The survivors stumbled from the shattered ruin like men crawling out of a grave. Dust caked their skin, lungs burned with every gasp, and the night sky above seemed too wide, too clean, too merciless after the suffocating weight of stone. Some fell to their knees and vomited, others sobbed into their hands.
But all of them looked, again and again, toward the one who had carved the path.
The Prince stood apart, his frame lit faintly by the glow of the Codex that pulsed within his chest. His body still bled in places, but the wounds closed almost as quickly as they opened. What lingered instead was something stranger, more dreadful: faint cracks of bone-like armor flickering in and out of existence across his arms and chest, as though some skeletal phantom overlapped his flesh.
He flexed his hand, staring at it as if it belonged to another man. The power from the Guardian still coursed inside him, raw and violent. And with it… a whisper. A new rune.
The Codex stirred, and for the first time its voice was not only hunger. It was command.
Rune of Dominion unlocked.
The words burned across his mind like brands. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, he saw them—threads of shadow coiling from his chest toward the people around him. Not binding them, not yet, but waiting.
The survivors shifted under his gaze. Fear glimmered in their eyes, but so did something else. Hope. Awe. The terrible recognition that this man, their exile prince, was becoming something more than flesh and blood.
He turned slowly, facing them fully.
"You saw it," he said, his voice raw but steady. "The ruin gave us no mercy. It demanded strength. It demanded price. And we paid."
A murmur ran through them. Some bowed their heads, ashamed of their panic during the fight. Others clenched their fists, still trembling from terror.
The Prince lifted his hand. "The Codex has given me a power—the Rune of Dominion. With it, I can share strength. I can make you faster. Stronger. Harder to kill. But…" His eyes narrowed, black flame flickering faintly in their depths. "That strength comes with a chain. Once you accept, your will is bound to mine. Betrayal will mean death. Not only your death—but your very soul devoured."
Silence crashed down. The weight of his words pressed heavier than the ruin's stones.
One of the outcasts—scarred, ragged, his eyes still wide with lingering fear—spat into the dirt. "Chains again? We've worn chains our whole lives! Better weak and free than strong and owned." He turned as if to leave.
The Prince did not move. He simply let the bone-armor ripple faintly across his skin. The man froze mid-step.
"Leave, then," the Prince said, voice like iron. "But remember—the borderlands will not spare you. And the next time we meet, you will not be one of mine."
The outcast hesitated… then slunk into the shadows. No one else followed.
The Prince's gaze swept the rest. "Choose."
One by one, they moved.
A woman with half her ear torn off stepped forward, trembling. She knelt. "I… I will take it, my lord. I am tired of running."
The Prince extended his hand, pressing his palm against her brow. The Codex flared, and the Rune of Dominion etched itself into her skin in a faint, glowing mark. She gasped as power coursed through her, her frail frame trembling with sudden strength. When she rose, her eyes no longer held fear—only fierce devotion.
Another man followed. Then another. The outcasts began to kneel in turn, voices shaking, eyes wet, but every one of them choosing the chain for the sake of survival.
And then… only Lira remained.
She stood apart, bow in hand, her jaw set. The others looked at her anxiously, for she was the closest to him, the one who had stood by his side even in ruin.
The Prince met her eyes. "You hesitate."
Her throat bobbed. "Because I wonder," she said quietly, "if the man who binds us with chains is the same man I swore to follow. Or if the Codex is making you into something else."
For a moment, silence stretched. The Prince's chest tightened, not with anger but with something sharper, heavier.
But then he stepped forward, lowering his hand—not to her brow, but to her shoulder. "Chains or no chains," he said, voice steady, "you are mine already. Not because the Codex wills it. Because you chose me when no one else did."
Her eyes widened, and the trembling in her jaw broke. She closed her eyes… then knelt. "Then let me choose again."
The Rune seared onto her skin. She gasped, shadow-like ripples spilling briefly from her body before vanishing. When she opened her eyes, they glowed faintly with the Codex's dark resonance.
The Prince straightened, bone-armor flickering and black fire swirling faintly around him. His outcasts—no, his followers—rose in unison, their voices joining in a rough, ragged roar that shook the night.
For the first time, he no longer saw cowards or beggars. He saw warriors. His.
The Codex pulsed with approval, and the Rune of Dominion etched itself deeper into his soul.
He turned, lifting his gaze toward the horizon where the borderlands stretched endless and cruel. "We are no longer prey. From this night forward, we are the Forsaken."
Their cheer rose again, fierce and defiant, echoing into the wilderness.
But it broke abruptly as a scout stumbled into the clearing, face pale, body covered in cuts.
"My lord," he gasped, falling to his knees. "Another warlord comes—marching with hundreds. They come for the ruin."
The fire in the Prince's chest flared, the Codex whispering for blood. His lips curved into something that was not quite a smile.
"Then let him come," he said softly, almost to himself. "We have been forged in ruin. Let us see if he can withstand what crawled out of it."
The outcasts—no, the Forsaken—turned as one toward the bloodied scout. His voice, ragged from running, still echoed in their ears: another warlord comes.
The night seemed to tighten around them. The ruined stones at their back still smoldered with fading fire, but now the wilderness beyond pulsed with a different dread—the inevitability of battle.
Murmurs rippled through the gathered survivors. Some clutched their new Dominion marks as if afraid the strength might vanish. Others stared at the Prince, waiting for his command, waiting for the certainty they did not have in themselves.
The Prince's gaze lingered on the scout. "How many?"
The man swallowed. "At least three hundred, my lord. Banners of iron tusks. Krag's horde." His voice faltered. "They say he tears men apart with his bare hands."
Fear prickled the air like static. The Forsaken shifted, eyes darting, memories of the ruin still fresh—of stone crushing flesh, of survival by inches. The thought of facing an army so soon after clawing from the grave made some tremble openly.
The Prince did not tremble.
He stepped forward, the faint glow of the Rune pulsing with each stride. Bone-armor cracked faintly across his arms, black fire whispering at the edge of his form. He stopped before the scout and lifted him to his feet with a single hand.
"You carried the warning through blade and thorn. That makes you one of mine."
The man's eyes widened, tears cutting paths through the grime on his cheeks. He bowed low, trembling—not in fear, but in something closer to reverence.
The Prince turned to the others. His voice rolled like distant thunder.
"You chose chains tonight. Not of iron, but of purpose. You bound yourselves to me, and in return I give you more than strength—I give you war."
The Rune thrummed in his chest, threads of shadow coiling tighter around those who had knelt. They straightened, shoulders squaring as the Codex poured faint embers of power into their flesh. Even the weakest looked less like beggars and more like soldiers.
But the fear still lingered. He could taste it, bitter on the night air.
So he bared his teeth in a grim smile. "Krag thinks us prey. He marches to devour scraps from the ruin. Let him find instead the Forsaken who carved their way out of stone itself. Let him find not rats, but wolves."
The words struck something raw. A roar broke from the outcasts—ragged, cracked, but fierce. Their fear did not vanish, but it turned, reshaped into something sharper: defiance.
Lira stood beside him, the new Rune mark glowing faintly on her skin. Her eyes met his, steady now. "Then tomorrow," she said, "we show him what ruin made of us."
The Prince's gaze swept the horizon. Already, faint tremors seemed to roll through the ground—the march of hundreds drawing near. The Codex burned hot in his bones, whispering for conquest, for blood.
He lifted his hand, and black fire curled around his fingers like a promise.
"Tomorrow," he said, his voice low but carrying through the night, "we prove the borderlands belong not to warlords… but to the Forsaken."
The cheer that followed was no longer ragged. It was thunder.
And far across the plains, war drums answered.