Story Title :- idle guy
Chapter 15: Ashes and Echoes
Smoke curled into the early morning sky, rising from the blackened remains of the battlefield. The scorched earth hissed beneath Kael's boots as he stepped over the fallen, the remnants of the Dawnfire lying scattered like broken dreams across the wasteland. Lira trailed behind him, her cloak torn and streaked with blood—some of it hers, much of it not.
They had won. But it didn’t feel like victory.
The silence was unbearable.
“This place…” Lira muttered, voice low. “It feels wrong.”
Kael said nothing. His mind was still reeling. Killing the Dawnfire leader had drained something from him. Not just physically—but something deeper. He could feel the shift within him, like a puzzle piece had locked into place. Something old. Something terrifying.
The Crown of Veyrin now rested in his pack, humming with energy. He could feel its pulse through the leather, as if it had a heartbeat of its own. The Nullsong Blade had gone dormant again, its hunger satisfied for now. But Kael couldn’t shake the feeling that both relics were merely biding their time.
“Lira,” he said finally, “we need to leave. This place isn’t safe.”
She nodded, glancing toward the distant mountains. “We still have to find the Spire.”
The Spire of Ages—where legend said the truth of the Rift would be revealed, and perhaps even the key to sealing it forever. But the journey there would not be simple. The Dawnfire had stalled them. And even in death, the cult’s influence still lingered.
The Message in the Flames
As they prepared to leave, a tremor shook the ground. Kael spun, blade drawn—only to see a pillar of dark fire erupt from the corpse of the Dawnfire leader. Lira screamed as she was flung back, her body rolling across the blackened soil.
Kael ran to her, shielding her as the fire twisted upward, forming into a ghostly apparition—a burning silhouette that hovered in the smoke.
“You think you’ve won?” the voice hissed, deep and echoing. “This was only a test.”
The figure’s form sharpened, revealing the leader’s face, his features now skeletal, eyes glowing like coals.
“You carry the Crown, Kael Veyrin. You carry the curse. The Rift sees you. The Rift wants you.”
Kael stared defiantly. “You’re dead. Stay that way.”
The ghost-lord sneered. “I am the first of many. The Rift’s guardians are awakening. The true power—your power—is bound to it. You cannot fight your nature. You were born from shadow.”
And with that, the flame erupted one final time—and vanished.
Kael helped Lira to her feet. She was pale, breathing hard, but alive.
“That wasn’t just some dying curse,” she said, brushing ash from her face. “It was a warning.”
Kael nodded, staring into the horizon. “Then we better start listening.”
Road to the Spire
Days passed.
Kael and Lira moved through forgotten ruins and ancient trails, the sky above them darkening each night, as if the Rift's influence was spreading. People whispered of strange lights in the sky, of disappearances, of nightmares bleeding into reality.
Kael began seeing things.
Flashes of the past—memories that weren’t his. A boy standing before a throne of obsidian. A woman with eyes like suns. A war fought in silence, beneath the skin of the world. Each vision left him reeling, as if the Rift was unspooling threads from his mind.
Lira noticed. “The Crown is speaking to you.”
“It’s more than that,” Kael murmured. “It’s showing me things… Things I don’t understand.”
One night, he dreamt of the Spire—tall, silver, floating above the clouds. Chains wrapped around its base, glowing with runes. And atop it, a throne of mirrors. A figure sat upon it… waiting.
Kael woke in a cold sweat.
The Riftwalker’s Arrival
They reached the ruins of Velmor on the fifth night—a ghost town devoured by time. But it wasn’t empty.
Waiting at the edge of the stone gate was a cloaked figure with silver hair, eyes like voids, and skin that shimmered like glass. A Riftwalker.
Kael froze. He had only read of them in legend—those touched by the Rift but unclaimed by it. Beings both alive and not. The figure stepped forward, and time itself seemed to ripple.
“You bear the Crown,” the Riftwalker said in a voice like wind through metal. “And yet you still breathe. Curious.”
Kael drew his blade, but the Riftwalker raised a single hand.
“I am not here to kill you. I am here to test you.”
Without warning, the world around them shifted. The ground cracked, trees dissolved into dust, and Kael found himself on a floating platform in a void of stars. Lira was gone. The Riftwalker stood across from him, wielding a blade of pure starlight.
“Prove you are worthy,” they said.
End of Chapter 15
