The nights had grown longer since the descent into Hal'kareth. Even as the Ashen Gale cut through warm southern waters, Raizen felt an icy dread that clung to him like salt in his veins. Sleep no longer offered rest — only visions. Screaming skies. A throne of light. And a shadow that always ended with his own reflection, burning from within.
It began with a whisper. Then the voice.
"You are the lock… and the key."
—
Zuri found him again on the deck before dawn, fists clenched, sweat matting his hair to his face. He stood shirtless under the stars, staring at a long, thin scar across his chest that pulsed faintly with crimson light. It hadn't been there before.
"I saw it again," he muttered. "The Throne. But this time… someone else was sitting on it."
She approached carefully. "Who?"
He turned to her, voice hollow. "Me."
—
Back below deck, Verrigan ran tests with what remained of the crystal shard retrieved in Hal'kareth. When placed near Raizen, the shard flickered violently — then cracked.
"It's reacting to something inside you," the scientist said grimly. "Something buried."
With the help of Kaidan — the crew's mystic navigator who once trained with the monks of Lu'Ten — they performed a ritual of spirit recall. Anchored in candlelight and inked runes, Raizen was guided deep into his own consciousness.
There, behind memory and mind, they found it.
A seal. Carved in ethereal chains. Glowing with ancient fire.
Bound to his soul.
—
As Raizen approached the spectral seal in this inner realm, a ghostly figure emerged: a man cloaked in obsidian robes, his face eerily similar to Raizen's own — older, scarred, broken.
"I am Velkar," the apparition said. "Your blood… your burden."
Raizen couldn't speak — the weight of the presence pressed against his lungs.
Velkar continued, "I sealed the Gift… and the Curse… within our line. For generations it slept, waiting for one strong enough to shatter fate. You were never meant to awaken it. Yet the world demands too much."
Raizen took a step forward. "What is it?"
"A weapon. A will. A truth so powerful it reshapes reality — or destroys it. The Hollow Throne was born from it… and shattered by it. I chose suppression over annihilation. You must now choose."
—
With Kaidan's help, Raizen returned to his body — drenched in sweat, heart pounding.
"I saw my ancestor," he told the crew. "He sealed something in me — something linked to the same power that broke the Throne."
Verrigan spoke quietly. "A power strong enough to rewrite the world… or erase it."
Zuri frowned. "Can you control it?"
Raizen looked down at the pulsing scar on his chest — the mark of inheritance.
"I don't know," he whispered. "But I don't think I'm meant to."
—
That night, alone in his quarters, Raizen traced the seal with his fingers.
He had fought tyrants, warlords, inquisitors… but this was different.
This was the enemy within — and it bore his name.
And somewhere, deep within the corridors of power, those who watched from the shadows began to move.
Because the Cursed Inheritance had awakened.
And its bearer had just learned the truth.
END OF THE CHAPTER9