Drillohiem
Drillohiem ran.
He didn't remember when he started running, only that he had to keep going. His legs burned, his breaths rasped, and his heart hammered like a trapped thing inside his chest. He ran as though the ground beneath him might swallow him whole if he dared to stop, though the ground was smooth—too smooth—like polished glass stretching endlessly in every direction.
And behind him, always behind him, were the green beings.
Not walking. Not sprinting.
Simply… following.
Sliding across the ground with an eerie, deliberate grace—silent except for the faint whisper of their presence, like cloth brushing against stone.
"What are these beings…?" Drillohiem whispered, slipping the words between gasps of breath. He kept his voice low, terrified that anything louder would snap the thin thread of distance between him and them. "What are you?"
The green beings did not answer. They never did.
They only followed.
He had seen them touch a wandering soul once—only once—and the memory still clawed at the edges of his mind. The victim's skin had turned pale, then translucent, and then… then gone. Not melted. Not shattered. Gone, as though erased from existence. No sound. No resistance. No farewell.
Drillohiem refused to let that be him.
He pushed his legs harder, though each movement felt heavier than the last. The smooth ground seemed to drag at him, gripping his ankles, resisting him with every step. It reminded him, horribly, of a recurring nightmare from his childhood: running toward safety he could see but never reach, his legs moving as though submerged in mud while monsters crept closer.
That nightmare had left him screaming in the night.
Now, he was living it.
His breaths turned sharp and shallow. Sweat streamed down his temples. His vision blurred at the edges, and every instinct screamed that he would collapse at any moment—and then they would take him.
Just as his body began to falter, a door appeared in the nothingness ahead of him.
A door with no frame.
No hinge.
No wall.
Just an impossible door in an impossible place, suspended in the empty plane like a single, stubborn thought.
Drillohiem didn't question it. Didn't doubt it.
He lunged.
His shoulder slammed into the door, it burst open, and he tumbled inside. As soon as he cleared the threshold he spun back and threw the door shut. Then he collapsed against it, his entire body trembling.
The cool surface soothed his fevered skin. His chest rose and fell in frantic heaves. Sweat dripped down his jaw, and for a long stretch of time he did nothing but breathe, the remnants of panic still quivering through him.
He didn't dare look around.
Didn't care what was in the room.
At that moment, all that mattered was the cold, blessed solidity of the door pressed against his spine.
At last, his breathing began to level out.
Until he heard it.
A throat clearing.
A chair shifting.
Soft whispers, like dried leaves brushing across stone.
His eyes snapped open.
The pain of instinct old as blood surged through him—his hand flew to Oathbreaker as he turned around.
A large round table sat at the center of the room.
Around it, seated calmly and watching him with patient, luminous eyes, were the green creatures.
But not the same as the ones that had chased him.
These were sharper in form, their outlines grounded instead of blurred. Where the others drifted, these sat with posture—purposeful, attentive. And none of them reached toward him.
"Drillohiem," one said in a voice that vibrated more than it sounded, ancient and unmistakably aware. "Come. Sit. We have much to discuss."
Drillohiem didn't move toward them. He stepped back, reaching for the door behind him.
But his fingers grasped nothing.
The door was gone.
He turned sharply. Where the door once stood was only empty air, rippling slightly like disturbed water.
"We removed the door for now," another said, its tone maddeningly calm. "It will return once our meeting has concluded."
Drillohiem swallowed hard.
He wasn't sure if he was trapped… or chosen.
---
Cassandra
Cassandra stood alone on the practice field.
The sun touched her face for the first time in weeks, a touch she once loved—a warmth she once took pride in basking under. Now it felt like judgmental fingers peeling back layers she would rather keep hidden.
Her wings cast long, black shadows on the ground. Once she carried them with a regal pride. Now they felt heavy, almost burdensome.
She raised her sword slowly.
Her hand trembled.
Not from fear—at least she told herself not fear—but from the weakness gnawing at her bones. Weeks confined to her room. Weeks refusing food, refusing water, refusing life. The confrontation with Grall had shattered more than her body; it had cracked her spirit down the middle.
She had been the Black-Winged Beauty of Xeno-Movia.
The pride of the Altains.
The blade in the sky.
But that was before Grall.
Cassandra exhaled shakily and adjusted her stance. Her fingers clenched around the hilt, though they felt stiff, foreign. Her skin—once immaculate and pale as fresh snow—had thinned and sagged, leaving a faint bluish tint she would never have allowed before.
No one said a word about her appearance.
They knew better.
She would have retreated again, vanished behind locked doors and darkness.
She already knew.
Her soldiers watched from afar, pretending not to.
Fearful of her.
Fearful for her.
She swung at the training dummy.
Her blade scraped across its wooden surface with a dull sound, lacking the sharpness of her former force. The moment the sword struck, pain shot up her arm, biting deep into her shoulder. She winced, the sound slipping through clenched teeth.
Cassandra lowered the blade, taking steadying breaths.
How pathetic she had become.
She should have died that day. Grall should have killed her.
Tyril had ruined that.
Saved her, he said.
Saved her?
For what?
"Damn you," she whispered, her voice brittle with bitterness. "Damn you, Tyril."
She squeezed her eyes shut, fighting tears—not from sorrow, but from rage and shame. She couldn't even swing a blade without pain. She couldn't lead her people. She couldn't look at herself without seeing weakness dripping from every pore.
But one thing remained:
She would die on her own terms.
Not as Grall intended—broken, humiliated, sobbing on the ground like a fallen child—but as Cassandra of the Black Wings. Sword held high. Pride intact.
Even if it killed her to lift the blade.
She struck the dummy again.
This time, she didn't wince.
---
Jaxale
The sky above the empty field was heavy, a deep gray that signaled another snowstorm preparing to descend on the land. Dronde flew low, wings slicing through the frigid air before landing with a thud that sent powdery crystals rising around them.
Jaxale slid off the creature's back, boots crunching noisily in the fresh snow. He glanced around the wide barren expanse, his brows drawn tight.
"This is it," he murmured, though doubt tugged at his voice. "The place he was last seen."
His breath hung in the air like a fragile cloud.
He didn't want to be right.
He didn't want to find what he knew they would.
Dronde snorted, lowering his head to sniff the snow. His irritation radiated off him in waves—wings twitching, talons digging into the earth. He already knew.
"I know…" Jaxale sighed, rubbing a hand down Dronde's scaled neck. "But we have to hope. Even if he's gone, even if… there's nothing left of him…"
He paused.
The truth weighed heavily on his tongue.
"…we must at least bring his body home. His family deserves closure."
Dronde huffed again and swept his tail through the snow, clearing a wide arc of ground.
Something dark and solid tumbled out from beneath the snow.
Jaxale's heart lurched.
He approached slowly, the crunch of snow deafening in the heavy silence. When he saw the small shape lying crumpled on the cleared earth, he stopped cold.
A boy. No older than ten.
Skin tinted faintly green beneath the blue chill of death.
Frozen.
Preserved.
Jaxale knelt beside him.
One of the young ones who hadn't made it to the portal. One who had fled the chaos, trying desperately to survive while the world around him tore itself apart under Grall's rampage.
He lived long enough to escape the monsters…
Only to succumb to the cold.
Jaxale closed his eyes and bowed his head.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
He lifted the child gently, cradling him as though afraid the boy might still feel pain.
"We take him home. His mother… she deserves to mourn him properly."
Dronde lowered his head in solemn agreement.
And together, they turned back.
---
Fluffles
Fluffles awoke with a jolt.
Not from a nightmare—though he had many—but from a presence standing over him. He felt it before he saw it: a weight in the air, heavy and suffocating.
Xierma.
His queen.
He scrambled off his sleeping cot and threw himself to the floor so quickly his forehead struck the stone. He didn't dare lift his head. His entire body shook, both from the lingering hunger and the tension coiling inside him like a spring.
Xierma's eyes burned with fury.
"You defied my orders," she said quietly, though her voice echoed with the force of a shout. "I commanded you to kill Grall's son."
Fluffles pressed his forehead harder into the ground.
"Yes, my queen."
"Why?"
He swallowed. His jaw ached. His skull throbbed.
She knew why. She wanted to hear him speak the words, to force him to confess aloud the betrayal she already believed he carried like a disease.
"I cannot break my oath to my master—"
"Oath?" Like a whip crack, her voice sliced the air. "You made an oath to me. To your queen."
He had. He couldn't deny it.
But the life-oath he swore to Grall transcended death, transcended thrones, transcended all logic. It bound him. Defined him. He could no more break it than he could rip his own soul apart.
But he could not say that.
Not if he wished to avoid starvation.
He remembered too vividly the hunger that had once broken him—turning him into a mindless beast that tore through fifty men before he regained himself. If Xierma starved him again, she would release that monster intentionally… pointed straight at Drillohiem.
He could not allow that.
"My queen," Fluffles whispered, choosing each word carefully, "my oath to you encompasses all matters that do not involve Grall or his bloodline. I cannot break the life-oath. Even… even under threat of death."
Xierma studied him.
Her thoughts were loud. Too loud. He could feel them in the air—rage, suspicion, fear, and something darker, something twisted at the root.
"If you wish to punish me," Fluffles continued, "I accept it. But I beg you—do not harm the boy. He is innocent. He may yet serve you… and Lord Grodak."
Xierma's eyes narrowed.
Then widened.
Then narrowed again.
A battle waged behind them.
She hated Grall.
Feared him.
Feared his bloodline.
Feared what they might become.
But Drillohiem might be a weapon. A tool. A pawn. Something useful if handled correctly.
"You may be right," she said slowly. "He might be of value."
Fluffles exhaled in quiet relief.
But her next words froze him solid.
"However, if he proves otherwise… you will kill him."
Fluffles lifted his head, mouth opening in instinctive protest—
Then he froze.
There was madness in her eyes.
Not anger.
Not frustration.
Madness.
The same madness that once consumed Grall.
Fluffles lowered his head.
"As you wish, my queen."
---
Xierma
The castle hallways felt colder than usual, though torches burned along every wall. Xierma walked slowly, each step measured, her mind replaying her conversation with Fluffles.
Everyone misunderstood her.
They believed she hated Grall.
Believed she feared him because of some ancient rivalry.
Believed she wanted to erase his lineage from the world out of bitterness.
They were wrong.
Xierma didn't hate Grall.
She never had.
Fear was the truth.
A fear woven deep into her bones, since the day she first witnessed the devastation he could conjure. A fear of the power he wielded, the chaos he embodied, the unpredictability that always accompanied him like a second shadow.
But deeper than that...
She feared what his presence would do to Grodak.
Grodak—the man she loved more than the crown, more than her kingdom, more than herself.
Grodak, who would always run toward danger to shield her.
Grodak, whose life she valued far more than her own.
If Grall returned, Grodak would confront him. He always would.
And Grall… Grall would not hesitate.
Her steps slowed as she approached a window overlooking the city below.
Her memories began to stir.
She saw Grall again in her mind—laughing as Cassandra collapsed, wings trembling, tears streaming down her cheeks. He had toyed with Tyril, tearing the mighty warrior apart with barely a flicker of effort. He had been unstoppable, unreasoning, monstrous.
No.
Not monstrous.
Transcendent.
Something beyond understanding.
Beyond mortality.
She remembered shielding a group of civilians when Grall appeared out of nothing. His presence alone nearly forced her to her knees. She had felt the air vibrate, trembling under the pressure of his existence.
Then—
"Xierma."
She had nearly screamed.
Grodak appeared behind her, face grim.
"Grodak," she whispered, trembling. "He's turned. He means to kill everyone."
Grodak's jaw tightened.
He knew.
She could see it in his eyes—the acceptance. The resolve. The quiet, unshakable certainty that he would give his life if necessary.
"Don't," she pleaded, barely breathing. "You can't fight him. Look at what he's done to the others. You'll die."
Grodak cupped her face, thumb brushing her cheek with heartbreaking gentleness.
"If death is the price I must pay to protect you," he whispered, "then it is a price I would pay a thousand times."
She hadn't watched the battle.
Couldn't.
Her heart wouldn't survive it.
When she later learned Grodak lived, she swore she would never allow Grall to return.
Never.
Not even through his offspring.
---
Drillohiem
Drillohiem sat at the round table, head buried in his hands. Everything the green specters—Harbingers—told him twisted the foundations of everything he believed.
Harbingers were myths.
Stories.
Legends whispered by scholars too drunk or too hopeful to recognize nonsense.
Yet here they were.
"I thought the Harbingers were just stories," Drillohiem muttered, rubbing his temples. His voice cracked under the weight of too much knowledge too fast.
"No," said Jason—the eldest among them, the one whose presence filled the air with the gravity of centuries. "We are older than this cycle. Older than the worlds. We walked beside the Source as the first cycles were formed."
Drillohiem swallowed.
Jason continued, "The Source tasked us with protecting this cycle from ending prematurely, as so many others have before it. And when the Reaper threatened to trigger the rebirth algorithm, we acted."
"Yes," Drillohiem murmured. "You used my uncle to kill my father."
Jason's eyes softened—not with pity, but with respect.
"We did not kill Grall."
Drillohiem looked up sharply.
Jason leaned forward.
"Grall fought the Reaper from within. Battled it. Contained it. He ended the rampage. He prevented the rebirth."
Drillohiem froze in place.
His father… saved the world?
That clashed with everything he'd been told. Everything he'd believed. Everything the stories claimed.
"So is that why I'm here?" Drillohiem asked, voice strained. "Because of him?"
"No."
Drillohiem slammed his hands on the table and stood abruptly, knocking his chair over. "Then why?! Why drag me here? Why chase me? Why any of this?"
Jason blinked.
"We did not bring you here."
Drillohiem stared.
Jason continued, voice gentle, patient.
"You did not choose to come to this place. But another did."
Drillohiem's breath hitched.
"Who?"
Jason smiled faintly, like someone revealing a truth long overdue.
"Talengar," he said. "Your first life."