not madness, but defiance.
"Do you see?" he shouted through the roar. "The fire itself shows what comes! Not my corruption—your blindness!"
He thrust both arms wide. The flames bent outward, curling away from him, forming a hollow passage. The crowd recoiled in terror.
[Villain System: Trial of Flames conquered.]Reward Claimed: +150 Villain Points.Hidden Outcome: Reputation Shift—Feared Prophet.
The last step carried him out of the fire and onto cool earth. His skin was blistered, his hair half-burnt, but he still stood. The council had no words. None dared approach.
Only Wounded Bear rose. His voice, low but carrying, broke the silence. "He walks with power. Whether that power saves or damns us… I do not know."
Ash-Singer's lips trembled. Her authority cracked like clay in drought. "No man bends fire without the shadow's aid. He is marked."
The crowd's voices split. Some cried out in awe, calling him chosen. Others spat curses, demanding exile, death.
Sky-Torn stood in their clamor, the System's numbers climbing inside his skull. For the first time, he realized that the game would not let him fade quietly. Power demanded spectacle. The world demanded a villain.
The flames died down, but the smoke lingered, curling into a sky already dark with storm.
That night, alone by the river's edge, he pressed his blistered palms into the water. Steam rose. His reflection stared back—half-man, half-scorched wraith.
[Villain System Update: Current Villain Points – 580.]Available Purchase: Prophecy Twist (Rank I). Cost: 500 Points.
The option glimmered in his mind like a snare. Prophecy Twist. To alter visions themselves. To corrupt destiny's core.
He hovered at the threshold. The tribe was splitting around him, like bone cracked by fire. The colonizers advanced closer with each moon. His people needed unity, but unity came only through lies—or force.
With a trembling breath, he confirmed.
[Purchase Confirmed. Prophecy Twist unlocked.]
The world shivered. The river's surface darkened, then stilled, showing not his face but a vision: warriors kneeling before him, colonizer banners burning, the council silenced forever.
His chest ached. Triumph and grief braided into one.
The System whispered: Villainy is destiny rewritten.
Sky-Torn closed his eyes, letting the whisper carry him into restless dreams.
The council had tried to judge him. Instead, the fire had crowned him. Yet the crown was of ash, and ash never lasts.
The storm that night broke with thunder that shook the lodges, as if the sky itself wanted to echo what every soul already knew: a path had been chosen, and it could not end in peace.