(Lián Xinyue's POV)
The Trial grounds burn brighter than the sun.
Flames coil in a perfect circle, alive and hungry, rising from the runic etchings carved into the stone floor. The heat presses against my skin, searing yet somehow intoxicating. Above the roaring blaze, the High Master's voice echoes, calm, detached, merciless.
"Step into the fire, Lián Xinyue. Let the flame decide if your blood is worthy."
My pulse drums like war. Around me, the assembly watches, nobles, warriors, apprentices, faces half-lit by the infernal glow. And somewhere among them, I feel him. Kaien. His gaze always finds me, even when I wish it wouldn't.
The fire crackles, tasting the air for fear.
I breathe once, deeply. The scent of burning incense and old ash fills my lungs. "Let it be done," I whisper, and step forward.
The flames swallow me whole.
Pain explodes through my body like a thousand needles piercing my veins. I choke back a scream. Fire races beneath my skin, my blood itself igniting. The runes on the ground flare brighter, as if feeding from something inside me.
For a heartbeat, I can't move. I can't breathe.
Then… something shifts.
The pain folds into power. The heat becomes light. The flames no longer burn, they listen. I open my eyes, and the world is drenched in gold. Threads of fire spiral around me, twisting upward into shapes, wings, serpents, runes from a language I've never seen.
Whispers ripple through the hall.
"The flame... it bends to her will?"
"Impossible."
"No one survives this long!"
And then Kaien's voice, sharp, desperate:
"Enough! Stop the ritual!"
But the High Master doesn't move. He's staring, not at the fire, but at me. At my arms, my hands...
The mark.
It appears like molten silver beneath my skin, curling from my wrist to my shoulder, a dragon coiled around a crescent moon. Its eyes shimmer with the same gold as the flames surrounding me.
I know that mark. I've seen it only once before, carved into the tomb beneath the temple. The symbol of the Ashborn Line.
My breath catches. That bloodline is forbidden, erased from the records a century ago.
And yet... it lives in me.
A gust of power bursts outward, the flames explode into an inferno, blowing back the onlookers. Kaien moves instinctively, throwing up a wall of crimson energy to shield the spectators. His eyes, black as storm clouds, lock with mine.
"Xinyue… stop!"
"I'm trying!" I cry, voice breaking under the roar. But the fire won't obey. It wants.
Then I feel it, a whisper, ancient and aching, deep in my bones.
"Child of ash… awaken."
The mark flares white-hot. The flames turn black.
Gasps fill the arena. The High Master stumbles backward, shouting for the guards.
I collapse to my knees, trembling as the dark fire recedes, leaving only smoke and silence behind. When I lift my head, every eye is on me, not in awe, but in horror.
Kaien crosses the distance before anyone else can move. His cloak sweeps around me, shielding me from the stares. His jaw tightens.
"Don't say a word," he whispers, low enough only I can hear. "Not here."
I try to speak, but my throat feels scorched. He doesn't wait. His arm slides around me, steady but firm, and he half-guides, half-drags me out of the Trial chamber.
Behind us, the High Master's voice booms:
"That girl bears the mark of the Accursed Flame. She cannot remain in the temple!"
I stiffen. My heart drops into my stomach.
Kaien's steps don't falter, but his voice hardens like steel.
"If you touch her, you answer to me."
We pass through the corridor in silence, walls lined with ancient scripts, the air heavy with incense and judgment. When we finally reach the quiet of the inner garden, he lets go, turning to face me.
His expression is unreadable, shadowed by torchlight.
"You should have told me," he says softly.
"I didn't know," I whisper. "I swear I didn't—"
"Xinyue." His tone sharpens, cutting through my defense. "That mark… do you realize what it means?"
Tears sting the back of my eyes, but I refuse to look away. "You think I wanted this?"
Silence stretches, thick and fragile. His hand moves, almost unconsciously, to my wrist, tracing the faint silver line of the dragon where it glows beneath the skin.
The touch burns more than the fire ever did.
"You shouldn't be alive," he murmurs, almost to himself.
Something inside me twists. "Then why am I?"
He doesn't answer.
For a long moment, all I hear is the soft hum of night, the rustle of the wind through bamboo, the quiet drip of water from the garden's fountain. Kaien's hand lingers a second too long before he pulls away.
"You need to rest," he says finally. "Before they decide what to do with you."
"What you decide, you mean?"
His jaw clenches. "It's not my choice anymore."
He turns to leave. I almost let him go. Almost.
But something in me snaps. "Kaien," I call, and when he looks back, I add softly, "You believed in me once. Don't stop now."
The faintest crack shows in his armor of control. For a breath, I see it, the man behind the rank, the fear behind his anger.
"Belief isn't the problem," he says. "It's what I might lose because of it."
And then he's gone, leaving me in the garden, alone, the moonlight glinting off the mark that will either crown me or condemn me.
I stare down at it, feeling its quiet pulse beneath my skin.
The Ashborn Heir...
A name whispered in legend. A curse sealed in blood.
Now it's mine.