The sensation of pain was a familiar companion, though this was a far cry from the back-alley brawls of his youth in the Trade District. As the third son of a wealthy mercantile family, Miklas was no stranger to a beating, yet this agony was different. It wasn’t the sharp bite of a blade or the heavy thud of a warhammer; it was a hollow, echoing void where his inner flame once burned.
Captain Miklas of the 5th Cohort forced his eyes open. His vision was a murky haze of sweat, ash, and congealed blood. Every attempt at a deep breath caused his ribs to grate together with a sickening friction, screaming in protest. He was a walking tapestry of bruises, his body pushed to the absolute edge of human endurance. And yet, the physical toll was nothing compared to the deafening silence residing in his soul.
On the right side of his neck, the Ancient Rune of the Sky felt like a parched riverbed under a dying sun. He had expended everything. Every drop of his essence had been poured into that final, desperate Bud Burst of his Ember.
Even that hadn’t been enough.
As he stared blankly into the smoky light of the ruin, memories began to resurface like a battering ram. The rhythmic, guttural thrum of animal-hide drums from the treeline was the first to return, followed by the synchronized roar of a thousand voices. Then came the smell: a suffocating mix of mud, copper, and the hallucinogenic smoke of the blue leaves the barbarians chewed before a slaughter.
They had prepared for a simple raid, perhaps a hundred warriors seeking a glorious end on the West Border. That was the natural order the 5th Cohort of the 7th Legion was meant to uphold. Five hundred veterans of the Dilemd Empire, standing in a perfect shield wall, supported by the last Knight-Mage of the cohort. It should have been a routine culling.
Instead, the forest had vomited a literal sea of painted flesh.
It was the Mud and Blood Coalition, thousands of them moving with a suicidal frenzy that defied all logic. They hadn’t come for loot; they had come to erase everything. Miklas remembered the impact, the imperial steel shuddering under the sheer mass of the tide. He saw his lieutenant dragged into the mass, his screams cut short as crude axes found the gaps in his armor.
In response, Miklas had unleashed his Sky Ember. He remembered the terrifying rush of power as his rune glowed with a blinding light. He had commanded the very air, his longsword summoning hurricanes that tossed men aside like leaves. Jagged arcs of lightning had descended from a clear sky, incinerating foes instantly, leaving only charred remains and the sharp scent of ozone. He had fought with the power of a storm god.
But gods are a myth, and Miklas was merely a man. For every ten he turned to ash, twenty more surged over the corpses. They fought as if something far more terrifying than lightning was hunting them from the deep woods.
Hours turned into a blur of mud and gore. The proud 5th Cohort was meticulously dismantled. The shield wall, the discipline—all shattered. Miklas watched the men he cared for, the ones he had trained, butchered like livestock. He fought until his muscles tore and his sword became slick with viscera, until his Ember flickered and died. He remembered collapsing atop a hill of the dead, a spear grazing his helm before the world went dark.
Five hundred men, five hundred sons of the Empire, were gone.
And I am still breathing.
The guilt was a physical weight, far heavier than any plate armor. He was their Captain; he belonged in the mud with them, his blood watering the border soil.
"Ugh... by the Emperor’s left buttock, my head..." his voice, rough as sandpaper, scraped out of his throat. Even now, his natural defense of shameless humor arrived before he was fully conscious.
His vision cleared. He was alive, lying on a hay bed beneath a makeshift tent of charred wood and torn cloth. The scent of roasted ham and stale bread hit him, causing his empty stomach to contract.
And sitting just a few feet away, illuminated by a flickering campfire, was a girl.
She looked no older than fourteen, with pitch-black hair and cold grey eyes that studied him with an intensity that made him instinctively reach for a sword that wasn’t there. She held a crude sandwich in her hands.
"You are in the ruins of Oakhaven," she said, her voice steady and devoid of the fear one would expect from a survivor. "Or what’s left of it."
Miklas tried to sit up, but a sharp pain in his abdomen forced a groan. He realized then that he was stripped to his under-tunic; his blackened plate and scale mail were gone.
"My armor... my sword," he rasped, his amber eyes searching the space.
"In the corner, under the tarp," she replied, taking a deliberate bite of bread. "You were too heavy to move otherwise. I had to see if you were bleeding out. You’re covered in bruises, but your armor held."
Miklas stared at her, a wry smirk breaking through the grime on his face despite the pain. "You stripped a Knight-Mage? I usually expect a lady to buy me dinner first, sweetheart, but I suppose an apocalypse speeds things up."
The girl didn’t blush or look away. She just stared, and Miklas felt a chill. Her eyes were hollow, carrying a darkness he only ever saw in the mirrors of veteran barracks. His smirk vanished.
"Who are you?" he asked, pushing onto his elbows. "Any other survivors? My men... did anyone else make it?"
"I am Elvit," she said flatly. "And no. Everyone is dead. The militia, the villagers, my parents. It’s just us and a mountain of rotting meat outside." She offered him a piece of bread. "Eat. You seams to have lost a lot of energy"
He hides behind jokes. A classic coping mechanism for trauma.
I watched him process the news. I’d seen leaders like him before—charismatic men who used humor as a shield for their squad. But when the squad is gone, that shield becomes a cage of guilt. His eyes darkened, and his jaw clenched so hard I thought his teeth might break.
"Watch your tone, child," he snapped, a flash of temper in his voice. "Five hundred good men died defending your mud hut. Don’t speak of them that way."
I didn’t flinch, my hand resting on the axe handle against my leg. I had a splint on my ankle, but I was still crippled. I was a teenager in a graveyard, and this man, even exhausted, was my only protector. I needed him functional.
I need a protector. He needs a purpose to snap him out of his suicidal depression. Symbiosis.
"I respect the dead, Captain," I said coldly. "But respect won’t stop the scavengers or the barbarian rear guard. You need to eat."
The anger drained from him, replaced by a weary sadness. His survival instinct won out. He reached out with a trembling, scarred hand and devoured the food in three bites. Whatever magic he had used must have left him with a massive caloric deficit.
"Slow down, or you’ll lose it," I warned, passing him a waterskin.
He drank greedily and then studied me. He was in his thirties, rugged and handsome in a way that suggested a wealthy manor. But it was the seal on his neck—the geometric triangles and the single dot—that drew me in. It looked ancient and dangerous.
"You said your name is Elvit," he said, a hint of his high-class accent returning. "I am Captain Miklas of the 7th Legion. I owe you a debt."
Captain of the 7th Legion. He’s the real deal.
"Don’t thank me yet," I replied, leaning back against the debris. "We’re in a graveyard and I can’t walk. My survival depends on your sword arm. I just hope you will bring me wherever you will go next , I have noting here anymore"
He nodded slowly. "Something managed to scare the tribes. They came as a horde—over ten thousand. They didn’t come to conquer; they came to break through. They were desperate."
Ten thousand. The numbers were staggering. Five hundred veterans against ten thousand. It was a human wave. The cohort never stood a chance.
"My men held for six hours," Miklas continued, his voice trembling. "I reached Bud Burst and called down lightning until my Ember died. But there were always more. The weight of them broke our formation. It was a slaughter." He looked at his hands. "I should have died with them."
"But you didn’t," I snapped. He needed grounding, not pity. "You’re alive. Guilt won’t bring them back. It won’t bring my parents back either."
He looked up, temper flaring again. "You’re incredibly cold for a child who just lost everything."
"I am not ,I just not to think about it," I corrected. "How did you end up on that mountain of bodies?"
Miklas rubbed his temples. "I fought to the center to draw them away. I must have collapsed when I burned out." He paused, looking at me. "Wait. If I was on top... how did you get me down?"
I pointed a thumb behind me. "I climbed up and saw you were still breathing."
"You carried me?" he asked, looking skeptically at my slender arms and splinted leg.
"Don’t be silly," I snorted. "You weigh as much as a horse. I pushed you off the edge and you rolled down. Then I spent an hour dragging you onto a cart."
Miklas stared in stunned silence. Then, a booming, shameless laugh escaped him, sounding entirely out of place in a graveyard. "You... you pushed a Knight-Mage off a pile of corpses and rolled him like a log?!"
"Gravity did the work," I replied deadpan. "You’re welcome. Try not to complain about the extra bruises."
He shook his head, amusement in his eyes. "You are a terrifying creature, Elvit. Truly." He let out a long breath. "What is our situation?."
I nodded, shifting my leg. "The horde moved on. They took the food and steel and left the dead. No scavengers yet, but tomorrow the smell will attract every predator for miles. If we stay, we die."
"And the scavengers?"
"None yet. But tomorrow will be different. Disease and predators will follow." I pointed at my leg. "I can’t walk, and your magic is gone. We have to go."
Miklas shifted into commander mode. "My circuit is drained. It will take days of meditation for my Ember to ignite. I’m relying on physical strength alone." He looked at my leg. "We need to reach the district capital. It’s a week’s march for us. We need a cart and provisions."
"I have the cart and five days of rations," I said. "I also have your sword and some daggers."
Miklas looked at me with pure incredulity. "Is there anything you haven’t prepared for?"
"I didn’t prepare for an axe in my mother’s neck," I said coldly, the memory of the thud and the blood flashing back. "I didn’t prepare for an arrow in my father’s throat."
A heavy silence followed, broken only by the crackling fire.
Miklas looked at me with genuine pity, the arrogant noble gone. I didn’t want his pity; I wanted his sword.
"I am sorry, Elvit," he said softly.
"Don’t be," I replied, watching the flames. "Just help me survive. We’re both ghosts now, Miklas. Let’s make sure we don’t join the rest of the corpses."
Miklas sat up, gritting his teeth, and placed a hand on my shoulder.
"We won’t," he swore, his eyes burning with determination. "I failed my cohort and your village. But I will not fail you. We leave at light."