The cave was empty.Tellen was gone. The fire, only ash. And outside, the storm had passed, leaving the mountains sheathed in frost and silence.
But Arjuna remembered the voice in the night.
"You are waking too soon, knight. Go back to sleep."
He did not sleep.
He walked.
At noon, the clouds parted, and far below, in a bowl-shaped valley, he saw it.Ashwood Hold.
A fortress swallowed by forest, half-sunken into the earth. Crumbling spires jutted out like snapped ribs. Trees had grown through battlements. Crows circled the tallest tower like it still bled.
Arjuna's breath caught. He knew this place.
Not from memory.But from a song.
"Where the knight waits, heart locked in steel,He bleeds not once, but thrice to feel."
Tellen had sung it the day before. Arjuna hadn't asked—but he remembered the name: Ser Thorne.
As he stepped into the ruin, time… bent.
Shadows didn't fall where they should. The sun blinked. The wind whispered names that hadn't been spoken in a thousand years.
A rusted bell tolled. Then silence.
Then footsteps.
He drew the sword from his back. The cloth peeled away like old skin. The blade shimmered faintly, unnaturally—its edge still sharp, its purpose forgotten.
Something moved in the old courtyard.
A knight in silvered black armor stood beneath a dead tree. Motionless. Towering.
His helm bore antlers. His gauntlets were clawed. And across his chest, runes pulsed—markings Arjuna didn't recognize… and somehow knew.
The knight spoke without turning.
"Do you remember me, Arjuna?"
His voice was hollow. Empty.
"I don't," Arjuna said softly.
The knight turned.
His faceplate was cracked. Beneath it, no flesh—only darkness, and a faint red glow where a heart should be.
"I am Thorne. The last of your brothers. You swore to bury me. You failed."
Arjuna took a step forward.
"You are dead."
"No," Thorne replied. "I am what your memory left behind."
He unsheathed his sword.
Arjuna's breath caught. The weapon was nearly identical to his own—same forge lines, same ember-glow along the fuller.
A twin blade.
"How…?"
"We were made together," Thorne said. "You and I. Blades forged by gods. Bound by oath."
Arjuna hesitated.
"Then why fight?"
Thorne's voice cracked.
"Because I can't stop."
The battle began in silence.
Thorne moved like shadow on steel. No war cry, no rage—only relentless precision.
Each blow rang with old grief. Arjuna blocked. Dodged. Countered. The swords sang a mirrored song.
Wind screamed through the ruins. Trees shuddered.
The red cloth on Arjuna's hilt fluttered like flame.
Then Thorne struck low—and Arjuna felt it: the crack of bone. His left shoulder tore.
He dropped to one knee.
Thorne raised his blade.
"This is mercy," he said. "To forget. As I did."
Arjuna clenched his fist.
"I don't want to forget anymore."
And he drove his sword not into Thorne's body—but into the cracked stone behind him.
The blow pierced the old altar.
A scream echoed through the ruin—not Thorne's voice, but a woman's.
The heart, hidden beneath the shrine, shattered.
Thorne staggered. His sword fell.
His helm cracked apart. Light spilled from within.
He laughed. A strange, hollow sound.
"I remember now... You smiled. Once. In the rain. That was… real."
He fell.
Arjuna stood over his fallen brother-in-arms.
There was no blood. Only ash where Thorne lay. Only a memory.
But beside the ashes, something glinted.
A medallion. Inside: two names carved in ancient script.
One was Thorne.The other… Arjuna.
The sky darkened.
Above, storm clouds gathered again.
And far off—in a place Arjuna could not see—a woman sat in a tower of bone and fire.
She opened her eyes.
"He awakens."
Nyssara, Demon Queen of the Black Star, rose from her throne.
And began to walk.