Whatever Thalmyr did—this spell—exiled the gods from our lands, leaving us to our wars, our suffering, our slow unraveling beneath power-hungry hands.A godless realm.
Thalmyr. He just stands there. Breathing heavy. Smiling.
A basin behind him begins to glow—fed by the tether he carved between realms. Their essence flows through it like leashed light, channeled from exile to empire.
I’m panting. Unable to center myself amongst the visions. I clutch my chest as if my hands can relieve the pressure there.
But before I can even take another breath, the vision fractures.
Light rips apart and reforms as stone walls emerge once more, but this time the chamber is not vast and ceremonial like before—it’s jagged, damp, and ancient. Hidden. It feels buried beneath years of dust and blood.
Dark iron torches flicker with green flame.
An altar sits at the center of the room, and around it, chalked in crimson sigils and carved bone, is a summoning circle.
A man kneels at its heart.
He’s older, cloaked in royal navy trimmed with silver, a faint crown glinting in his golden brown hair. He looks familiar—his profile stern and shadowed, strong and noble.
Kael.
No... not Kael.
This is his father.
King Aurius.
I watch as he reaches into a small iron bowl and paints three lines of blood across the stone. His voice trembles as he chants, not with fear, but desperation.
“God of Endings. Guardian of the Final Gate. Morrathys, hear me. I do not summon you to command, only to beg. Spare my people. Break your curse. Return balance to Zerynthia.”
The shadows swell.
A second man steps into the circle, silent until now. He bears Aurius’s face—sharper, crueler. A brother.
They exchange no words, only a knowing look.
Then the circle ignites.
The runes flare green and black, and the altar shakes with power. A shape unfurls in the shadows. Ancient and beautiful—terribly so.
Morrathys. The tenth god.
Skin like moonlight, smooth and pale, stretched over a frame too tall, too still. Hair as dark as a raven’s wing falls around his shoulders, and his eyes—gods, his eyes—are fathomless pools of night.
He does not walk—hedescends. Graceful and slow.
“I am not yours to summon,” Morrathys grits out, voice like breaking stone. “But I have watched. And I have listened. And now I have come.”
He steps into the circle. The torches snuff out.
The room holds its breath.
Aurius stands to speak again—but he is not given the chance.
The second man moves.
Steel flashes.
